Re: [seul-edu] Language to teach 10 year olds

[Michael Viron <mviron@wsdo.sao.uwf.edu>]

<huge snip>	
You're more
>apt to see self-taught languages as an asset than a liability.  It shows
>incentive on the part of the student, that they have the "right stuff".
<huge snip>
I would guess that "volunteer" positions and experience do the same things
for a college / university graduate, as doing home-learning of a
programming language does for a high school student.

It is very rare, especially with a full-load of classes, for a college
student to have the time to deal with an internship or coop or even a
part-time job for that matter.  This is why some, not all, choose
"volunteer" type experiences instead--they get to choose what they are
interested in and depending on the organization have much more say
concerning scheduling than they would otherwise.

Some employers are of the mindset that "volunteer" experience doesn't count
for anything.  Others really don't care whether the experience is volunteer
or not, just that you have it.

For example, for a short while I was the Web Development Team Leader
(Webmaster) for the Linux Professional Institute (http://www.lpi.org) in
1999--and it is a plus on my resume because of what I was working on and
who I was coordinating with (the Board of Directors and the Database
Administrator).

Several weeks ago, I was interviewed for a management position at the
University of Florida's Helpdesk (2 direct reports, co-supervision of 50-70
people), and the only reason I was interviewed is because I had several
years of volunteer experience in a position where I was managing 50
volunteer web developers--on the other hand, most corporate organizations
don't think I'm ready for management, because I have no *paid* management
experience.

Sorry to get so far off topic...

Michael