Revision as of 16:58, 24 January 2014

Career Planning

• Description: An in-class exercise for students to think about the role of open source projects in their career planning.
• Source: Ben Coleman
• Prerequisite Knowledge: Sophomore standing and a declared major or minor in computer science.
• Estimate Time to Completion: 35 minutes
• Learning Objectives: Students will think about where they are in their learning and project where they can be by graduation.
• Materials/Environment: paper and pencil
• Additional Information: N/A
• Rights & Licensed: CC BY-SA FIXME check that this license is appropriate
• Turn In: None

Background

Many students do not stop to think about how they will get a job after graduation. They simply expect that having a degree in computer science will result in job offers. The goal of this exercise is to get students thinking about their future and the types of activities they can do as an undergraduate to make their resume and job application stand out.

Directions

1. (10 minutes) As a “Think, Pair, Share” exercise (see http://www.readingquest.org/strat/tps.html:
   • Describe the ideal candidate for an entry-level programming position.
   • What would the resume of such a candidate look like?
2. (10 minutes) Questions for class discussion:
   • What technologies would you list on your resume? What information do you intend to convey with this list? What can an employer conclude from such a list?
   • If thousands of students graduate each year with a degree in computer science, how can an employer differentiate between applicants?
   • Is it the responsibility of the school to prepare you for your career? What is your responsibility?
3. (5 minutes) Mini-lecture on open source projects
   • What it means to be open
   • Common technologies used (version control, etc.)
   • Online presence
4. (10 minutes) Class discussion:
   • How can participation in an open source project help differentiate you in a job candidate pool?
     • Real-world experience with the software development process
     • Experience using common tools
     • Experience with a large code base
     • Record of contrubutions