Ideas for gap year employment?

sbjdorlo
Sat, 03 Oct 2015 17:53:35 +0000

That’s really great, @mathmom! Your son sounds like he rocked it.

I like the idea of shadowing, but we don’t know anyone in the business. Many years ago, my sister worked in the game design field, but her contacts have scattered and none are nearby. He doesn’t mind teaching cello, but isn’t interested in teaching otherwise. He’s a true introvert, and his energy can wax and wane depending on the stability of his diabetes. As I said, his paid experience is all in cello.

He doesn’t have a lot of game experience. He’s taken two semesters of animation, and has created a few short animated videos (but nothing special). He can use 3dsMax, is learning Unity, has taken Java, can use RPG Maker, Alice, Scratch, Arduino, and has done two non-paid Beta Test jobs. He is exploring Python and likely C#, but needs to be more structured about them. I think that’s about it. He has excellent written communication skills. He interacts well with classmates, and will often take a leadership role in academic group settings.

He plays games a lot, but I don’t think he’s done team stuff. He plays League of Legends with a couple of friends. His personal favorite is LOTRO, which is what he’s done Beta Testing for. And he’s played probably a dozen other games. He’s a pretty avid gamer, but not over the top enough to make money playing.

He honestly isn’t sure games is it, but he wanted to investigate the possibility. He’s currently going in as a Fine Arts major to Penn, but has looked at the Cinema program with some interest, as well as a DMD minor. Even English is a slight possibilty for a major. He’s very confused and unsure of what he wants to do. He’s the classic dabbler and master of none except cello.

He wants to do something that will get him a secure job, but I think he needs to do what he enjoys. All we know is that he’s creative and imaginative, loves to write little stories and poems about his pencil and paper characters, and has shown interest in engineering, digital media, animation, game design, cinema, industrial design, and creative writing. He does not want to major in music. His cello will stay an EC and occasional source of income.

This morning, we found a number of seasonal jobs, so once he’s back from his cello lesson, he can put in some more applications.