I chose to find my placement myself, even though my school had offered alternatives. I was glad of the time I put into researching suitable companies.
This wasn’t the typical type of work experience; there was no making tea or moments of boredom! I was always kept occupied with several exciting tasks such as searching for a suitable WordPress theme for one of their websites and learning a programming language that was fairly unknown to me, HTML. In addition to working inside the office, I had the opportunity to attend some events over the week. For example, the majority of my first day was spent at a bake sale fundraiser at a company called Bluewolf where I was able to talk to staff about their experience in the tech industry.
Another exciting event I was lucky enough to attend was the Computer Weekly’s Top 50 Most Influential Women in IT conference. The talks I listened to there on diversity and inclusion and the issues discussed were eye-opening and certainly very intriguing. Also, it gave me an insight into the IT industry and an idea of some of the careers that can be ascertained from studying STEM subjects.
Moreover, my week was enriched by the Stemette team’s approachability and welcoming attitude which put me at ease and allowed me to ask for help when problems arose. I felt part of the team! I enjoyed my work experience thoroughly, I left feeling inspired, accompanied by new skills that would aid me in whatever I choose to do such as HTML coding. I would recommend work experience at Stemettes to anyone who has an interest in a STEM subject or would like to see what the industry is all about.
This article was written by Caitlin, 15, who is studying for her GCSEs and has chosen Computer Science and Triple Science as part of her options. She spent a week doing work experience with the Stemettes team in June 2016.
If you would like to spend a week with the Stemettes, email a copy of your CV to team@stemettes.org and we’ll take it from there.
