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Career Choices
Filed under: Big Kids, Work Life, Day Care & Education
When I was in high school, I had grand plans to become an electronics engineer. I was going to go to the University of Illinois for my undergraduate degree, followed by graduate work at MIT. I was going to design computers and robots and all manner of labor saving devices, much like the hero of Robert Heinlein's Door into Summer.Alas, a combination of bad grades and a lack of money meant I ended up at City College of San Francisco, studying computer programming; I've been doing that ever since. Still, that dream of designing nifty doohickeys has never really died. So it was with great personal joy that I greeted Jared's declaration of his intended career:
Jared: "I'm going to be an engineer when I grow up!"
Me (bursting with pride): "Really? Cool!"
Jared: "Yeah, I'm going to drive a train!"
You know that scene from You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown where Schroeder is playing the piano and Lucy is telling him how she's always dreamed of marrying a man who plays the piano? How he'd play something nice at parties like April Showers or Frere Jacques? And she ends it with a resigned "Beethoven's nice too"? That's how I felt. Trains are nice too.
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ReaderComments (Page 1 of 1)
2-16-2008 @ 1:40PM
Ethel said...It's a real choice, we know of two young men - one graduated and another about to graduate from high school who are trying to sign on with Burlington-Northern for the conductor training. The process is that you are a conductor, and after so many hours you get to be an engineer trainee and after completing so many hours of driving trains you are an engineer. Some conductors opt out of the engineer training, which I can understand - being a conductor is less responsibility, and we know of one young man who is about 22 years who has been an engineer for 4 (he did steam trains on his parent's line for a while before finishing high school). The pay for a full time engineer on a local line is about $50K/year, nationally more, without college loans.
You can do much worse, and they are in need of fresh engineers since the baby-boomers will be retiring the next two decades.
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2-16-2008 @ 2:14PM
Judy said...Maybe our sons will work together someday. My almost-4-year-old has been in love with trains since he could start expressing his likes and dislikes. He wants to be an engineer, too.
If he is doing what he really wants to do, and as long as he has a strong basic education (part of the reason we're homeschooling), then I'll encourage him to go for it! There are much worse things to be, and the important thing is for them to be happy and successful.
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2-22-2008 @ 10:49AM
Jan Bay said...Wouldn't it be nice to take a poll to see how many people stick to the career choices that they dreamed of as small children? If we find that they do it might be a good thing to expose them to the many possibilities and fields available or we'll have an overload of firemen and mailmen!
Jan from http://www.unique-baby-gear-ideas.com/
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