Thread by @PaulDJohnston

Thread: My wife was at the supermarket today picking up some bits and pieces and she got chatting to the young guy at the checkout.

They had a chat...

He had decided after school not to go to University and had been working there for a couple of years but was excited now because he was about to go.

He'd looked at the options after school and seen it as something that wasn't for him. But having worked for two years he decided that the job options weren't that good so decided to look again.

He decided to look at what career he wanted and therefore the course and picked...

Software Engineering

He doesn't know that he is talking to my wife who knows a bit about software engineering and the business around it because it's paid for stuff like our mortgage for 20 years

But the way my wife recounts it, he's really excited. He's got a place at University on a 4 year course with a year in industry in year 3. His dream is to work for someone like @Google or @amazon as a software engineer.

This young man is working at a checkout. He's not privileged. He doesn't have rich parents. He's expecting to come out of University with debt.

And he's excited.

The area the store is in is in an area that would be classed as deprived, for many reasons including the shutting/reducing of the local railway works. The town was the first town purpose built for the railways in the world and the economics has changed it.

My immediate thought was "how can I help this kid?" But I don't know how his name and only the University he's going to and store he works at.

But maybe I thought, the store engineering team could help out!

So how about it @Tesco?

Oh and the store is in Wokverton

My wife talked for a short time at checkout with the young man and talked about the future.

I get really frustrated when in tech we have these "why not come and work for free with us?" schemes as they only work for those with the means to support themselves.

This young man will be unlikely to have that kind of support behind him given the area and the job he has.

I think we should all be more careful in thinking about the privilege we all have in this industry when we see the new people coming in.

We all started somewhere /Thread

Oh... And he's going to study at @dmuleicester if my wife heard correctly.

Good luck to him!