My job and my son

So, Friday, I had the opportunity to talk to my son's fifth grade class about my job and my career. I talked about what I do today (as manager of a team of people responsible for the knowledge infrastructure of my company) and also talked a bit about my career and my education. I stressed the importance of various aspects of my education (reading, writing and typing being key skills :-)).

The kids each had a form for the session that had several questions on it - when the kids started asking questions, I was thinking, "Gee, that's a good question!" and it took me a few questions before I realized they were getting them from the form and not their heads.

After chatting the night before with my son about the questions I expected - one of them being that I expected someone to ask me how much I made - it was, of course, my son that asked that question! The goofball! We'd joked at dinner the night before that I should answer, "I make one billion dollars!", so that the kids would go home and tell their parent, "You know how much Mr Romero makes!! He makes a billion dollars!" But, I just told them I make more than minimum wage and I make "enough".

Once the kids understood that I have (and do still, but very minimally these days) written computer programs in the past, they had a lot of questions about whether I could write a video game or not. I told them I theoretically could, but that it takes a lot (!) of work - way more than I have time to spend on or interest in.

Overall, it was a nice experience to meet my son's classmates (again, for most of them) and talk to them about jobs/careers and help get them interested in different things.