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What's it like to be in Career Village?

I have #autism. My life was very rough with it. I was struggling in #school all these years because I mad some of my #teachers mad in the past. All I want is to #graduate and go to #college so that I can get a #job. I have my #parents to support me. I sometimes like to dabble in #arts-and-crafts. When I enter college, I would like to enroll in #STEM. I know it may be hard, but I hope that when I #graduate, I would have the talent in a few #technology jobs like computer science.

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Subject: Career question for you

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Jo Ann’s Answer

Hi Callum,

My youngest son is also in the Autism spectrum and I I believe that even though you may face some unique challenges, you are capable of pursuing and achieving your dreams. My dad used to tell me that it is not a matter of ability, it is a matter on how hard you are willing to work for what you want. If you want to pursue a career in computer science, go for it!

There is a lot of career opportunities in the computer science field. It is a broad field. Web development is just one of the many opportunities. Web development does allow you to tap into your creative side as well.

Check out this website for more information on opportunities within the computer science field.
https://www.coursera.org/articles/computer-science-jobs-for-the-future


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Leo’s Answer

A few of us (not sure how many) are answering questions for free.

The staff behind CareerVillage.org is probably getting paid. If they are, then they are most likely going to be Software Engineers. So if you want to have a similar job (maintaining a web page/forum/etc), then yes, studying Computer Science would allow you to work in this area.
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Rudy’s Answer

Hi Callum

My daughter is combining her passion for Music with Computer science. Many colleges offer degrees where you can combine different fields.
Check out Northeastern University "Combined Majors" section - link provided below.

STEM can be challenging, but also very stimulating. Most colleges will accommodate learners and will provide a wide range of support options.
I imagine that working at CareerVillage with a combined/SW and Arts degree would be very interesting.

Hope this helps

Rudy recommends the following next steps:

https://www.northeastern.edu/admissions/academics/areas-of-study/_ga=2.163870783.1256455611.1621604703-1568550094.1617813947
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Mickael’s Answer

I guess that depends which side of careerVillage you are looking at.

If you are looking from our perspective (our means the professional answering questions) then I think it's great. It's great to be able to guide young people to find answers to their tough questions (I wish I had that opportunity). From us, we are just taking on our time.

If you are talking about developing the service, that mostly mean being a software developer or moderator. Since your summary is mentioning STEM and technology, I will stay focused on the software developer part.
Be a software developer, in CareerVillage or somewhere else means that you constantly have to check for feedback, develop the tool to meet the user's expectations and make sure your service remains available. There are also people who are managing the server where the code is running, depending on where your server is running. Some persons will also be more IT oriented, or devops oriented, providing the tools and infrastructures for the developers to write and test the software.

Computer science is broader than just developing applications and website like careervillage but that will be the thing to do.
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Joseph’s Answer

That depends what you mean by being "in Career Village".

I can see a few other answers have assumed you mean working for this website, CareerVillage. For being an employee there, you'd have to ask the staff. You can also look up employ reviews on websites like Glassdoor: https://www.glassdoor.co.uk/Reviews/CareerVillage-Reviews-E1398894.htm.

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Many/most of us professionals answering these questions are volunteers who don't work for CareerVillage directly. If the question means "What's it like to be a volunteer contributor here?", then it depends on what you want to get out of it. I personally love to contribute to helping people online like this. It's important to help and encourage the next generations, and doing so from an open and inclusive online platform means those from disadvantaged and minority backgrounds can access answers and guidance they otherwise might struggle to access, which I think is important in to deal with some of the problems of non-inclusiveness and biases that have led to monocultures of the same types of people in some industries (eg gender bias in STEM and elsewhere)
Like you, I also have an autism diagnosis, albeit on the higher-functioning end of the scale, and struggle with some of the more social ways people in industry outreach to help the next generations; but I find contributing online is a great way for me to give back.

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Maybe, however, by "being in Career Village", you're just saying "having a job" in a more flowery way?

In that case, it depends what you're working on, but if you can find a job that matches your skills and interests well, it's great, and although I think it's rare to ever totally shake off the fact that at the end of the day, you're working to earn money to pay the bills, if you can find something you enjoy doing, it's more than "just-a-job".

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Whatever the question was supposed to mean, as someone who also suffers with autism, and had many of the same struggles with teachers at school and other people that don't engage well with neuro-atypical folk like ourselves, you're certainly not alone in that. I see much of myself in you (even down to the dabbling in art and craft), and it sounds like you'll do excellently in a STEM field, so I wish you all the best.
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