T w e n t y S i d e d

The other ten kids in this room are from all over the state of Pennsylvania, each of us representing a Vo-Tech school. We’ve met in the middle of the state, in this small shabby classroom, to find out which one is the better programmer.

It’s been a long road to get here. I’ve been captivated by computers since before I understood what they were. I’ve wanted to program them since the day I discovered such a thing was even possible. While the adults in my life have been cramming worksheets and busywork down my throat, I have been driven to pursue this body of knowledge. It’s been my focus and my passion for nearly my entire life. I bought my own machines. I taught myself the languages. I learned about the hardware on my own. This isn’t just a chance to win some medals or scholarships. This is a chance to validate everything I’ve been working towards. Not for everyone else, but for myself. I want to see how well I’ve educated myself.

This is a three-day event. The first day was spent travelling, and ended with some sort of general assembly to welcome us to the event and let us know how lucky we are to be here. Today we will compete. Tonight we will have another assembly where they will no doubt impress upon us something obvious and profound. “You Are The Future!” is a safe bet. Then there will be a dance. Tomorrow we will have another assembly, the winners will be announced, and then each of us will go home to our glory or shame.

I try not to think about the ride home. I need to keep my mind on this competition, which is off to a very strange start.

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Autoblography Part 28: VICA State”

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

Through Vo-Tech, I have become a member of the Vocational Industrial Clubs of America, which goes by the ugly and somewhat awkward name “VICA”. (In the late 1990’s, it will be renamed SkillsUSA.)

VICA holds a yearly competition for students of various vocations, where accolades and scholarships can be won by those who distinguish themselves by doing whatever it is they’re being trained to do. It works like this: Many high schools feed students into a single Vo-Tech building. Then many Vo-Tech chapters compete against each other for the district title. The winners of that contest go on to compete at the state level, and the winners at state will go on to compete nationally.

Each individual Vo-Tech instructor can select one of their students according to their own discretion. I imagine in most cases the teacher might have a test of some sort to find the best student, but I seem to be the runaway contender in all of Miss Shack’s classes. I suppose if another student expressed an interest in competing she would pit us against each other, but no such challenger appears. Having “won” at the local level by default, I will be representing our school at the district level.

I don’t want to repeat the folly of Seven Springs. I want to win this, if I can. This isn’t some generic “computer knowledge” test. This is the real thing. This is a test of programming skill and ability. This is a chance to validate everything I’ve been working for since I was a child. I’ve poured myself into this work, and I’m eager (and a little frightened) to see how all of that effort will pay off in real-world terms. It’s one thing to be the best in your class of twenty people. It’s quite another to be better than hundreds or thousands of other students. Certainly there are other Shamus-like kids out there? If there are, I’ll be facing them.

Having said that, I’m not sure how to prepare or train for this test. I already spend a lot of my leisure time programming. I’ve already explored the extremities of BASIC far beyond anything that might be taught in a classroom, on multiple machines, for over half a decade. There isn’t that much left for me to do or learn.

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Autoblography Part 27: VICA Regionals”

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

Way back on Nov 21, 2006, I posted a massive 8,000 word story covering the time I joined FBLA and competed at the state level in Computer Science. When I went back to re-tell the story of my entire high school career, I felt like this bit needed to be included in the chronology. But how to do it? Should I re-post the material? That would duplicate things and I’d end up with two different posts with the same content. The programmer in me does not like that solution. Should I shift the dates on the old entries to have them appear here in 2011, where they will fit into the continuity of the Autoblography? Do I take them down first? Should I change the titles so that they fit in the series? Hm.

In the end, I’ve decided to leave them as they were posted, and put links to them here.

Seven Springs, Part One: Naked Girls and A Hotel-Sized Prank

Seven Springs, Part Two: The Terrors of Room 102, and Lessons Learned

Now, for the comments: Those two posts already have long-dormant discussion threads, and I don’t want people responding to five-year-old comments, or double-posting in multiple places. So, if you want to leave a general comment about both entries, this post (the one you’re reading now) is the place to do it, particularly if you want other readers to see and respond to it. You’re free to leave comments on those old posts if you like, but I’ll probably be the only person to read them.

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.

And so I arrive at my senior year. I’m eighteen. I’ve always wondered what it would feel like to get to the end of all of this schooling. I remember what it was like to sit in first grade and look at the sixth-grade kids in awe. The lofty seat of sixth grade is now six years behind me. Have I really been in school for twelve years? Adult life is just a few steps away.

I’ve managed to wiggle my way into a few computer courses at the high school. Based on my success at Vo-Tech, I was able to convince my guidance counselor to waive the normal mathematical prerequisites and let me near some computers.

In the mornings I have a computer-aided drafting class. It’s fun and interesting, but I can tell drafting isn’t for me. I had a traditional drafting class back in junior high, and I thought the work was a bit too fussy. I completely understood the need for extreme neatness, precision, and adherence to a large collection of seemingly pedantic rules, but I could see it wasn’t something I would enjoy doing. Computer-aided drafting offloads a lot of the worst aspects of the work onto the computer, but it’s still a bit too rigid for my tastes. Still, the idea of constructing solid objects in 3D space is really interesting and I wouldn’t mind doing it for fun.

Continue reading ⟩⟩ “Autoblography Part 25: The Beginning of the End”

Shamus Young is a programmer, an author, and nearly a composer. He works on this site full time. If you'd like to support him, you can do so via Patreon or PayPal.