At the world-renowned Science Museum on Tuesday 18th September, we welcomed 180 of the brightest STEM students on the network and 9 of the most innovative technology companies in the UK to Bright Network Future STEM Leaders 2018. This day was designed to give our members a unique opportunity to network with the best firms in the industry and to ask all the questions they had about a career in technology or engineering.
Our premier sponsor Citrix brought their Director of Product Management & Partner Engineering, David Cottingham, to educate our members on three hard problems in technology today. He shared his insights with our students about what he has gained from many years in the industry.
Next, attendees heard from three Bright Network alumni: Joseph Chimento from Accenture, Shaquilla Johnson from Atos and Chris Parkinson from Sky. They shared their stories on how they secured roles in this competitive sector and gave the students top tips on how to ace their applications.
The students then moved on to two hours of structured networking – their perfect chance to get all their questions answered and build their professional networks with representatives from all of our partner firms on the day including, Premier Sponsor Citrix, Accenture, Alfa, Atos, British Airways, Dyson, HSBC, Microsoft and P&G.
“I thoroughly enjoyed the Alumni session; hearing directly from graduates who were in our position not long ago provided truly brilliant professional guidance.” – Solomon, University of Oxford
“The structured networking was an amazing insight into all of the partner firms you teamed up with today; meeting amazing people and learning more about potential careers in technology and consulting was definitely the highlight of the day.” – Taiwo, Imperial Collage London
After the structured networking, the students were divided into groups of 8 and worked on a very interesting Case Study held by Citrix. During this one hour Case Study, students learned about the concept and process of whiteboarding, why it is an important skill to learn, and how to do it effectively.
We finished the day of with an Awards Ceremony where we rewarded Bright Network members who had achieved excellence. It was a lovely edition to the day to highlight the remarkable work of our students, and it was followed by some drinks and nibbles together with all the firms to explore one of the Science Museum galleries.