NEWS IN DETAIL...
Business students take part in 24 hour employment event
Cornwall College Camborne recently hosted an "Employ a Geek" event which is a 24 hour challenge to provide web based support to various companies run by developers and designers. The event ran from 6pm Friday night to 6pm Saturday night, with five of the 18 developers staying for the entire length of time.
The 24 hour ‘Geekathon' was held in the Opie building of Cornwall College Camborne which is the home of all Business and IT courses at the campus and so a fitting location for the event. Students from the foundation degree in Computing, Networking and Software Development took part in the event and helped to build a new website for the Sensory Trust charity, while at the same time learning a lot from industry insiders Mark Picken and Mark Grice, Employ a Geek directors.
Mark Grice said: "It has been an incredible 24 hours! Everyone who took part has worked really hard but had a lot of fun on the project."
Fellow Employ a Geek director, Mark Picken added: "We'd like to say a big thank you to Chris Jenkins and the team at Cornwall College for letting us use their great facilities and being on hand throughout the event to make sure everyone was okay."
Chris Jenkins, Programme Manager for FdSc Computing, Networking and Software Development, said: "This has been a wonderful opportunity for our students to experience working alongside the client, Sensory Trust, together with expert developers and programmers. It is not uncommon in the world of software development to work long hours to meet deadlines, so in all ways taking part in the ‘Geekathon' was a valuable learning experience and great fun!"
Daniel Neville, from Newquay, is currently studying the foundation degree Computing, Networking and Software Development and said: "This has been a valuable experience for us and we have all thoroughly enjoyed it, despite being quite tired at the end of the 24 hours."
The Sensory Trust is based in St Austell and makes places more accessible for people regardless of age, disability or background. During the 24 hours the team worked on a new micro-website for the charity as well as an internal intranet which helps organisations run more smoothly online.
Jane Stoneman from the Sensory Trust said: "This has been an amazing project; we were surprised to find that we were the chosen charity to be the focus of this event. The whole team have been fantastic and we can't thank them enough."
Dave Linnell, Principal of Cornwall College, said: "We are thrilled to host such an event on our Camborne campus. It allows our Business and IT students to gain real insight into what will be their eventual careers. I would like to thank Employ a Geek for choosing to hold the event here."
