My formal education and professional experience, after high school, was mostly in Christian ministry. Although I have an associates in General/Liberal Arts from Moberly Area Community College, my bachelor’s from Harding University is in ministry. I preached for churches while in college and then went to Brazil for a few years as a missionary. Though both my brothers work in different fields of technology, I never really considered that area. For a long time I thought the full extent of my “non-ministerial” work would be in teaching English as a Second/Foreign language. When I considered alternative forms of ministry, it usually involved ESL/EFL. Over the past few years of living and working in the greater New York metro area, this has changed.
I’ve gone from B2B customer service, to mobile data support and then into wearing many hats at a tech startup in Manhattan. Ubuntu Linux has replaced Microsoft Windows in my home, and the command line is now almost second nature to me. I can now say that Ruby is my first programming language (hopefully of what will become a handful of languages) and Ruby on Rails has been fun to begin learning. A few years ago I knew virtually no one, other than my brothers, in the tech field. Now, through NYLUG and other local meetups I have several good friends and contacts in this area.
As I’ve said recently, I’d like to eventually go back to Brazil. When I think of what would be involved I don’t imagine doing what I did before. Something more like what Jon “maddog” Hall is advocating comes to mind. Open source solutions and tech training for sustainable community development projects in Brazil that help lift people out of poverty…that’s what I want to be about.
At this point I’m not fully prepared for the task of tech training and advocacy in Brazil. That’s where work experience right now comes into play.
My time at that Internet startup in Manhattan gave me a place to begin, a basic skill set upon which I can build professionally, with an eye toward doing good in South America.
If you know of any full-time positions in or around Manhattan where I could utilize my customer service, tech support and/or training skills together possibly with my fundamental understanding of QA and object-oriented programming, in a work environment were I would be encouraged to learn more, let me know. I’m more than happy to work my way to the level of training and experience I’ll need to really make a difference.
