My Job Shadowing Experience As A STEM Student In High School

Preparation for college began as my education progressed from elementary through high school when being accepted into the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics program also called STEM. Only a hundred students out of all the schools in the county were accepted into STEM. I feel like STEM was the height of my learning career I was being accepted into the STEM challenged me to excel in rigorous classes. The purpose of STEM is to prepare students for college and importance of students who enter the program need to have a strong desire to succeed. As a STEM student in high school, I learned the importance of homework, projects, and gained a sense of belonging, how to apply what I learned, and mentor other STEM students
Job Shadowing was an opportunity for STEM students and their teachers participate in field trips to learn about how science, technology, engineer and math (STEM) is applied to real world situation. Being outside the classroom, this experience opened my eyes to different professional job fields. Prior to each field trip, students were required to answer questions about the place they were going to visit. The job shadowing experience added to my STEM knowledge by learning how my classes would apply to a particular organization or job, knowledge of what is needed to have a career in the field and what questions to ask by listening to other students and the teacher. I realized out of all of these job shadowing’s only certain one`s interested me even thought I was supposed to be good at everything related to science, technology, engineering and math since I was a STEM student but most of the jobs I did not think would suit me well. The job shadowing I learned the most about was the National Cryptological Museum, which provided insight to national security careers. The level of depth in computer science, understanding code and deciphering information was a surprise for me. After learning about how technical the job career is in national security I like to be challenged but the type of tedious work involved with deciphering code, languages or number scheme and minimal interaction with people, I would not find this rewarding as a career. On the other hand, the most interesting field trip was to the Phillip Merrill Environmental Center in Annapolis, Maryland. The tour guide was engaging, sharing with us on-going field research, knowledge about the habitat and the Chesapeake Bay wildlife. After the post visit, and back in