Andrew Tipper landed a job before he graduated, and he’s been on the go ever since.
Andrew is an application specialist at Vermont Systems, Inc. “I provide customer support on a day-to-day basis. I manage projects for migrating and installing software for new and old customers,” he says. Those clients are located all around the United States, so Andrew travels frequently to get his job done. His company creates software tools that help people manage recreational activities in towns, in the military, and on college campuses.
“I had the interview after the job fair at VTC and was hired while still in school. I started in June after graduation,” he says.
“The hardware aspects and coding aspects have helped out a lot in understanding certain problems I see while working here,” he says. “It was also a benefit to have classes where you had to make speeches, as part of my job is to train people on the software I install.”
Andrew worked on a senior project at Vermont Tech that has been put to use by the college: a virtual campus tour. “The project was very memorable. I spent a lot of time browsing Google – it was based off the Google API so we could have the important locations across VTC pinpointed on a map,” he says. “I learned a lot about paying attention to detail.”
This young alumnus has some advice for those who want to get a degree in the IT field. “Information technology is a broad subject,” he says. “Take the classes that you know you will use first (electives as well). Once you have those down, if there is still room, fit in things you are interested in as you never know which classes you may take a liking to and you could possibly go in a direction you did not think you would.”