Hearing about the Trip

I was first told about the trip to the Silicon Valley at the Options Evening that I went to towards the end of year 9, before choosing my GCSE subjects. I already knew that I wanted to take ICT for my GCSE, as it has always been one of my favourite subjects, but my dad and I visited the department to hear about what I would do during years 10 and 11, and to make sure that I definitely wanted to take it. During the talk, we were told about the opportunity to visit the Silicon Valley. I was very excited by it, and knew that I would try my best to get onto the trip when the opportunity was given to me.

Applying to the Trip and Getting Accepted

In March 2016, we were given letters about the Silicon Valley trip, giving more information about the trip and the application process. We were given 3 weeks to create a multimedia application, including answers to questions such as why we would like to be chosen for the trip, and information about at least one of the places that we were going to visit. To create my application, I used this blog, and my application can be seen on the other pages. I spent many hours on my application, but I knew how amazing the trip is, and it would all be worth it if I got to go. I handed in my application on the last day of term, and then had the 2 week wait over Easter until I would find out if I had got in.

I was given my letter in an envelope in my maths lesson. I was the only person in my class who was given a letter, because some people had ICT or Computer Science next lesson, and so they would find out then. I opened the letter when I got home, and when I saw that I had been accepted, my mum and I both cried! We were so happy, because I had worked really hard to get in, and I was so pleased that I got chosen. The trip is a once in a lifetime opportunity and I am so proud to have gotten picked to go.

Silicon Valley Day 1-Computer History Museum, NASA Ames Research Centre and Microsoft Workshop

It was our first day in the Silicon Valley, and the first thing we did was visit the Computer History Museum, which had lots of original computers as their complexity developed over the centuries, from abacuses to large, cumbersome calculators, to machines such as the Enigma Code machine, finally to the kinds of technology that we have access to today. I learnt a lot from this trip, and I really enjoyed being able to see the progression of computer designs and how different scientists and engineers from completely different parts of the world built on and improved each others’ ideas, and even worked on similar projects without knowing about the others’ work.

I liked looking at and learning about the Enigma machine, as we learnt a small amount about it in school before, and it is something I am interested in as I enjoy both computing and history, and am interested in the technology of the wars. I enjoyed being able to learn more about the machine and how it worked.

There was a large amount of information about punched cards and the computers which were used to make them. A small hole is cut in the card, and the placement is determined by the combination of buttons that is pressed. This seemingly simple principle revolutionised research that was taking place, and they became one of the most common ways of condensing and storing data. I was able to try out a small one of these machines and make one of my own cards, with a code punched into it that signified my name. I found this extremely interesting and it was not something that I had known about before visiting the museum.

After our trip to the museum, we visited the NASA Ames Research centre, which was something I had been looking forward to, and had a talk from an astronomer working for NASA. This was very interesting and beneficial, as we were able to ask a lot of questions, and I learnt a lot of information about the many different jobs and kinds of people that work at NASA, and the different roles and fields that people can go into. I enjoyed this talk, and found out a lot about possible jobs for the future that I did not know about before. I never realised just how many kinds of people are employed by NASA alone, and there are also many more available within other companies. The talk was very helpful for me when making decisions such as the options I will take at A Level and University in order to have a wider range of options and fields that I could go into.

Our last activity for the day was a workshop at the Microsoft store, which everyone really enjoyed. We first did some coding on the computer, trying to make a character to perform certain action using small blocks of code. We also did Just Dance on the Xbox 1, which was really funny. the final activity in the workshop was a virtual reality experience using the Oculus Rift. I was really excited for this, as I have never used any kind of virtual reality device, so I have never done anything similar. whilst waiting, we could see what the person wearing the mask would be able to see on a TV screen, but this is completely different to actually wearing the goggles, as it is a fully immersive experience and it is completely realistic. I really enjoyed this workshop, and though we all had fun doing the Just Dance and Virtual Reality, I also liked learning a bit more about code, ads it is not something I often do any more, but I enjoy it and liked being able to find out more about how to do it.

Day 2-NetApp and Stanford University

The first visit today was to NetApp, the first of many tech companies that we will be visiting on the trip. I was excited and interested to find out about how such a large company is run, and I enjoyed the trip a lot. We first had a talk from Dona Munsch, who gave us a lot of valuable advice about working in technology, as well as information about what NetApp does as a company. She told us three skills that we need to be successful in tech. They were:

• have good communication skills
• be brave and have a voice
• embrace your inner dude

Though embracing my inner dude was not a term I had heard before, once Dona had explained what it meant, I realised how important it was, especially in the tech industry, which is currently predominantly male. It means that we need to always let our voices be heard and be confident in ourselves and our ideas, to not be afraid to fail and to always try our best, and to try and make a connection with men by trying to be interested in the things that they like so that you can be respected. Currently, only around 30% of the people working at each technology company are female, and many women are working hard to change that, by not only being employed by the company, but becoming highly respected and useful members of technology teams.

Dona also explained about the kinds of work and technology that NetApp does and provides. NetApp has created a cloud computing storage service, which allows many people to collaborate on the same piece of work from many different areas of the world, and the same person can access their work from different devices and places.

After our talk from Dona, we also had a talk from Stan Cox, and then a tour of the data centre, who gave us some good advice about working in the future. He told us to:

1. take chances and always work hard
2. keep your head up and don’t look back
3. be determined and conquer adversity and problems
4. get back up if you fail and never hold yourself back
5. never be afraid to accept offers for things that you are not familiar with.

The final point is particularly important, as this is the step that he took to become the manager of the data centre at NetApp, and if he had not taken that chance, he would not have gotten to where he is today, so I found this particularly inspiring. Also, Stan reminded us that though we can locally delete things such as photos and social media posts from our phones, if they have been saved to a cloud service at some point, they will always be there and there is no way for us to delete them, so we must always be careful about what we post.

Before our tour of the data centre, Stan explained what it is and how it works. This is where computers are networked to servers, which mostly used by big organisations, and are used to control the storage, processing, or transferring of data. There are multiple data centres around America, and they are all linked together and are able to communicate, so that if one goes down, the others can pick up and store the data so that the user’s experience is not affected and they never know of the problems that are happening behind the scenes.

We then went into the data centre at NetApp, which I found very interesting. Stan showed us all of the servers linked together and networked, and explained how they like to save energy. So that the computers do not overheat, the data centre must be kept at a certain temperature. Rather than keeping the air conditioning on all day, whenever it is cold enough outside, they will pull air into the room from outside to keep it cool. The company also uses the heat given off by the computers to heat other rooms in the HQ, by using plastic curtains to trap the air. I found this interesting, as it is such a simple, yet clever idea, and is much better for the environment, and cheaper for the company.

After our NetApp visit, we went on a tour of Stanford University campus. I found this trip to be extremely useful, as I did not know just how different universities in America are to the ones in the UK, and so I liked learning about it. The campus was very big and was unlike anything I had seen before. It was so big that the students have to cycle between classes as they may miss lessons if they don’t. I did not expect the campus to be so big. I also did not know that students in American colleges can change classes and take lots of different classes, which is different to in the UK, as most people only choose one or two subjects to study.

Day 3-Robotics at Berkeley University of California and Exploratorium

The first visit was to see a robotics talk and demonstration from a group of students at Berkeley University of California. They first explained about the different ways that a robot can be programmed and taught how to perform actions, and then we were shown a demonstration of a robot called BRETT (Berkeley Robot for the Elimination of Tedious Tasks). There was a demonstration of learning from demonstration, where the robot was shown how to tie a knot, and then the rope was placed in a slightly different position and Brett was told to repeat the task. The robot warped the original demonstration to fit the new configuration of the rope to complete the task, though it did accidentally pick up the tablecloth, and so it did not quite go correctly.

After visiting the University, we went to the Exploratorium, which had many different exhibits that demonstrated different scientific theories. We used a shadow box, where our bodies blocked the light on a screen, so the image had light all around, but our bodies made a shape, which I thought was really cool. We also found that if we turned the flashlight on our phones, we could write words or draw pictures on the walls, which was also fun.

Another exhibit that we liked was the slinky treadmill, where there was a moving platform that a slinky moved along, and we had to try and make the treadmill move at the correct speed so that it stayed at the same point, rather than falling off either end of the treadmill.

To end the day, we all had a meal in the Hard Rock Café, which was an enjoyable way to spend some time all together and have a meal as a large group, as this is something that we have not all done on the trip yet.

Day 4-Robotics at Palo Alto High School, Google and Adobe

First, we visited Palo Alto high school, which is right next to Stanford University, to have a talk on robotics and a tour of their lab. We learnt about a competition that the school takes part in called FRC (First Robotics Competition#0 ran by a company called FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology), where they are set a task, which is usually a different sport each year, and then each team, which must be a minimum of 10 people but there is no maximum, must design and build a robot to complete the task. They are given only 6 weeks to build and design the robot before the contest, and we were told that the team spends around 15 hours a week outside of school time to work on the robot (though this is only for those 6 weeks; the rest of the time they spend around 2-5 hours a week in meetings), and their commitment and clear love for what they are doing inspired me to show the same commitment to my own interests. After the talk, we were given a tour of the auto shop, and at the moment it is Spirit Week, so the shop was filled with the floats that the students had been making for the parade at the end of the week. All of the floats were so intricate and I was amazed by the details in them.

Later, we visited Google HQ, which was a visit that I had been looking forward to a lot. Our first talk was from Chen Shay, who is a software engineer. She works to make sure that the more accurate medical information is displayed towards the top of search results, rather than the less accurate, yet more popular websites, are not used as much so that users of Google get accurate information. She has also developed a piece of software that allows people in developing countries to access information about health issues. If someone has a bad internet connection, they will be given the ‘lite’ version, which does not contain quite as much detail and photos, but still provides necessary information, and so it can load on a bad or unreliable internet connection, meaning that more people can have access to this important data. Recently, Chen has launched a piece of software that recognises if a search is a medical condition (‘how common is asthma?’, ‘What are the symptoms of diabetes?’ etc.) and if the data is available, it will then be brought to the top and displayed to the user. As well as explaining what she does and how she helps people, she gave us some inspiring advice:

• Do what you are passionate about and then work hard at it.
• Keep trying, even when it is difficult, as nothing in life will be easy.
• Have a wide range of skills and have hobbies other than the field you are working in to allow you to come up with more creative and out of the box ideas.

Another Google product that she told us about was the Google Lens, and though it is not yet released, when it is, it will greatly benefit the lives of people with type one diabetes, such as Chen’s own brother. Currently, people with the condition have to prick their fingers and use a machine to measure their blood sugar levels every few hours, but the Google lens can check glucose levels from tears, which is much easier as it is automatic.

The next talk that we had was from Mark Rubin. He taught us the four best values to have when preparing for an interview:

• technical confidence
• listening
• teach others
• don’t be a jerk

He also told us to take note of how people communicate, such as their tone of voice and their body language. Mark also gave us tips on learning how to write code, saying that we should learn 2 coding languages (such as Java or Golang) fully, and then experiment in other languages. This is easier than trying to learn them all, and then when experimenting after learning 2 languages, we will already have some background knowledge on how to write the code.

After visiting Google, we went to Adobe. First, we were given a tour of the HQ, which was very beautiful. They have a lot of emphasis on the wellbeing of their employees, so there is a wellness centre with a massage room, a meditation room, nap pods, a gym, and other places to wind down. This means that they can make sure that the employees are always working to the best of their ability, which I think is an important value for the company to have. We were also told about how environmentally friendly the company is. They:

• recycle everything they use, so there is a 0% waste from the company.
• generate their own electricity using wind power.
• grow their own vegetables for use in the canteen

as well as many others. I have not seen such an environmentally conscious company, so I was pleased and surprised by exactly how much they do.

Once our tour had finished, we were given some talks and were able to ask some questions. Our first speaker was Toni Vanwinkle. She told us that there are 15,00 Adobe employees worldwide and they are voted in the top 100 places to work.  As a company, Adobe provides for both personal users, and big businesses such as Nike. The next talk was from Troy Dunham, who looks for necessary information during legal matters, using data from phones and computers. Most smartphones track your location (even when GPS is turned off), so Adobe can use this to prove where you were at a certain time. This was not something that I knew, and it reminded me just how careful we have to be with what we post on social media. He also told us to make the most of the innovation era, as the first generation who can work in tech who have grown up using things such as iPhones and tablets. The CIO of Adobe, Cynthia Stoddard, also gave us an inspirational talk. She said that:

• You do not have to be loud to be successful in business; you just have to be confident in yourself.
• Never stop learning. Always ask questions and be curious.
• Have courage.
• It is important to be happy to be successful.
• Move out of you comfort zone.
• People and relationship matter.
• Excel in what you do…expand your skills through chronic learning.

After Cynthia’s talk, there was a panel for a Q and A session. In that, I found out that Adobe works very closely with the ‘Girls Who Code’ program, encouraging more young women to be interested in and qualify for jobs in technology and coding.

Today, the words of the speakers inspired me, especially Cynthia Stoddard, as she has been in so many different jobs before she got to where she is today, which shows that it does not matter if you feel you have made the wrong choice, as you can change career until you find the job that works well for you. This helps me to know that I do not have to find exactly what I want to do right away, and it is okay if this takes some time.

Day 5-Gunn High School, Microsoft and Intel Museum

The first activity this morning was a visit to Gunn High School. We first had a short tour of the school campus from one of the Computer Science teachers at the school, and then had a short demonstration of a programming language that I had not seen before in one of the classrooms. I found this interesting, as I had not seen a language that worked quite in this way. The teacher also showed us how to work out how long it will take for the computer to complete the action set, by multiplying by 1.61. When we left the classroom, recess had just started, and each of the different grades were dressed up in differently themed costumes for spirit week. Some were hippies, some were nerds, and others were army officers. There was also a competitive game that took place, where a representative from each grade had to throw small balls into cups taped to helmets on other students’ heads. This was really fun for us all to watch as the students got into the competition, and so did we.

Once we left the high school, we went to visit Microsoft. First, we had a talk from Kenny Spade, who works as the program manager in the Garage at the company. He helps the people who come into the Garage to find the hardware, software and training that they need to create whatever it may be that they have decided to build. The Garage also helps many companies with marketing and releasing their products to the public. This is very common with new phone apps, and a large percentage of apps in the App Store have been in the Garage. Kenny also told us about the internships that take place at Microsoft. They offer 2 types: a traditional style internship, offered to either students between their 2nd and 3rd year of university, or students between their 3rd and 4th year of university, or the Explorer program, where the interns get to work with different teams, each for a small amount of time, to find out which fields they like and don’t like.

Microsoft has a Hackathon once a year, which is a week where they encourage as many employees as possible to work on any project they want. There is a science fair at the end where people can show what they have built. In some cases, after the Hackathon, Microsoft will approach a team and offer to allow them to continue with the project that they came up with during the week of Hackathon to turn it into a reality. I found this inspiring, as this means that a small project that people came up with and started on in just a week can become a product that thousands of people buy and use.

After Kenny’s talk, we had a panel, which we were able to ask questions. I found the questions asked to be very beneficial, as the panel was made up of 4 women working in tech, so it applied directly to us, and the kinds of opportunities which may be open to us when we begin to work. They gave us some good advice:

• If you can, try and have some work experience or an internship whilst at university, so you get the experience that many employers look for, and you know what kind of thing to expect when you get your first real job.
• Communication skills are important.

Once we had eaten lunch, we went to the Intel Museum, where I learnt more about this company, the work that they do, and the products that they have created. I learnt that Intel stands for Integrated Electronics, which is something that I did not know before. The company released their first microprocessor in 1971, which was called the Intel 4004 microprocessor. It completely changed the way the electronic devices were created after this.

Another interesting piece of information that I found out was about the BunnyPeople, which were launched in 1997. These were created to represent the more vivid colour and audio experiences given by the Intel MMX media enhancement, which was a new technology being brought out for PCs at the time. Lots of people loved the characters, and there were hundreds of orders for toy versions.

As well as all of the information that we learnt, there was also an activity where we could use binary code to write our names. This allowed me to learn a little more about binary code as I had to input each of the letters into the computer myself, after finding them on a list beside the activity. I enjoyed the museum, as it allowed me to learn some more about a company that I did not previously know much about.

Day 6-Walt Disney Family Museum and DropBox HQ

This morning was one of the activities that I had been looking forward to most: the Walt Disney Family Museum. I am a massive Disney fan so I thoroughly enjoyed this trip. First, we had a tour around the museum with a guide to tell us some information about the different pieces that they had. We saw one of the original multiplane cameras used by Walt Disney between the late 1930s and 1989 (the last film it was used for was The Little Mermaid). We were told about how different layers of the background, middleground and foreground are created on separate slides and added to the equipment and then the camera can zoom in and out to create a more 3D and immersive image. We also saw some of the original drawings from the first ever full length feature film, ‘Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs’, which I found very interesting. The museum contained many original drawings, and I found it very interesting to see how the company made the films come to life.

Once we had finished looking around, we went in for an animation workshop, where we got to use our own multiplane camera to make a short animation. My group created a woodland themed animation, with moving birds, bees, and a campfire. I really enjoyed this workshop as we got to use the same equipment that Walt Disney used to use, though in a much smaller scale.

After visiting the museum, we went to DropBox Headquarters. The company was founded in 2007, and was created to aid the founder, who kept forgetting his memory stick so wanted a more efficient way to be able to access his files from different devices. The company allows people to access their files from many devices, comment on data and collaborate on the same project with people from all over the world. First, we had a Q and A with a panel of some of the people who work at DropBox, with each person having a different role within the company. We were given lots of good information and advice:

• One of the core values of the company is cupcake (a small thing that makes someone’s day better-either an employee or a customer)
• Always keep learning and getting better in whatever you are doing and show you have the ability to learn when talking to possible employers.
• Cancer research teams use DropBox storage to store their research data.
• Pick a focus and get really good at it.
• The company makes sure that possible new recruits meet a lot of relevant people currently working at the company, such as those who would be on the team they are applying for a job in, and to test that they would fit in and align with the values at the company. They look at the person as a whole, rather than purely focusing on their qualifications.

Day 7-Alcatraz and San Francisco City Tour

This morning, we had an early start to go and visit Alcatraz. After taking the boat over to the island, we walked up to the main prison and had a guided audio tour. I found this extremely audio tour. I found this extremely interesting, and even better than just walking around and looking in the prison, as the tour explained exactly what each part was and told stories of escape attempts. the audio contained the words and voices of prisoners who had served time at Alcatraz and the officers who had worked there. The inmates at Alcatraz were some of the most dangerous in the country, and so the officers would constantly have their lives in jeopardy whilst at work. In one event, a group of inmates made an escape attempt, holding the officers hostage in a cell so that they could not be stopped. They also shot at officers and 2 were killed in this incident. The escape attempt was unsuccessful.

After lunch at a farmers market, we had a tour of San Francisco with Nic. We visited tourist locations and had lots of photograph opportunities at Twin Peaks, which had amazing views of San Francisco, and the Golden Gate Bridge, where we could have some good group photos and were able to take a short walk across the bridge, which I enjoyed. We drove through lots of different areas of San Francisco, such as the Castro, which is one of the biggest LGBT communities in the USA, and saw the most winding road in the area. I found this tour very interesting, and we got to see many areas of San Francisco that we had not previously seen on the trip.

Day 8-Six Flags Magic Mountain

Today we went on a trip to Six Flags Magic Mountain, which I had been very excited for. There were lots of rides, and my favourite was a ride called New Revolution. On this ride, we got to wear virtual reality headsets, and there was a simulation that we were flying a fighter jet as we went around the roller coaster. This is nothing like any ride I have ever been on before, and so I really enjoyed it. I also really liked the other rides I got to go on, and overall had a really fun day.

Day 9-NASA JPL and ScienCenter

This morning, we went to the JPL centre, which is owned by NASA, but run by Caltech. I am interested in space, so I found this really enjoyable. We got to see lots of models of the rovers and robots that have been sent into space by JPL, such as the Mars Rovers, which I found really interesting to look at and learn about, as I did not know much information about them before. We also got to see the assembly room, where they had a heat shield, which I found really cool because, if everything goes to plan, it will be in space in around 5 years.

After the JPL centre, we went to the ScienCenter. There we looked at the Endeavour space shuttle. First, we learnt about the shuttle, which is the most advanced space shuttle built so far, with better computers and navigation, and a drag chute to make landing easier. Some of us also went in a simulator, which turned and shook as a video played about an Endeavour mission to fix a part of the Hubble Telescope, which was really cool. We also got to see the real Endeavour space shuttle, which was really interesting. There was information and facts underneath the shuttle, such as:

• it weighs 81,000 kg with the main engines installed.
•  the main body is made from aluminium, like many aeroplane. Tiles and thermal blankets kept the metal from melting as it launched, and later re-entered the atmosphere.
• the space shuttle is 37 m long and has a wingspan of 24 m.

Once we had visited the ScienCenter, we had a surprise trip up a small mountain, where there was an amazing view of LA, and we could also see the Hollywood sign really well. We could take lots of photographs and I really liked being able to see the Hollywood sign, as I have never seen it before, so it was a nice surprise to end the day.

Day 10-Warner Brothers Studio Tour

It was the last day of activities today, and I had been so excited for the tour as it is where two of my favourite TV shows have been filmed; Friends and The Big Bang Theory. In the morning, we had a careers talk with 4 women who work at the studios. There was Kacey, who is the director of marketing for television globally, Julie, who is the vice president for the digital group, Karen, who is the director of global solutions and home entertainment solutions, and Erin, executive director of global product planning. I found their advice very inspiring:

• Stay open.
• Stay confident. Charge ahead.
• Believe in yourself and keep moving forward.
• You may not know what your passion is yet, but keep trying and find what you love.
• Network, meet people and reach out to others who can help you get to where you want to be.
•  Stay curious.
• Believe in your dreams and don’t let anyone make you think that it is not going to come true.
• Always make sure you love what you are doing and stay true to what you want in life.
• Stay true to the thing that drives you and ignore what anyone says about what you love to do.

Karen also told us an inspiring story that taught us to never give up on our dreams, and ignore what other people say. She enrolled at a tech school at the age of 18, in 1982, where they would not allow her to train as a programmer, as they believed that no company would employ a girl as a programmer. She did not listen to them and refused to give up, and 6 months later, at the age of 19, she was employed as a programmer. I found this amazing, as she didn’t listen to anyone who tried to hold her back, and in just a short amount of time, she managed to get a job she was told she would never have. This showed me that I should do the same, and always continue trying to achieve my dreams, ignoring what others say if it will not help me get there.

After we had eaten lunch, we went on a tour of the studios, which was incredible. We were driven around in a golf cart, and then we got out at the different sets. We saw lots of the sets for Friends, which I loved, because it is one of my most favourite TV shows. It was really interesting to find out how different film production teams come in and decorate the sets for different films and TV shows, and that the same set can be used for so many different shows, and they are decorated so differently that they become almost unrecognisable.

Later, we went on a short trip to the Hollywood Walk of Fame, where we got to see some of the stars on the ground, such as Mickey Mouse and Daniel Radcliffe. I have never been to the Hollywood Walk of Fame before, and so I really liked being able to see some of the plaques of actors who I really like.

Today was one of my favourite visits, and was an amazing end to a trip that I will never forget.