Summer
break is not the only time to organize an awesome camp; this year Bearingpoint
Caribbean (BE) organized its first ever Autumn Camp! The goal of this skills-camp
was to have an impact
on young people’s lives by offering them opportunities to learn, to discover
talents and to be exposed to new and stimulating environments and experiences. Curaçao
Cares invited Fundashon Kompa Nanzi’s leerinstituut Klimop to participate with
a selection of children between the ages of 12 and 15 years old.
Kickoff!
Day 1 kicked off with
energetic introductory words by MC ‘Tio’
Gino Jacobs, Senior Consultant at Bearingpoint. Every student also received a
Welcome packet comprised of a t-shirt, a USB stick and other school supplies. The group then took a tour of
Bearingpoint’s office, where they had a chance to look behind the scenes and
speak with different employees. The students were really impressed by Manager
Icheron Constancia, who spoke about his journey before and with Bearingpoint
and the many opportunities he has had to travel and grow both professionally
and personally. But the Autumn Camp was off to its official start when students
were paired with a ‘buddy’, a BE employee, during the icebreaker game. The
buddies hit it off from the get go. One could immediately tell that this group
of potential IT specialists were excited and eager to get started!
‘Tio’ in the morning,
Consultant in the afternoon
Each student was paired one-on-one with a BearingPoint buddy, meaning
every student in fact had a personal Consultant/Analyst, Senior Consultant or
even Senior Manager/Director devoted to supporting them along the way (the
privilege!). A meeting room was turned into the designated Autumn Camp lab
where students partook in different workshops on MS PowerPoint, presentation
techniques and other IT and professional skills.They even got a quick session from
consultant Kris Samsom on how to navigate the BE informed software platform. By the
end of it they helped create a model that would predict whether they would pass
the year: input = hasi bo best +
(afhankelijk van) hal bon punto = output: exito sigur!”. The Autumn Camp
classroom was filled with enthusiastic energy from both the students and the
employees.
To inspire and to be
inspired…
A panel of judges would pick out their favourite presentations. When the time came, a few students were a little nervous, seemingly going through Senior Consultant Menno Vinck’s presentation do’s and don’ts in their head. But all of them were determined! It was remarkable to see the effort that all of these students took to apply what they had learned, and to share what had inspired them and what they think should serve as inspiration for Curaçao. The winning presentation by Rajeev Sanchez was a smartly crafted powerpoint..but it was the message that was most powerful:”Only those who risk going too far can possibly find out how far they can go”, by -T.S Elliott. For Rajeev, Alton Paas is a perfect role model for Curacaoans: a young man that was not afraid to pursue what he believed was possible and to persevere despite the obstacles.
The conclusion of the Autumn Camp: Bearingpoint Caribbean’s young and
dynamic staff paid it forward by sharing their passions and talents, but they were also inspired as they saw the young students rise to
the occasion.
For more
pictures of the Autumn Camp visit www.facebook.com/curacaocares/autumncamp
