Stuart Kirk:
CLASS OF 1994
Merritton High SchoolClass of 1994
St. catharines, ON
Wayne State University - MedicineClass of 2007
Detroit, MI
Brock University - Computer ScienceClass of 2000
St. catharines, ON
Laura Secord Secondary SchoolClass of 1995
St. catharines, ON
Ferndale Public SchoolClass of 1990
St. catharines, ON
Stuart's Story
Life
No pets, no kids, no motorcycles. Both my wife and I drive Volkswagens and love them. We're enjoying our liberty before the family begins in a couple of years.
School
I had many crushes, but as you well know in high school was far too uncool to be able to hook up with any of them. Their loss. I'm significantly happier where I am now, and consider myself to be extremely successful in my career, and in life.
Workplace
My jobs? I guess my first one would have been a paper boy delivering the St. Catharines Standard. I also did a brief stint as a carnie operator for the Merritton Labour Day carnival. Ah, yes, I too used to have "white trash" jobs.
From there I moved up the ladder to working at the "Hungry Bear" restaurant at Marineland, which of course didn't last more than one season.
Next, I actually had a somewhat decent and respectable job especially for a high school kid by working at the license bureau. Of course, the conditions were crap and I had to deal with the public. There were no benefits provided since it was just a little cash cow for the owner and likely still is today. I remember my highest pay rate there was $7.99 an hour -- give me a break.
By this time, I was finished with high school and moved over to Brock University where I worked as a Computer Laboratory advisor. This position was a good one which I enjoyed, however had clashes with the management as I was more into providing a service to students and they were more into ensuring machines were kept locked down. Independant thought was discouraged, and th...Expand for more
is position didn't last more than a couple of years.
During my time at Brock I held two other positions. The first of which was what I referred to as an "untapped market" -- designing websites for different departments at the school. This proved to be extremely profitable and my best man, Andrew Bailey, and I made some good money off of that. Of course, now that I'm no longer at Brock, the IT folks there have "stolen" my idea and now all this is done "in-house". Let the minions work for $7 an hour making a website and send the extra cash to the IT coffers. It's also interesting to see how much "contet wise" the current main website for the University looks like the one I had developed years ago for the FOB.
The last real position I held at Brock University was that of an IT Consultant for the Faculty of Business. This was probably the best job I had to date. After much negotiation I had turned a "contract" position into a salaried position with benefits and was doing quite well not to mention bringing the FOB into the 21st century with technology. They are still expanding today and now have 3 IT people on staff. I wish them continued success and best wishes for the future.
At present, I work as a Senior Systems Administrator at Wayne State University in the School of Medicine. This is my home for the forseeable future. My salary is very respectable, fringe benefits are amazing, daily tasks are enjoyable, and colleagues are friends.
Not bad, if you ask me.
Military
Canada has a military? I was a Boy Scout -- does that count?
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