Last week I had the opportunity to meet students congregated from around the globe in San Diego, CA to compete for World Champion titles in Microsoft Office applications. These students are wicked fast at taking the Microsoft Office Specialist exams, which are used in the competition. Seriously. Typically these students pass the competition level exams (which are tougher) with perfect scores and complete the exams in as little as ten minutes. Simpl amazing. You can read about all of the champions in this press release. It was particularly amazing to watch the students' and their instructors and parents' reactions as the winners were announced in each of the categories - Word 2007, Excel 2007, PowerPoint 2007, Word 2010, and Excel 2010. I had a goosebumps moment looking at all the winners up on the stage and realized, these are our next generation of power Office users. How in the world will I ever keep up?
One student's story is particularly exciting. Rebecca Rickwood, a student of Sawtry Community College near Cambridge in England, was offered a job with a training company called Course Academy paying $170,000, specifically as a result of winning the Excel 2007 World Champion title at the competition. She's 15 years old and a student at Sawtry Community College near Cambridge. Of course, she's expected to finish college first! You can read all the details in a ZDNet article located here.
If you are a student, or have a student that uses Microsoft Office with amazing skill, you might consider participating next year. We'll be in Las Vegas for the 2012 final competition event, and I'd love to see you there! This will be an event where what happens in Las Vegas won't stay in Las Vegas!
Via: Wendy Johnson (MSL)
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