Way back in the 20th Century, on the final day of my high school career, the graduating class was invited to visit the typing classroom to see “the wave of the future”—it was my first computer-sighting. Boy-oh-boy, the typing teacher was right about that. Computers now outperform humans in all our tasks!
When I returned to the workforce after raising a family, we were on the other side of the age of computers. Having never used a PC, my first office job required data processing in student, financial, and administrative records. In addition, a working knowledge of Microsoft Outlook and Word were a daily necessity. With no formal background, I managed five different software applications and databases in my daily workload by reading directions and asking for help when needed. Dummies books, community classes, and kind co-workers helped me. Still, high stress and low confidence achievements are on-the-job tasks that are easily forgotten.
It has been an arduous process from this introduction to computers. Many years later—and with the benefit of coursework—I have extensive on-the-job experience working with several databases and software packages. However, formal education is the keystone to any job worth doing; it fills in blanks and unlocks doors.