Ryan Anderson

When thinking of a company where cubicles are shunned, where open format board meetings and where cooperation between employees is of the utmost importance, a first guess might point to Silicon Valley. However, senior Ryan Anderson was able to experience the advantages of working in an innovative company first hand in Round Rock when he visited Dell along with other Leander ISD students for COOL Week.

Anderson spent the majority of COOL Week at Dell’s headquarters in Round Rock. During his time there, he was able to tour several of the buildings, while also gaining an understanding of what working at a large tech corporation might be like.

“[Visiting Dell] really showed me how I have to prepare myself for that kind of career,” Anderson said. “I also got to see the kind of environment that [I am] going to be working in, along with how businesses operate now compared to how they operated 30 years ago.”

Dell is one of the largest tech companies in the world, employing more than 103,300 people in the U.S. and around the world. Anderson was able to observe how a business of that scale operates.

“[I was most impressed with] how professional the facilities were,” Anderson said. “All of [the facilities] were new and remodeled because they are moving away from the cubicle style of an office building. It was more of an interactive building with lots of open tables and open spaces where people can work together.”

In Anderson’s case, there were many other students who appear to share his interests in working at a company such as Dell. Multiple students applied to shadow tech companies.

“Meeting all of the different people from the rest of the district [was really fun],” Anderson said. “There are so many people in the [Leander] district, so the experience of meeting new people kinda reminded me about how you go to college, and get to meet new people.”

Students are granted up to a full week of school off in order to become fully immersed in their visit, and fortunately for Anderson, he was able to spend four out of the five school days at Dell.

“Just being there for one day doesn’t give you the full experience,” Anderson said. “Throughout the week we toured all of the buildings at Dell, and you would not be able to get the same experience from just one day.”