Here in Northern California, we’re in the heart of the world of technology with Silicon Valley at the epicenter. STEM learning experiences are prime and children who get a leg up at a young age have such a bright future ahead of them. Currently my 11 year old is taking a gifted and talented (GATE) course after school a few times a month and one week her topic was coding and she loved it! Our kids have technology in their hands almost daily between their personal electronics and school opportunities, why not take it one step further? iD Tech offers summer camps in California immersing children ages 6-18 into the world of computer science, learning to code apps, design video games, mod Minecraft, engineer robots, build websites, and more.
During weeklong sessions, most held at top California colleges and universities, students create an impressive project, and build skills that last long after summer. From dress-up days, raffles, and outdoor activities, to gaming tournaments, music video parodies, and pie-your-instructor Fridays, this fun camp culture takes the pressure off so students can get to what matters–building a passion for tech.
Did you know that by 2018 there will be roughly 1,148,000 unfilled STEM jobs in California alone, 78,756 of which involve computer science? The demand for in-state programmers is growing at 4.1 times the state average, yet less than 5,200 students graduate with degrees in computer science each year.
STEM education landscape in California:
- In CA, computer science counts for either math or science credit—yet only 311 schools teach computer science.
- California is one of 25 states where computer science counts toward high school graduation.
- CA features numerous colleges and universities with renowned STEM programs: Caltech, Stanford, San Jose State, UC Davis, UC Irvine, UCLA, and many more. To encourage higher learning, iD Tech summer programs are held at many of these campuses.
- Looking for a fun, STEM-related outing in CA? Visit the Tech Museum of Innovation in San Jose, the state’s most popular STEM-centric museum, embodying the “Spirit of Silicon Valley.”
- California is home to Silicon Valley, a global hotspot for technology and innovation, which houses big-name, industry leaders like Apple, eBay, Facebook, Cisco, Google, Intel, HP, LinkedIn, Netflix, Pandora, Oracle, Microsoft, Twitter, Tesla, Yahoo, Zynga, and many more. The exciting career opportunities are boundless! iD Tech is also headquartered in Silicon Valley.
DISCOUNT CODE
Sign up now and receive a $75 discount toward registration with the code: APR2017
With an 8 to 1 ratio of students to instructors, an all girls summer camp program option (Alexa Cafe), and brand new, real-world curriculum and professional software from Adobe, Apple, Microsoft, and other industry leaders, take a look at the iD Tech for your child this summer! To learn more or check out the camps and courses offered, visit https://www.idtech.com/courses/.
This is a partnered post with iD Tech.
Written by my husband: Our household electronic devices are multiplying without end. Managing these devices and files has become a mess in which no one knows which device has which file and considerable time is wasted just locating something on our network. “Storage Made Easy” was the tagline that led us to try the 
The ReadyNAS RN10200 is a sleek black cube 9” long, 4” wide and 5.5” tall and fits just about anywhere. It comes with an installation CD, AC power adapter, CAT5 cable and instructions, this model is a diskless system that has two bays that accept 2.5” or 3.5” SATA/SSD drives. We installed and 1TB Seagate SV35 drive and as our storage grows, we can easily drop another drive in the other bay. Further down the line it’s nice to know that these bays/drives are hot swappable and capable of handling up to 8TB of data.
Within minutes of opening the box I had slid the hard drive into the tray and installed it into the device. All that was left to do with the hardware was to plug into the network and attach the AC power; total hardware setup time was about 10 minutes. On to the software, often a sticky spot for me due to my stubbornness and insistence that I could have written it better.
This is where Netgear began to really impress me. After setting up a username and password for the device as directed by the ReadyCLOUD install, I stepped over to my IPad and installed the ReadyCLOUD app from the appstore and shortly thereafter I had access to all our important files from my IPad anywhere I had internet service. Then I realized that the software is set up to automatically make copies of the photos on your devices and store them at home on the ReadyNAS.
My husband and I have heard my teenage son’s pleas for a cell phone for a few years. Electronics are huge in our family between televisions, computers, tablets, music players, and cell phones and my son paints a clear picture of his needs. He is out of school the latest in the day, he has after-school sports that often run well into the evenings, and he’s proven to be very responsible as well as successful in school. All those things are valid points for getting a phone plan for him, but the real question is what kind of mobile plan would be most cost efficient?
If you or your child for instance will only be using Wi-Fi for a majority of the month (perhaps during summer vacation) you can pay as low as $5/month. But, then say you’ll be on vacation for a week, change the plan to gain more cellular data right from your phone. Your service will be prorated from the day your make the switch up to your bill cycle date. If upgrading you’ll be charged the difference, if downgrading, you’ll get a credit towards the next month’s bill. 
