Today, Cisco and Junior Achievement teamed up to host a Job Shadow Day as part of Cisco's series of STEM mentoring events being held throughout the week. Fifty students from the Josephine Dobbs Clement Early College High School -a group of first generation college attendees, English as second language (ESL), and under-represented minorities and low-income students -participated in the day's activities.

The event featured Rene Daughtry, Cisco Project Manager and Chairman of NCCU Advisory Council, who offered a keynote highlighted the job opportunities that the Internet of Everything will create for STEM professionals.

Throughout the day, students had the opportunity to participate in speed mentoring sessions,  tour the Technical Assistance Center,  experience TelePresence technology and learn about personal finance management during a Junior Achievement session lead by Cisco Finance employees.

This is part of a series of STEM mentoring events taking place all week at three of Cisco's campuses -Richardson, Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, and Silicon Valley.  Nearly 200 students and 200 mentors will participate in these events.

For almost two-decades, Cisco has made it a top priority to build a talent pipeline prepared to meet the challenges of a modern economy and a workforce that generates the next wave of innovation. And by 2018, there will be 1.2 million open jobs in the United States in the fields that make up STEM.

Cisco invests in programs from kindergarten to college and beyond that are preparing a diverse generation of talent for careers in STEM and is a founding partner of US2020, an initiative that connects STEM professionals with girls and students from underserved communities from kindergarten through college. By 2020, Cisco has committed that 20% of our US employees will provide at least 20 hours of STEM mentoring per year.

Every student should have the opportunity to prepare themselves for the rapidly growing job opportunities in science, technology, engineering and math -and Cisco is committed to building the lifelong skills that will enable North Carolina's youth to have careers in the workforce of tomorrow.

All in all, today's event was terrific.  We had a great interaction with the students in each session.  Hopefully, we'll see more than a few of them choose careers in STEM down the road.