Emily Rockman
Growing up I was the rare breed of kid that never changed what I wanted to be when I grew up. I was going to be a veterinarian. I loved animals. That never changed. I even went to summer camp in high school for aspiring veterinarians. It just solidified what I wanted to do.
Then I took an intro biology class my first semester of college.
I promptly dropped the class and changed my major to mathematics. I had come to the realization that I had probably romanticized being a veterinarian my entire life. I didn’t really like biology. It wasn’t interesting to me. I didn’t enjoy it. That was going to make a long 8+ years to becoming a veterinarian - something I probably wouldn’t even enjoy!
My second course altering realization happened towards the end of college when I realized that, while I did love mathematics, I wasn’t sure what I would do with the major when I graduated. Graduate school wasn’t somewhere I was ready to go. So I joined the UTeach program and got my teaching certificate where I promptly got a job teaching high school freshman mathematics.
That lasted 1.5 years.
The summer after that last semester teaching I was applying for all kinds of jobs. I ended up getting a position as a Analyst Trainee with the University of Texas. It was a paid position where I was taught to program (on a mainframe!) and then hired within the University to work full time. It was a great program and a turning point for me professionally. I stayed with them, working in the same department for the majority of that time, for over 8 years. In that time I moved out of the country and back again. I went on vacations. I met my now husband. I learned more programming languages. I passed on knowledge to others. I became the campus expert on various subjects. I grew professionally.
Then I had my son and @rocktavious and I decided that it was time to help our son grow and I was going to take a break from work. Since then I’ve been raising an amazing boy, had an amazing girl, and decided to (slowly) begin to work again.
But this time, the work would be on my terms. @Rocktavious and I started Red Owl Games and started our journey in game development. I’ve been taking care of a lot of the business dealings with getting the company up and running. I’ve also enjoyed learning about Unity and C#. But reality hit again. Game development is not my passion. But what is?
My passion comes in questioning. Why? How? Is X really causing Y?
