Technology always looks toward the future. And much of that future will be formed in the minds of those who have yet to even enter the technology industry. Therefore, we recently hosted two special events - GOLDEN TICKET and EXPERIENCE MICROSOFT - for exceptional college-aged engineers from across the country.

GOLDEN TICKET is a red-carpet visit to our Redmond campus for extraordinary college sophomores and juniors. We select the top national Computer Science & Computer Engineering students as recommended by professors. EXPERIENCE MICROSOFT is a similar program, but for outstanding freshman, underrepresented in the tech industry (women, minorities and individuals with disabilities).

At the events, participants immersed themselves in various workshops, including a test scenario where they practiced black box, white box and real-world testing. Competition was fierce to find bugs in live product websites and online tools created specifically for Golden Ticket.

Teams of students were also tasked with creating new games. Design specifications brought to life these creative multi-media games using only allocated materials, constraints, a target audience and judging criteria. Some highlights from this workshop were “Top of the Class”- the winning game and “Memory Evolved”- whose team members are planning to connect and create phone application versions of the game over summer!

Participants had the opportunity to network with engineers from all over the company and enjoy lunch at one of the 40+ restaurants at the Microsoft Commons. Students were then exposed to new ideas about technology and learned how such ideas make it to market at a Tech Fair, which featured different Microsoft product teams.

As the sun was setting, students headed to The Garage, where there’s a long history of creating grassroots, entrepreneurial products here on the Microsoft campus. The events ended with a bang at Seattle’s iconic Space Needle. There was dinner, drinks, amazing views, more team challenges and plenty of prizes!

The ‘Softies who worked with the events were more than impressed by the enthusiasm, poise, and intellect of the Golden Ticket and Experience Microsoft attendees. Check out additional photos at Microsoft Careers on Facebook.