Computer and information science student Sabrina Jay has just returned from a behind-the-scenes trip to the Huawei Headquarters in Shenzhen, China. Photo / George Novak
Computer and information science student Sabrina Jay has just returned from a behind-the-scenes trip to the Huawei Headquarters in Shenzhen, China. Photo / George Novak
A Papamoa woman took her IT skills from Tauranga to China last week after receiving an all expenses paid trip to go behind the scenes at Huawei, a multinational networking and telecommunications company in Shenzhen.
Sabrina Jay, a computer and information science student at Auckland University of Technology, returned lastSunday from the two-week trip, which initially she thought she would not get.
"I got an email and looked at it and thought, 'an all expenses paid trip to China, that can't be right. It must be spam'," Ms Jay said.
Ms Jay applied after receiving another email about the trip and was chosen for the experience after a strenuous vetting process.
She was one of six students who got the opportunity to be immersed in life in China.
The students spent their first week in Beijing "doing cultural things", and also spent four days learning Mandarin and calligraphy.
They then went to he Huawei Headquarters in Shenzhen, which has its own university.
Ms Jay spent her days doing classes on intelligent network and design, which taught her about the development from copper wiring to fibre, mobile network developments for 5G, and looking into 'cloud' development.
They also went on factory tours and looked at the Huawei control room which watches their six manufacturing plants.
New Zealand Public Affairs Manager Nick Wilson said the aim of the programme was to immerse the students in the life of "one of the world's most advanced technological companies".
"The intention is to give them a flavour of what it's like, and hopefully have sparked an interest".
The global programme picks students from 47 places around the world, but Mr Wilson said the group from New Zealand was important due to "New Zealand being a major trading partner with China".
Ms Jay has returned to Papamoa for the summer and will be working at Whakatane East I.T.
She has one semester left to complete her degree, where she has focused on networking and system network security.
