As a recent college graduate living in the Boston area, I had the opportunity to take a Computer Science class at Harvard University. The professor held a PhD from Oxford University and was the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) at one of the Boston area’s hot technology companies. This long-time member of the Harvard Adjunct Faculty had made a reputation for himself and his class by regularly hiring the top students from the classes he taught at Harvard. The class I took had at least five hundred other students with me in the large auditorium. Graduate Assistants provided weekly section meetings and graded all the work, except for a final project which was optional but required to earn a top grade in the class. I chose to do a final project and completed the class with an A minus. Two years later, I managed to get a reference from this popular professor to secure what was then my dream job.
