Living in the 21st century, everything seems to revolve around technology and the impact its developments have on society. NVIDIA, a company that works to create graphic processing units for the gaming industry along with developing innovative graphics, is now interested in establishing a partnership with PASD to raise awareness of the technology industry. Robert Zuppert, 1998 PAHS graduate, leads this partnership.

Zuppert has been at NVIDIA for three and a half years. He works on driving innovative technology across the Federal government to tackle the government’s problems.

NVIDIA focuses on changing the world in artificial intelligence, supercomputing, virtual reality, autonomous driving and gaming. For the school, however, Zuppert and NVIDIA will get students the necessary exposure they may need in order to excel in a technology field.

“When I was in high school I sat there like, ‘What do I want to do? What jobs are there going to be in the future?’ And now you can start to see how technology is not only changing society, but the changing the future job market,” Zuppert said. “I see this bridge that [NVIDIA] creates for our customers and how technology is changing so quickly. I now see the opportunity for partnering with education to help bridge the gap between future jobs, where technology is going and what skills you need to learn in high school that will enable you to find new job opportunities in the technology field.”

There was no clear path to getting him a job in the technology field, but Zuppert says his time at Pottsville helped him develop vital teamwork skills in order for him to thrive after high school and at NVIDIA.

“One thing that Pottsville really taught me was work ethic and really driving for success, and I think that really helped me throughout my career,” Zuppert said.

Zuppert is in the early stages of developing a partnership with the school.

“I think [the plan] will change over time, but the initial goals are three-pronged. First, create awareness about technology so students can see the future of technology and how it is impacting the world. Secondly is to provide basic skills that are required for jobs in areas like computer and data science. It’s about creating a skills set that students can learn to grow with. Thirdly is creating a stream of information in order to learn about technologies that will impact the market,” Zuppert said.

Zuppert hopes that this exposure to technology will lead students in directions that they may not have considered before or help them be prepared for the future. He is currently coordinating with the IT department at PASD to provide students access to iPad applications focused on computer programming. Providing students with this type of information will be the beginning step of the partnership.