Nearly 150 high school students gathered at Pace University’s Pleasantville campus for the second annual AV Talent Summit — an ambitious effort to get more young people interested in audiovisual careers. The event took place on November 20, supported by NextLVL Learning, is significantly larger than last year’s inaugural summit.
Industry heavyweights like Sennheiser, Legrand | AV, and Q-SYS showed up to talk with the next generation of AV professionals. Students from White Plains, Ossining, and — yes — Sleepy Hollow filled Pace’s Kessel Student Center to hear from industry leaders and learn about career opportunities in the tech sector.
The summit kicked off with a keynote from Brandon Beck, Ed.D., who shared a wild story about literally catching on fire while playing with gasoline as a teen (seriously) before turning his life around to become an educator and author. His message to the room of 16-18 year olds? Everyone’s a leader in some capacity, even if they don’t realize it yet.
A panel moderated by Alesia Hendley (Sennheiser) and featured Kristin Bidwell of Audiovisual Consulting Team, Erica Carroll of CharBett Strategies and Bradford Terry of Pace Univeristy followed. Their advice was refreshingly direct: network aggressively, build your personal brand, and don’t be afraid to showcase your skills. “If you can sell yourself, you can sell anything,” Hendley told the crowd.
Bidwell shared a story highlighting her career so far; designing the audio at San Francisco 49ers Levi Stadium. “Imagine building something that will be there for years and years,” Bidwell said as she highlighted the unique experiences audiovisual professionals enjoy.
The most interesting moments came during the student panel, moderated by Brittany DiCesare of Control Concepts, where current Pace undergrads made it clear they’re not just looking for jobs — they want actual careers. Full Sail University reps got the room buzzing with talk of esports opportunities, from racing sims to audio engineering programs.
NextLVL Learning, founded by George Chacko and Rich Miller III, organized the event. While some in the industry stress about talent shortages, they’re actually doing something about it.
Tim Albright is the founder of AVNation and is the driving force behind the AVNation network. He carries the InfoComm CTS, a B.S. from Greenville College and is pursuing an M.S. in Mass Communications from Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville. When not steering the AVNation ship, Tim has spent his career designing systems for churches both large and small, Fortune 500 companies, and education facilities.
