Instead of having them spend that month doing arithmetic, make them write something that’s, say, 50,000 words long. As far as I can tell, the most important non-technical skill that someone is supposed to learn in college is how to write—and it’s amazing how many people can’t do it.
I know someone who works in HR/recruitment and she told me that having a marathon or similar achievement on your CV makes a big impression on recruiters.
Speaking as a two-time NaNoWriMo winner myself (2009: Not Taking This Seriously, 2010: Kevin Levitin and the Special Snowflake Syndrome), I don’t consider it an impressive credential. Writing something good during NaNoWriMo is impressive, but merely generating the 50,000 words is not difficult as long as you keep a sufficiently low quality standard.
My suggestion:
Instead of having them spend that month doing arithmetic, make them write something that’s, say, 50,000 words long. As far as I can tell, the most important non-technical skill that someone is supposed to learn in college is how to write—and it’s amazing how many people can’t do it.
It never occurred to me to consider completion of NaNoWriMo a credential, but now that I think of it, it actually is.
I know someone who works in HR/recruitment and she told me that having a marathon or similar achievement on your CV makes a big impression on recruiters.
Speaking as a two-time NaNoWriMo winner myself (2009: Not Taking This Seriously, 2010: Kevin Levitin and the Special Snowflake Syndrome), I don’t consider it an impressive credential. Writing something good during NaNoWriMo is impressive, but merely generating the 50,000 words is not difficult as long as you keep a sufficiently low quality standard.