Ten ways to connect a young person with the real world.
Open Circuit is the connector, not another program to enroll in. Each of these is a simple, real experience that puts young people face to face with the people building our community.
Offer one of these Bring your child
Mentor Meetups
One-on-one and small-group conversations with someone doing the work. Low commitment, high impact, and often the spark that makes a career feel real.
Workplace Tours
A guided look at a studio, lab, firm, kitchen, clinic, or job site. Young people see what a workday actually looks like, not just what a title sounds like.
Career Exploration Events
Community gatherings where young people meet professionals across many fields in one place, ask questions, and discover paths they had never considered.
Industry Panels
A handful of professionals share the real story of their careers, including the detours, the pivots, and the dead ends that textbooks leave out.
Hands-on Workshops
Learn one real skill by doing it, led by someone who does it for a living. Making something builds confidence that a lecture never could.
Passion Project Mentorship
We pair a young person's idea with a professional who can help move it forward, from a first sketch to something real.
Community Design Challenges
Teams of young people tackle a real local problem with guidance from working professionals, learning to think, collaborate, and build.
Innovation Showcases
Young people present what they have built or learned to the community, gaining the experience of sharing their work with a real audience.
Job Shadowing
A young person spends part of a day alongside a professional in a field they are curious about, seeing the work up close and in motion.
Service Learning Projects
Young people give back through hands-on projects that serve the community, connecting real skills to real impact.
Every one of these depends on people who are willing to share what they know. In-person programs start in the Austin metro and Central Texas, and grow from there.
Real fields, real workplaces
Every program is a doorway into a working world that is closer than most young people realize.
Creative studios
Science & research
Skilled trades
Culinary arts
Design & architecture
Construction & engineeringWhich one could you offer?
Most of our programs start with a single professional saying yes. Pick the one that fits you, and we handle the rest.
I can help with one of these We're an organization