Computer Savvy

By KRISTI ALBERTSON

Editor's note - This is the third in a series of stories about student entrepreneurs graduating from high school this week.

The Daily Inter Lake

In less than a decade, Brandon Norick has learned at least three languages. He has started a successful business with sufficient income to cover his love for high-tech toys. He has become a go-to guy for Internet- and computer-related problems.

On Saturday, he'll graduate from high school.

Norick, a senior at Columbia Falls High School, has turned his love for programming into a successful business venture. Designing Web pages for local writers and artists has enabled him to pay for a huge portion of his college education.

He has learned three programming languages and constantly is adding to his knowledge base. Even people who work in high-tech jobs are impressed with Norick's expertise.

Last summer, he got a job in Semitool's IT department. He wowed his supervisors with his programming skills before he even walked through the door.

"The night before they hired him, they said, 'You're a junior in college, right?'" Norick's mother, Tara, said with a laugh.

Norick started small; his first Web page was about staplers. His mother used to subscribe to an e-mail newsletter for children, and Norick, then 10 years old, found an item in one issue about building Web sites. He followed the basic, step-by-step instructions, added an image and some text, and soon had a simple site about staplers.

After that, he was hooked. He used his allowance to buy a thick book on HTML coding.

"He said, 'I'm going to learn that,'" Tara Norick said.

She was skeptical at first; that thick book was daunting. But it wasn't long before Norick mastered HTML and built a Web page for his family.

When he was 11, he learned another programming language, JAVA, at Flathead Valley Community College. A year later, he landed his first paid Web design job.

His father, Skyler, put him in touch with Roland Cheek, a local writer. Norick built a Web site from scratch and taught Cheek's wife, Jane, basic skills that would allow her to maintain the site on her own.

"It was a lot of work, and he learned so much," Tara Norick said.

Cheek paid him in software, she added, so he was able to get a new version of Adobe Photoshop and improve his skills. He had a few other jobs after finishing Cheek's, mostly updating and upgrading sites, but he also began helping others learn basic Internet skills.

"During that time, and still now, he was working with a lot of older people and teaching them," Tara Norick said. "He has the patience for that."

Norick has a knack for cutting through the technical jargon and explaining things in terms "generic people like us" can understand, she said. He did some repairs and showed people how to do basic Internet operations, such as virus scans and setting up e-mail accounts.

He called this "business" Premium Computer Services, and he still gets calls from people he has helped.

When he started high school, Norick was one of nine students from across the country chosen for the National 4-H Youth Technology Leadership Team. The students received all-expenses-paid trips to Raleigh, N.C., St. Louis and Washington, D.C., and learned technology-related skills.

Norick learned yet another programming language, PHP, which is intended for dynamic Web pages with constant changes and updates. He used PHP to build a Web site for local artist Allen Jimmerson, who wanted to put some of his art online.

There is a single database behind the entire site, which displays Jimmerson's original paintings and prints. People can browse the site and check prices.

To place an order, however, they still have to call Jimmerson.

"I offered to set it up so people can order prints online, but he didn't want it," Norick said. "He likes to talk to people."

Each job has made Norick a better programmer - but there is one area in which he feels deficient.

"The funny thing is, I'm not artistically inclined. My biggest challenge is, what do you want it to look like?" he said. "I can't pick a color scheme to save my life."

He is experienced in Photoshop, so he can take care of the graphics in a pinch. But it's better if customers can tell him exactly what they want to see on the page.

Norick will continue to learn about Web design and programming when he leaves for Montana State University this fall. He plans to major in computer science and mathematics and hopes to earn his Ph.D. in software engineering.

It will be a challenge - which is what Norick loves most about programming.

"With this, you really have to think. When you can go through a day of school and not have to think that hard very often …" He shrugged. "With this, I can.

"This is why I love it. It makes the wheels turn."

On the 'Net: www.bnorick.net

Reporter Kristi Albertson may be reached at 758-4438 or by e-mail at kalbertson@dailyinterlake.com