Wednesday with Marco, ITS Meccatronica student in Bergamo
A second-year ITS Academy student uploads a robotics project at lunch, gets contacted by an automation company by Friday, and figures out what to say in the interview using a Decision Pack he didn't write himself.
09:30 — Lab
Marco is 21. He's halfway through the second year of an ITS Academy program in Meccatronica in Bergamo. This morning his class is in the school's lab finishing a vision-system integration on a small production cell — a Cognex camera reading a barcode, a Siemens PLC sequencing the conveyor, a six-axis arm picking based on what the camera sees.
It works. Two weeks ago it didn't. Marco wrote 60% of the PLC code and most of the OPC UA bindings. The whole thing now sits in a Git repo plus a folder of CAD files plus a 4-minute video he shot on his phone during the first successful run.
13:15 — Lunch
He sits at a bar across from the lab, opens his InTransparency profile from his phone, and uploads the lot. The app asks him for one paragraph in plain Italian describing what the project is. He types five sentences. He adds his tutor's name. He adds the company that hosted the stage curriculare last semester.
Then he closes the laptop and eats.
Overnight — the part Marco doesn't see
The platform's AI reads his code, looks at his CAD files, parses his README, and skims the video transcript. It extracts a structured skill list:
- Siemens PLC — TIA Portal, Structured Text, Function Blocks
- OPC UA — server configuration, basic security
- Cognex VisionPro — pattern matching, calibration
- Industrial robotics — basic kinematics, ABB RAPID syntax (light)
- Mechanical CAD — Solidworks parts and assemblies
- Project documentation — README quality, version control hygiene
The skills aren't a checklist Marco populated. They are a function of what he actually built. The AI is wrong about one thing — it tagged "advanced safety system design" because his README mentioned a light curtain, but he only configured it, didn't design it. He'll downgrade that himself when he sees it tomorrow.
Friday morning — a message
Marco's phone vibrates at 09:48. A talent acquisition lead at an automation systems integrator near Brescia has sent him a message. The message went through the Mediation Inbox at his ITS Academy first — a staff member approved it at 09:30 because it conformed to the school's communication policy.
The message is short. It references the production-cell project specifically. It mentions the stage company by name. It asks if Marco would be open to a 30-minute call about a junior automation engineer position.
Marco has never heard of the company before. He clicks through to the company's profile. Six people. €1.4M revenue. 12 active projects in food-and-beverage automation.
Friday afternoon — the Decision Pack
Marco's career services tutor, who he has WhatsApped, sends him a one-line reply: "I've pulled the Decision Pack the company saw before they messaged you. Look at it before the call."
The Decision Pack is a two-page PDF. Marco didn't write it. The platform generated it from his profile. It has:
- His verified skill list, with confidence scores and links to the artifacts they were extracted from
- His ITS program, his tutor's name, his stage company's name
- His normalized grade equivalents (his Italian grades translated for any non-Italian recruiter who reads them)
- A short personality summary based on the optional questionnaire he took two months ago
- An employability prediction with the assumptions visible
He reads it. It's accurate. He also realizes for the first time that he comes across as more confident in writing than he feels in person — the personality section is the one he's been least sure about, and seeing it framed by an outside system is the first time it has clicked.
This is the part the HR consultants we talked to kept emphasizing. Showing yourself off doesn't help if you don't know who you are first. Marco is figuring out who he is by reading what an outside observer says about him — built from his actual work.
The call
Marco takes the 30-minute call on Monday. He's nervous, but he has read the Decision Pack twice and he's not blindsided by any question. The company asks him to come in for a half-day trial in two weeks. He says yes.
Whether he gets the offer depends on the trial. Whether the trial happens at all is what changed when he uploaded the project files at lunch on Wednesday.
That's the platform from a student's seat.