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Jonathan Nicolas Meijer (born June 16, 1982) is a French Canadian entrepreneur, computer engineer, software developer and network administrator.
[edit] Early Life
Born in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, Jonathan first lived for 12 years in Barrhaven in neighbouring Nepean, before moving to the neighbourhood of Alta Vista of Ottawa in 1994. Between 1988 and 1995, he attended school at the École élémentaire publique Charlotte-Lemieux; after less than two months of grade 8, he skipped to grade 9, thereby also attending a different school, l'École secondaire publique De La Salle. On September 7, 2000, he started his studies in Computer Engineering at the University of Ottawa. He finished his bachelor with Magna cum laude on April 26, 2004, after which he started working as a software developer for i4design in Hull, Quebec. After a few weeks, due to an internal company reorganization, he worked for Protocol IS where he is still employed primarily as a WebObjects developer. In early 2004, Jonathan moved to Hull, Quebec, where he lived for nearly 2 years, before moving to Gatineau, Quebec in December 2005.
[edit] Employment
In June 1997, through the CEPOC co-op office, Jonathan was able to score a summer co-op job at Nortel. The co-op placement, which lasted approximately between July 3 and 31, was a position which consisted mostly in running automated tests in an AIN (Advanced Intelligent Network) system. In 1998, when he was still in Berlin, Germany in the context of his student exchange, Jonathan obtained, with the help of his father, a position in Product Verification (known internally as PV) for Norstar at Nortel. That term lasted approx June 22 till July 31, 1998. In 1999, Jonathan was hired as an Amiga sales representative and technician by Wonder Computers (defunct since February 21 (?), 2001). He left that position after approximately six weeks, around July 27, 1999, as he was going to leave for a three week course in Marienau, Germany, which he won two months earlier as the first prize of the Ontario High School German Contest (OHSGC). In June 2000, Jonathan obtained an 8-week long employment once again in the Norstar department of Nortel, but this time with the responsibility of creating the whole equipment inventory for the former Product Verification and Tech Trial labs.
[edit] Awards
Encouraged by his parents to follow the family tradition of academic excellence, Jonathan has always strived to be the best of the best.
[edit] Academic excellence
- June 26, 2000: Bronze Medal For Academic Excellence, ÉSP De La Salle
[edit] Mathematics contests
- 1996: 3rd place (Concours Pascal)
- 1997: 5th place (Coucours Cayley)
- 1998: 2nd place (Concours Fermat)
- 1999: 1st place (Concours Euclide)
- 2000: 2nd place (Concours Descartes)
- 2000: 1st place, AHSME; following his results in this American competition, he was the only one from his class qualified to try the next level, AIME.
[edit] Language proficiency
Jonathan grew up in a French-speaking home. At the age of three, he spent a half a day every week in an english-language daycare center in Barrhaven. This early exposure to English, along with television, provided him with the necessary knowledge to follow, without any trouble, English courses at school, which are mandatory for francophone students in Ontario. In grade 10, he started elementary German at school, and after taking another course in grade 11, he was prepared for his three-month student exchange term in Berlin. His complete immersion in German meant that he became a fluent speaker a few weeks before going back to Ottawa. This knowledge of German language, coupled with some strong exposure to Dutch in the summer of 2001, gave him a basic knowledge of Dutch. In September 2002, in the context of his B.A.Sc., Jonathan was required to take 3 non-engineering, non-science elective courses, out of which a maximum of one could be a language course. As a result, he chose Breton (CLT1530), in part because Irish, Scottish Gaelic and Welsh would have caused schedule conflicts. At the same time, Jonathan met his then-future husband Gary, with whom he spoke English most of the time, thereby strongly improving his eloquence of the language.
[edit] Facts & trivia
