Wow. you have a good idea for your future, unlike me. All I know is that i wuld like to go on to use writing in my future job too.
At my schoolwe do alot of travel writing and it's boring crap, I wouldn't recommend it!
I'm guessing that by sci-fi conventions you meant the big sci-fi convention they had in the SECC in Glasgow a while back, I went to that one too!