Reflections

The past four months have been a WHIRLWIND. Over the course of my time in Flatiron's Software course, I learned so much and met many incredible people. Read on to hear more about my experience with Flatiron.

I'll start off by talking about why I chose to do a tech bootcamp. My introduction to programming was somewhat unconventional. It occurred early on in my life and accidentally while playing the computer game MarbleBlast Gold. I had completed all of the levels and wanted a new challenge, so, at ten years old, I turned to the internet in hopes of finding additional levels. I unfortunately did not find any new levels, but I did find a Youtube tutorial demonstrating how to modify the levels that already existed.

After following the tutorial, I had written my first lines of code. But I didn't know this at the time. All I knew was that I had typed some weird-looking words and symbols into a big black box, and had been able to customize the levels in my favorite game.

Fast forward 10+ years, and I found myself feeling unchallenged at work. I missed using my brain to solve complex problems, and knew that no amount of crossword puzzling would fill that void. I learned about tech bootcamps from a family friend who had completed one, and I started looking into them. I took the plunge and enrolled at Flatiron after dipping my toe into the programming pool through some free courses, and I'm so glad that I did.

Going into a tech bootcamp, I had some expectations and tons of questions. I knew that I would come out of the bootcamp with the ability to conceptualize, design, and build websites, but I really had no idea what that entailed. What was a backend? How did it communicate with a frontend? When would I start cracking cringey coding jokes? (The answer to that last one was two weeks in. What's a ghost's favorite data type? A BOOlean! Awful, I know)

Now, four months later, I have answers to all of those questions and so many more. I learned that JavaScript can be vanilla, which I guess makes frameworks such as React spicy? And I learned that Semantic UI can be both a help and a hinderance. Most importantly, though, I learned which parts of the app-building process I enjoy most and which parts make me want to escape from reality by blasting pop-punk.

Angst aside, I have enjoyed these past four months so much. I feel empowered and prepared to enter the job market, hiring freezes be damned. I plan to take the skills I gained over the past several months to a career focused on bridging the gap between tech and business, and I am excited to do so.