In the Beginning There was...
I graduated from a brick and mortar university in July of this year with a Master's in Science for data science. I graduated at a time when the world was in the bowels of dealing with a pandemic. My graduation was digital. My internship opportunity went up in smoke right along with the economy. So I decided at that time that I was going to make the most of it and focus on the positive during the negative. There is ALWAYS a positive!! In this situation, I Found several positives. Educational and networking Meetups went digital so I could attend webinars from all over the world. More schools offered their classes online and a lot of schools and companies offered their classes for free. I had more time on my hands to improve my existing skillsets and learn new ones. People were helping people!
Preparation, Goals, and Opportunity...
I joined every relevant group on Meetup and attended many webinars. I signed up for plenty of online courses. I read blogs and articles. I bought and read books. I joined a hackathon. I volunteered my data science skills through Datakind. I kept applying to jobs that were quickly disappearing due to the pandemic. Then, I joined a program for veterans and their spouses called Hiring Our Heros. That was life-changing for me. It was through this program that I got an internship as a junior data scientist yay! That was several months ago and I am still at that job and couldn't be happier. Long term I had another big goal in mind, back to school. I wanted to get a second Master's degree in software development. Now, I am still recovering from my first round of grad school and did not plan on attending the second round of grad school for years. Yet an opportunity popped up with Alabama Women in Tech. They were offering a full-ride scholarship to Flatiron. Whoever was chosen for the scholarship, could choose whichever bootcamp they desired and software engineering (full stack web development) was one of the options. I flocked to the opportunity and applied, wrote the essays, went through the interviews, and was selected for the scholarship. I am so thankful. This amazing opportunity had fallen into my lap. HOW COULD I TURN THAT DOWN?! So here I am in the second week of bootcamp. I am drowning between working full-time and the huge learning curve up front but I am still swimming...still floating onward towards this amazing goal in my universe!
Why I Want to Add Web Development to My Skillset...
Gaining web development skills will open up different and additional job opportunities for me. It will help me stand out from the crowd as a data scientist with web development skills. I plan on continuing my career as a data scientist and combining web development with data science. In combination with data science, web development skills will allow me to build websites and applications where users can interact with my machine learning models and output for example. Learning several more languages for web development such as Ruby, HTML, CSS, and Javascript will add to my arsenal and capabilities. Learning web development will allow me to work strictly as a web developer too if I ever feel the need or have the desire. Lastly, let's not forget the art and creativity that comes with developing websites!
In summary, I decided to learn software engineering because it will combine nicely with my data science skills, open up new opportunities in the job market, and will allow me to be creative and have fun making beautiful web pages for myself and others to enjoy!
Top comments (2)
Interesting story good luck.
That is a great story.
I hope that you find Flatiron interesting and enjoyable.
Best of Luck,
M