Hey everyone!
My name is Jeffrey Payne, and I’ve wanted to be a software engineer ever since I was in elementary school. I took my first coding class at the Apple Store when they were participating in the “Hour of Code” movement by Code.org, and I took Computer Science classes all through middle and high school. I even went to college for Information Science and Arts at the University of Arizona and was part of the group that won first place in the app development category of our senior showcase.
While it sounds like I should know how to build an app from the ground up or create an API, I don’t.
My main goal in those classes was just to pass, to get a grade good enough that I wouldn’t fall behind or end up on academic probation, risking my financial aid. Because of this, I focused more on “keeping up” than on actually understanding what was being taught. Professor Google and Lecturer Stack Overflow were my crutches during my entire 4-year degree. I’m not going to lie: I have no clue how my group and I were able to start with nothing and end up in first place for our senior showcase.
Since graduating, I’ve been struggling through the post-grad life for the last few months. All of the jobs I’ve seen or applied for require a skill set that I feel like I just don’t have. I’d try opening up LeetCode, and all the information I supposedly learned about data structures and algorithms was just nonexistent.
If you want me to write a simple Python script to go through a dataset, build a password generator, or make a call from a simple API off the top of my head, I absolutely can. Anything more complicated than that? Call someone else.
Because of this huge gap in knowledge, I spent most of this last year in a depressive state. I kept wondering if I just wasted four years of my life trying to get this degree but not getting anything in return, knowledge-wise. Instead of going for the job or career that I wanted, I ended up working this miserable IT help desk job at one of our local hospitals during the day and just sulking at night.
The post-grad depression was real... until I realized that I was the reason it was real.
For whatever reason, I felt like my life was over when it’s just beginning. I’m in my 20s and have free will (not to mention the internet), so why not just teach myself these skills? That’s when I hopped on Google and did some research. And that’s when I found The Odin Project.
The Odin Project is a free and open-source curriculum designed not only to teach you full-stack web development but also how to learn.
Now, you might be asking, “Why The Odin Project and not something like Codecademy or FreeCodeCamp?” Well, first off, I discovered The Odin Project through FreeCodeCamp, but I was drawn to the fact that you have to do everything yourself. There’s no integrated IDE with all the required packages installed for you right out of the box. Instead, you have a lesson, questions you should answer to make sure you understand the topic, and homework (yes, homework).
I’m at the point in my life where I want to learn, but on my own time. I want to get my hands dirty to understand something that interests me and not have to worry about a GPA or a grade. Not to mention, the reviews for this course have been crazy good.
Now… why the blog?
Well, in order for me to make sure that I fully understand a topic, I need to be able to explain it to others. I don’t have anyone else going through this journey with me, so I decided that after each lesson, I’m going to teach the topics that I learned right here to YOU.
Not only will this help me solidify the topic in my mind, but maybe we can build a community? You know, ask questions, hype each other up, and PLEASE call me out if I misunderstood something. I would rather be corrected than move on when I don’t understand a crucial topic.
Right now, I’m going to be starting the first “official” lesson once I get past the introductory and prerequisite sections. Does that mean I’m skipping them? Absolutely not. Not only do they help you prepare for this curriculum, but they also have actual info that will help you along the way. Please, please, PLEASE, do not skip them if you’re also thinking about starting The Odin Project.
That being said, welcome to the journey! I don’t know where we’ll end up, but I’m glad you’re here!
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