My Story

In August of 2017, I was bit by the programming bug and began my dive into the world of web development. Beginning with the basics of HTML and CSS from Codecademy, I found my way to The Odin Project. It's here that I experienced the awesomeness of JavaScript followed by an adventure through the workings of Ruby and Ruby on Rails. While the sheer mass of information was overwhelming at times, I was absorbing new concepts at every change I had.

Knowing the reality of affording a second college degree or attending a bootcamp were out of the question, the plan was to continue the scouring of the internet for additional free resources for learning. Around the time of finishing The Odin Project curriculum, I applied for and received a scholarship to complete the Udacity Front-End Developer Nanodegree. This program exposed me to the JavaScript frameworks of the world, with a special focus on React. At the same time, I also was given the opportunity at one of my jobs to implement a MERN app to solve the time management challenge faced by college students. In the end, the nanodegree was finished well ahead of schedule and the app deployed to production.

The time then came to prepare for a career shift. Teaching is fulfilling in its own ways, but being a life-long learner who loves to problem-solve has made me drawn toward the life of a web developer. Since June of 2019, I have been working as a full-stack engineer refining my front-end skills while also developing talents as a Python programmer. While working in healthcare tech during the day, ed tech and fin tech are definite areas that intrigue me in my off hours.