Although I have just recently started the Online Software Engineering program here at Flatiron, my background is quite different. Before this, I was an ESL teacher living overseas in Japan. So why make such a huge leap into programming? My personal reasons boiled down to these basic few:
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A general enjoyment for the nature of coding. I have always enjoyed tasks that challenge my brain and force me to think of them different ways. The more I learned about coding, the more it just seemed to fit my personality.
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The community. One of my favorite things about the coding world is how huge and diverse it is. There are so many people from different walks of life in the programming world. And the amount of support and resources that exist are truly staggering.
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A desire to keep up with technology. As someone who was always interested in technology as a child, it kind of scared me how quickly I started getting left behind in technological knowledge as an adult. When I worked outside the tech field, it was really difficult to keep up with it. But I truly enjoy it, and I think that technology is the path to the world’s future. I want to keep up with it in order to be a more active part of that future.
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The career options. It’s probably not fashionable to say that money is a motivating factor. But the width of great-paying careers for experienced programmers were absolutely one of the things that brought me here. I hope that I can make myself even more capable and more successful through Flatiron.
I’ve learned a lot already, even though it’s often difficult. But I feel ready to continue giving my best effort!