Journey to becoming a Google Certified Android Developer/ ALC Experience
This an attempt to highlight the different timelines in the ALC journey. Hopefully this helps potential ALC members feel the experience even before they begin.
PS: This is basically squeezing 4 months experience into one article so might be a TLDR;
ALC - This is Andela’s Android Learning Community
My Android development life before ALC
I fell in love with Android development during my University days, majorly because i loved the idea i could control my phone’s behavior to suite my personal needs by just building an Android app. Some things i have tried to do to on my Android device are:
- An Alarm Clock app that uses fingerprint authentication to snooze or dismiss the Alarm.
- An SmsLogger that syncs all SMS on my phone with a remote server.
I attempted some these and some other ideas for just my phone and didn’t go much further. My attempts involved reading articles, getting code online and hacking it to work for me etc. They were not clean and professional but since the apps were for my use only, it didn’t matter.
I didn’t put much effort in the aspects of user experience and design because i was building these apps for my personal use.
After attending the Google I/O extended event in 2015, i became more passionate about Android development and even more for the community around it both in Nigeria and the World at large. It is a really vibrant community. Following this experience, i decided to take my passion for android development seriously rather than than hacking together code i got online to develop apps for myself.
I embarked on this journey to becoming a professional android developer in 2016 during my NYSC. I started off with Reto Meier’s Professional Android Application Development. Then i took an Android course on Udemy and the Android beginner course on Udacity. These resources exposed me to concepts that make the foundation of Android.
After these, i was still hungry for more especially cause i knew many of the resources were old and Android was really evolving. I also needed structure as to how to combine these different concepts and use them to build quality android applications.
The ALC Challenge
This started when i came across a post on one of Techcabal’s daily newsletters.

I was drawn to it cause of the idea of learning with a group of really hungry developers but i almost drew away from it cause of the time commitment stated (10 hours a week). It looked like a lot for me cause i have a full time job as a Software Engineer. I didn’t believe it would be possible cause of how intense my job can be at times but i just took on the challenge as a way to prove to myself that my prior knowledge of Android is not a waste.
The challenge was a to build a Github client that uses the Github API to fetch the top java developers in Nigeria. I also included a details screen for any selected developer on the list. The challenge was quite simple to me cause i have done something like that in the past involving fetching data via an API and displaying on a list in Android.
I missed the initial deadline due to procrastination but fortunately the deadline was extended and i was able to complete the challenge.
Slack Party and First Hangout Session
March 21st I got a mail from the ALC team saying i had been accepted into the community.

They shared the link to the slack channel and i couldn’t wait to meet the other developers.
From Day 1 they emphasized owning your learning and driving the community. This was really important cause it allowed people learn at their pace and also prevented silos. The channel became alive and people could not just stop sharing even from the first day. We shared screenshots and github repo links of our solutions to the challenge so we were already learning from ourselves from the first day.
At the online slack party, we were told the importance of the program, the sponsors, how we were among a hundred and something selected out of around 300 applications. These made us (or me) feel special.
We had a google hangout session with the organizers Chimdi, Solomon (Awesome guys!!), Jeremy from Andela, and a representative from Google. They also emphasized the importance of the program in Africa and how our performance would encourage the continuation and spread of the program in Africa. These in a way changed my approach towards the program and i took it more seriously.
There were other hangout sessions over the course of the program. We got to learn from awesome Android developers both from within and outside Nigeria. They shared their stories and also answered questions. These sessions were really inspiring.
Udacity Fast Track Course

This course was to help prepare us for the Google certificate exam. It comprised of courses taken from the Udacity Android Nanodegree. We were given a schedule to help us cover the contents of the course before the date for the exam. This really helped me cause even though it was self paced, setting deadlines helped me create a plan to meet each deadline even with my daily job life. This helped prevent a case of rushing the course content few days to the exam.
Challenges faced / Milestones
Due to the nature of my job it looked almost impossible to meet the deadlines. I read Moyinoluwa Adeyemi’s article on how she was able to complete her Android Nanodegree and she mentioned doing two hours a day to cover the contents of the course. I tried this approach but honestly many days i was not able to achieve this. I then resolved to watching the lessons on the Udacity mobile application during free times like during transit to the office in the morning. I used the weekends to complete the coding tasks in the topics covered for a milestone. I had to work on some of the projects till 5 mins before the deadline to submit. This almost cost me once. Am basically saying It’s not easy doing this with a full time job but it is not impossible!
We were broken into groups with 6 members each. Group leaders were selected by group members. My group members were really awesome and we really helped motivate each other. I can never forget the day one of them (Abdul) saved me from missing a deadline. I had plan to submit before 12 am but fell asleep. He called me 30 mins to the time cause he didn’t see my submission. I was able to finished up and submit before the deadline cause of him.
There were three milestones and i was able to complete all the projects attached to each milestone. The best part of completing a project was the code review. I love code reviews!! They make you a better developer. From my first review I finally got convinced to try the ButterKnife library for data binding after hearing about it for so long!!
The sharing spirit of the community also made completing these projects easier. People would create channels for each project and drop screenshots of their projects. This really help me especially at times i was stuck at coming up with a design mockups for the project. People also shared articles that helped explain the concepts needed to complete the project. Some people went as far as helping others debug issues they faced. It was really awesome seeing everyone working together to achieve this feat. It was obvious everyone in the community had all they help they needed to achieve this feat.
Exam preparation/Inspiration
A projecthon was created nation wide to enable members of the community come together and help one another complete all the projects.
I wasn’t able to attend the projecthon but from images and testimonies posted on the channel, it was really awesome. Articles written by people with experience writing the exam were posted on the channel. This really helped create a picture of what to expect in the exam.
I also used details from some of these stories to pick out topics of the course content i needed to revisit. For me it was UI testing and background services.
Certification Exam
I started the exam 12am on a Saturday July 15. I went through the content of the exam and was then relaxed when i found out the preparation really paid off. It basically involved an application with functionalities that covered most of the topics covered in the fast track course. I was able to complete the exam and submit around 5pm the same day. I was also able to complete the ID verification stage.
Exit Interview
I received a mail from Udacity stating my submission had been graded and i was ready for the next stage which is the exit interview.

I was able to scheduled the interview with Anthony. The interview was really awesome! I was asked questions related to the application in the exam. I was also asked to provide the ID i used for verification and some questions relating to Android development. Basically the interview was to prove i really wrote the exam myself.
Certificate
On the 21st of July, i got a mail from Udacity confirming i had passed all the requirements for the certification and now approved as a Google Certified Associate Android Developer. Finally!! 😅

Final Thoughts
I have not always been a big fan of certificates but i think this was worth it cause of the journey. This is a journey i would really love to embark again and conquer more technologies. Am laying emphasis on the journey cause, to me it just made the experience feel like school again and unconsciously you are attaining heights in a field that is really important today. Imaging doing something like this every year, you would have made so much progress by just having fun with other tech enthusiasts along side your daily work. Its a win/win situation.
The next thing for me and the rest of this great movement is to show off what we just attained by developing applications of world class quality and also giving back the knowledge we have acquired to passionate beginners. Hopefully these would encourage and inspire more people to join the community.
Appreciation
Thanks to Andela Nigeria, Udacity, Google and other sponsor’s of this awesome program for this opportunity! It was really great!!
Also big thanks to Awosupin olalere Solomon and Chimdindu Aneke!! They really made this experience awesome for everyone.
