THANK YOU COLAB KADUNA NIGERIA, QUINCY LARSON, FREECODECAMP AND ALEXANDER KALLAWAY

I recently got my FCC’s Front End Development Certificate and the experience has been really fulfilling. For someone who has a degree in Computer Science, I don’t know what other feeling can and will top this (except the love for my wife and the birth of a child). So I am writing this to share some of my experiences and knowledge gathered while trying to achieve this level of self-satisfaction and fulfillment.
THE BEGINNING
In a class of about 70 plus computer science graduates in 2009, only about 5 of my friends and colleagues continued actively in the Development field. The rest of us ended up in the category of IT support or doing something entirely different from our degrees. Not like I blame the educational system, I just want to buttress the point that becoming a Developer is strictly achieved if you have a personal commitment to achieve it.
So in the fourth quarter of 2014, I decided to join the Development category and I reached out to one of my colleagues who followed that path, unfortunately I did not get all the answers I was looking for. However, this move exposed me to lots of online learning platforms (and that would be the beginning of my problems in the search of a suitable “Development” career path).
THE MIDDLE
The search for the right development career path was a long and lonely one. I had never felt so alone in my life because the “Development” gurus were busy writing code for companies and the few that were willing to teach the next generation had a lot of students to attend to and can only teach you “Beginners Guide”, especially in a country where Development was still a new phenomenon. In other words, I felt like Sandra Bullocks in the movie — Gravity. Gratefully, hope was restored when I read Stack Overflow’s yearly survey that a high percentage of Developers were self-taught and most of them did not have a Computer Science degree. That for me meant “Keep going son!”
I also learned how difficult it was to find a certified developer course that is trusted and recognized in the world. Also, the increasing rate of third party App Creation platforms, meant that one could get lost while tagging himself as a Developer. Don’t get me wrong, these platforms speed up IT processes for businesses and are 100% effective, however, they have restrictions on expressions of creativity for a Developer, since technically they were built by other Developers.
Another challenge I had was knowing what part of Development I wanted to go into. I love video games and sadly that led to so many unfinished C++ and C# courses on Udemy especially the day I found out it took 200+ people to create a Call of Duty game. I will still take up the challenge in the future though.
Fast forward to March 2017, I remember seeing a job vacancy on Twitter for a Web Developer position (at this stage I had done 70% of Web Development courses on Udemy and I could use WordPress, so why not?), so I applied for it. I was invited for an interview and I went to pay them a visit. It turned out, I had struck a gold mine. Not only did I find a co-working space, I also found a like-minded group of people, in the FLESH! I really could not hide my excitement. One other unique thing was that it is located in a region of my country known to have a lot of clichés like; it is a volatile region and it is inhabited by unintelligent life forms and what not. So you can imagine how excited I was that they had defeated that sense of reasoning. Anyway, I ended up subscribing to their monthly plans to use their co-work space and learn a lot in the shortest time possible because I am in a profession where I move around a lot.
THE END
To the part of starting Free Code Camp, I soon realized that I still did not know enough about Development and still have not earned the title “Developer” yet because, during conversations with well established and senior developers I found myself asking so many questions and trying very hard to maintain my “Imposter Effect.” Then, one day while having one of those discussions the topic Free Code Camp was suggested and I decided to give it a try.
The HTML and CSS challenges were a bit easy and I scaled through them in no time. Problem started when algorithm challenges and personal projects started, I noticed that I had a lot of challenges committing myself to the course, partly because I had moved again to a different location. Then came Alexander Kallaway to save the day with a #100DaysOfCode challenge and that was the fuel that drove my passion to the achievement I have today and the journey continues.
CONCLUSION
This article will not be complete if I do not motivate the people that are still going through the process and to them I say:
1. Do not give up; it literally took me eight (8) years to get to this level of self-satisfaction.
2. I am sure you have heard this a lot, but I will still say it anyway: “Google is your best friend.”
3. Take the words in the programming courses with their literal meaning. For instance, when faced with the word “Inheritance” it literally means something is inheriting something else in your code.
4. Groups and communities are very helpful, use and cherish them.
5. If you get stuck while doing your projects, always refer to your achieved challenges. They have a lot of answers.
Thank you Colab Kaduna
Thank you Quincy Larson
Thank you Free Code Camp
Thank you Alexander Kallaway
