On the Road to Becoming a Software Developer

I have been coding almost 5 years now, and there is a reason why I want to study computer science.

Five years ago, whenever I needed money, I would ask my mom.

She didn’t like me to ask for money, and would blame me for her financial troubles. I felt then that I wanted to earn my own money.

I saw street vendors able to earn money just through copy and paste. It was then I decided I learn about computers, and maybe someday earn a living.

I registered for a basic short course in computers at school. I saw that some students and the teacher were able to earn money just by setting up Window OS for others.

After I finished this course, I began to repair software and hardware on my own. Still 13 years old, I thought I would start a small business to provide basic repair services.

The computer repair business did not prove to be profitable.

I saved up $150 dollars, bought three broken desktops computers, and repaired all three.

I was able to sell one to a classmate who loves to play games, and the other two are still in my room getting older.

I never had a client except for my uncle, and I still keep wanting to make money, but in the computer repair business, there are more repair shops than there are customers.

I went to discuss this problem with my computer science teacher and he told me that the best way to earn money with a computer is to learn programming.

Still 13, there was no technical school in Phnom Penh that would accept me, but fortunately my teacher was able help with admission to a private technology training program with older students.

I spend the next 2 years training in this program, beginning with C/C++ and finished with C# Advance.

After this initial training, I helped developed human resource management and a point-of-sale (POS) software with a local firm, while at the same time I developed two software systems related to restaurant and food service management.

Next, I enrolled in full-time programming course with at another school and made many friends and contacts there. While at this school one of my teachers saw I was motivated to learn and earn and offered an internship opportunity as a web developer at his company.

Being busy with work and still enrolled in high school full-time, I completed the first term at this school and decided to focus on my own self-paced internet learning program.

I continue to learn, improve and expand my skill set as time allows and I enjoy digging deep into emerging technologies.

My advice to young people is to begin to pursuit your dream in any way possible as soon as you can, because technology never stops moving forward and there is value in every lesson you can learn.

For young people who want to learn technical skills, there are more schools and opportunities for self-learning than ever before, so find your own starting point and get going along your own road to success.

Now at 17 and in my senior year at high school, I keep busy learning in school and improving my skills, and continue to provide freelance software development services.

To read more about me, visit thakvika.com