How I Grew With Google and Udacity -My Journey
By Marc Gallegos
In October of 2018, I signed up for the GrowWithGoogle Udacity Scholarship Challenge for a chance to win a nanodegree course Scholarship Sponsored by Udacity and Google to learn Android Basics to be able to make apps for today’s Android devices.
The email announcement for phase 2 was like receiving a golden ticket and I will admit even I cried tears of joy when I opened mine, as Google and Udacity saw in me what my employer, one of the largest Software and Gaming Console manufacturers in the world -never had.
Previously I had put myself through Technical College as a MicroComputer Electronics Technician. I am also certified through the ADDA as a Mechanical Drafter.
As a husband and father of 3, I worked whatever decent Tech jobs my expired (since’05) Technical College Certification could land me to keep food on the table, kids in clothes etc. and pay bills.
As much as I desired to, I could not afford to go to the local University.
About a year before, after seeing a Wired article about modern coding boot camps, my father had suggested I attend one to further my coding experience. A few months after he and I had talked about it, we discovered he had been diagnosed with stomach cancer. I used the money I was saving for the camp to be able to afford gas, food, and lodging so that we could accompany him to his specialist who was located over 300 miles away in Denver.
After seeing my apps, the material I had been learning, and the time and dedication I had sank into my projects, my parents were thrilled, and were proud of my choice to make a career of what I always dreamed to do, but till now was never able to pursue. In fact, this once-in-a-lifetime experience has brought me closer to my father.
As a retired Professor of English Literature, he wasn’t fully aware of all the career possibilities and opportunities for entry level programmers and was originally unsure of what careers could be had in coding. Now that he has seen some of the job listings and career potential for experienced coders he is proud to see me reaching those goals.
Udacity and Google helped us bridge a gap and form a common bond in our decisions to help others learn, that we didn’t realize at the time, but now see -had been missing.
A Microcomputer Electronics Technician by trade, I naturally found a niche in Remote Network and Gaming Support and have always loved my chosen field as I like to be able to help others with the talents I was blessed with. I remember even though the program was for those with little to no previous experience, I was still worried I might not have enough under my belt to qualify and succeed at programming when I signed up. I had some prior experience coding, as I had taught myself HTML and SMTP in college and back then, even made a digital HTML resume for business card CDs, complete with my embedded digitized drafting portfolio.
It felt like my career path with my current company had plateaued, I knew I could do more in my career and my community, do more to strengthen myself, and achieve higher goals, but I needed training that -to me at the time, was simply unattainable, I was growing unhappy with constant changes at work affecting policies empowering us to do our jobs for our clients efficiently, staffing issues, and scheduling changes thrown on us which, seemed impossible to keep up with and also match with my families’ schedules and kids’ last remaining events, as they already attend the local University, and my Daughter, being well into wildlands firefighter training to be an EMT.
I had been one of over 100,000 applicants for phase 1, -in which initial Grow with Google Developer Scholarship applicants received full access to our Udacity classrooms and nanodegree course material and received an email invitation to a private Udacity GWG Scholarship support workspace in Slack where we could receive or give help within our tracts’ respective channels on our projects, and discuss our lessons or even post and discuss random general and motivational stuff like pics, jokes, and the occasional rant or vent. By the end of that short 3 months we had bonded into a community of thinkers, learners, and student mentor/educators. Some of us initially had little to no experience with our chosen courses or even programming at all for that matter, and those that had, used those skills to help others.
Throughout phase 1, our selection phase -where we were reviewed for our projects and their content, and the participation we maintained within the community thru contact with our fellow students.
The end of phase 1 was very emotional for all of us, as not all of our new friends that we had gotten used to chatting with, helping, and working towards our goals with -had made the cut to phase 2.
To prevent us from losing touch with our newly created community, comraderies, contacts, and resources, some awesome development groups like- PepperBiscuits Development Group, which was created by students to continue collaborating on code and working together, we had made the decision to stay together and continue to grow and help each other as developers.
In phase 1, I had quickly taken to helping others in the Slack channel and in the Udacity forums so that they too, could get the same enjoyment out of the shared rare opportunity we had been generously given, and that they could enjoy the challenges of learning Android application development as much as I was. It felt good to be able to help my colleagues when they were stuck, so naturally whenever I could I would volunteer my (albeit-limited) knowledge in our new field of study.
After the guidance and tutelage I received, naturally after I felt more comfortable with my abilities in troubleshooting XML and Java code, I signed up to be a Student Mentor Guide and was eventually approved to help meetup with students 1-on-1 to assist them with lessons, concepts, techniques, and projects.
Our projects became more complex and utilized prior lessons and concepts to teach progressively more advanced techniques and methods in creation of our apps.
The apps I built for the Android Basics course were: a simple single screen business card to learn layouts , then a Scorekeeper app (I made a Zombie Kill Counter and a Magic The Gathering BattleScore App), then we were tasked with building a 7 -10 question Quiz app with scoring logic that displays quiz score results in a Toast Popup Message. Next we made a Coffee ordering app that logs a customer’s syrup and topping choices and sends them to the shop via email, Then the Musical Structure app project introduced us to tabbed navigation and Loaders, the following News app also used those concepts and pulled live data from a JSON response from The Guardian API site. After that we made a Tour Guide app that was reviewed in 2 different stages of completion, which I made for Winery and Dispensary tourists to Colorado’s Western Slope, building up to the final project, a two part Inventory app utilizing an SQL database the user can add dummy or actual inventory data to and also display data from, a reorder button to contact supplier, a Loader to minimize lengthy tasks in the UI thread, and a Content Provider that utilizes a helper class.
In between we also built many mini apps to teach us vital concepts we would need later, and would apply to our final projects such as: an all Java user profile to learn layout in Java, a Pokedex app that uses JSON responses to display Pokemon with their favorite candy, and even a pet shelter database app to help learn SQL in preparation to build our Inventory App.
Throughout the course of the program many webinars were held for us by Udacity and Google, ranging from student project walk-throughs, a pizza party study jam (where pizza was given away every hour to students studying along at home,) other study jams -including a Harry Potter themed October Study Jam complete with an online costume contest, and staff led AMAs (Ask Me Anything sessions,) to webinars on resume tips, interviewing technique and practice exercises, employment meetings with employers, and linked in profile advice. Udacity is serious about helping students find successful development careers and their training teaches to code cleanly and efficiently as desired by app stores, and in my opinion it is worth EVERY CENT of their paid courses if you are truly serious about furthering your career and self.
Our Android Basics Nano Degree (ABND) tract had numerous amazingly informative webinars and I even attended many for the other tracts as well, building on my previous self taught skills and broadening my knowledge base towards the other fields. We also had the opportunity to be placed into study cohorts to help each other and later compete as a team in challenges against the other teams. Later in the course, Study Jams were held more frequently, on every Saturday to get each other caught back up and used those opportunities to hang out and get to know the other developers also. I volunteered as a study jam leader when I could to help answer students questions and test my ability to help and research the problems that I had not encountered myself during projects or lessons.
My Phase 2 Quiz app, that utilized editText views, buttons, checkboxes, and radio buttons to accept user input for scoring using logic that returns your score in a Toast popup.
When I became stuck I tried to reach out in Slack or the Udacity forums as quickly as possible to keep the problem from manifesting both in my code and head as it was an easy path to giving up and that was NOT an option for me. I had come too far and too many people depended on me to just walk away, no matter how big the obstacle felt.
Knowing this I often scrubbed our ABND live help channel in Slack keeping an eye out for students whose questions had been missed, or developed problems after their original questions had been answered, I made it a point to reach out to project coaches if a student had a problem I couldn’t solve on my own.
Luckily I had the privilege of having one of the best dev/coaches PC Charles Rowland in the tract, right in the study cohort I volunteered to lead, and he helped many others through the course, myself included whenever we needed it, regardless of self or health.
Between the community camaraderie, willingness of everyone to help, and the excellent caliber instruction and assistance- I would, (and do,) in a HEARTBEAT, recommend the Udacity Android Basics nanodegree course and definitely their other nanodegree courses also.
(Udacity has some awesome free courses too) to anyone serious enough about learning and about their future, be it to advance their skills in a hobby or to begin pursuit of a serious career change.
The Community Managers Kelsey, Brenda, Nick, and Karen made the experience an awesome one that I will cherish, as will many other people that, during that year, made Slack- our homes away from home in our path to our nanodegrees. I am eternally grateful to Google and Udacity for what they have done for us and our communities.
I personally, was inspired to reach out in my community -thanks to them, and I contacted my local Hilltop Resource Center and created an app to fight Domestic Violence in my community, and am currently reworking versions for men and children as well as women.
It is a stealth app that appears to be a fully functioning app that displays random motivational quotes, and when an invisible button hidden in the screen is pressed, it transitions into a “batphone” of sorts, displaying Children’s and Adult Services offered to the area and a hotlink to dial our region’s crisis lines for those that may need it at a moment’s notice.
I plan to take the free classes Udacity offers as they are presented in the AND- Android Developer course until I can take the nanodegree course and hope to get my Google Android Developer Certification as many of the AND students did when they finished their nanodegree courses. A Slack workspace was created by Catie Lynn called GWG AND ByStudentsForStudents to allow students to help each other succeed.
I had made the choice to separate from my employer due to conflict of interest with receiving training sponsored by their competition but do not regret it for one second as Google and Udacity saw it in me, to give me the opportunity to advance my skills and self, and provide a better future and overall life for my family. (at the time of editing I have received a full nanodegree enrollment from Udacity and am pursuing the AND!)
I again thank Google and Udacity for teaching me the skills to empower myself to help my community and fight a problem that plagues our communities and hurts all who have to witness it, starting with the beautiful community I was born and raised, and hold dear to my heart wherever I venture.
I am no longer powerless and will use my skills to help those who need it.
