“Remote learning has been perfect for me.”
Awesome people do come together in our Full-Stack Web & App Development course. In a series of interviews we are talking with them about their past, their experiences within the coding bootcamp and their dreams.
Today we talk with Liv. Joining our batch from Copenhagen, she represents the “Danish Dynamite” in the class. As a former teacher and web editor, she was looking for a new challenge and a skill set to travel the world.
Hi Liv, the first 4 weeks of your coding bootcamp are over. How does it feel right now for you?
Honestly, for the first time, I’m looking forward to the weekend. It’s a lot of information in a short time so my head is spinning a bit. But the previous weekends, I’ve ended up looking forward to Monday.
Could you give us a brief summary of your first weeks?
It feels like it’s gone by really fast. It’s surprising to me that four weeks have passed already. Initially, I felt quite confident with the HTML and CSS, but progressing into programming has been causing a bit more frustration for me — as I think it should.
Everyone is talking about remote work and remote learning now. How does it feel to you?
Especially with programming, I think remote learning has been perfect for me. It gives the possibility to dig deeper into it on your own, but still meeting up and discussing with other people who are learning. I would have struggled to do this in a physical class where I don’t have the option to go make a coffee or stretch my legs during a lecture to help me focus.
On the other hand, I don’t think I would have been able to do this with pure self-study, at least not this intense. It has been really crucial for me to meet up with a small class that is learning the same things. When learning a programming language I think it’s easy to think it’s just you not understanding it and lose motivation. It’s nice to be lost together.
Do you have a certain situation in mind that showed that you are a team although everyone is separated?
I don’t feel alone. I have a dog that also forces me to go out and refuses to let me be alone, so that might also change the picture a bit. Honestly, I can’t come up with one situation in particular. I feel like it is something to see daily when we are struggling and come together in class to solve it. And at least for me, just hearing the process of someone who has been working on the same as I have means a lot.
Our teacher Aria was there for you in the first weeks. Did he do a great job?
I think Aria is a really good coder. I am impressed with his patience. You are never left to feel like you asked a stupid question and there is always room for repetition. When I am stuck on something, I feel confident that I will get it later in the class or during live coding.
Do you personally feel the progress and how does it feel?
It is impressive to see the progress. It is easy to overlook it from exhaustion over something new, but when I take a moment to look back it is impressive to see how things that seemed impossible 3 weeks ago, seem natural today!
Did you do some free courses before to test if it fits you?
I dabbled a bit with several. But generally, I missed the interaction, feedback and up-to-date material. The small class is a huge advantage in this course compared to a lot of other paid courses as well. And meeting up with the same teacher every day.
The coronavirus situation is challenging for all of us. How much does it affect you personally — and as our student?
I could not have picked a better time to study online. So because of this, my everyday life is probably changing less than for most of the others. But I am definitely affected. Spending so much intense time in front of a screen, in your own home, comes with challenges of its own. I came into this with a weekly schedule of movement and seeing friends. That has obviously changed. So far I am lucky to not have anyone close to me in a dire situation, otherwise my answer would most likely have been a bit different.
You did create a schedule for movement and friends? Awesome — can you tell me more about that?
When you’re tired after a long mentally exhausting day, it’s easy to collapse onto the couch, at least for me. But I know how important it is to match your mental energy use with physical energy use to stay sharp and happy. So to make sure that happened I’d planned classes at my local gym that matches the schedule we’re on. And promised myself to not make plans those days so I don’t get overwhelmed. That way my schedule with friends happened quite natural although less strict.
Where would you be now without the decision to take part in our course?
I would most likely be in a job with some connection to web editing while doing part-time courses to try and change that into full web development. I came to this course quite determined.
Great! How determined is your future right now? What about plans and dreams?
Well, one of the things I like about this field is that not much is set in stone. I am falling more and more in love with it and I can’t wait to get out and actually use it! So my plans and dreams are to find a job where I get to do just that soon after the course.
Later I hope to take it with me while traveling. I’ve already spent some time working in India and I loved the change in location. I’m hoping to do more changing but with more financial stability and better working conditions.
Liv, thanks for your time.
