The story I am about to tell has probably been told many times before. Well, not the exact same one (since no one could better write my story than me), but similar stories. Stories about stepping outside the box, outside the social norm.
I want to share how I have gathered the courage to go against the norm and become a web developer.
My first e-mail
I was born in 1994 in the south of Germany. My father was still at university and my mom was working as a nurse. My birth wasn't really planned and it wasn't always easy for my parents. Especially with finances. Around that time the world wide web grew and developed fast and my father, as resourceful as he is, got into programming.
I don't remember much from my childhood in Bavaria, but I remember that we always had a computer and I wrote my first email at age 6. And since then I have practically had the same email address. As a six year old I obviously didn't understand how big a deal it was to be able to send and receive emails. All I remember was writing them and asking my dad excitedly whether I got an answer.
From computers to laptops to smartphones, technology advanced, and I grew up. My father was there throughout, teaching my brother and I how to navigate the internet, detect spam mails, use a computer and much more. It still amazes me that it took nearly 20 years from writing my first email to writing my first line of code.
It all takes one bad teacher
Growing up with technology I obviously got excited when I could pick an additional class about building and programming robots in middle school. I always liked school and learning new things. I thought this class would be super cool and I really wanted to program my own robot.
To this day I still haven't programmed a robot. What went wrong? All it took was one bad teacher. I was so utterly disappointed when I found out that for her, programming meant to teach how to handle Microsoft Excel. We didn't even learn it on the computer, that's how bad it was. I quickly lost any interest in programming and didn't bother to pursue programming a robot.
All my other teachers were really great, I learned a lot, got really good marks and finished high school as second best in my year. I even got the highest score in three exams and everyone seemed very proud of me. And obviously expected me to do really well in life and my studies. Except I didn't.
How I failed the social norm
School, university, job. That is the way it goes, right? You are expected to go to school, finish strong and then go to university or do an apprenticeship (I think that is a very German thing) and then start a job. To get a good job it is necessary to get a degree, any kind of degree. Well, this is the social norm. But what happens when you don't fit in?
What I loved about school is that we would have to learn different subjects. I know that for some people that was and is a real struggle because they don't get along with arts or maths or languages. For me it was the opposite. I liked every subject and loved the variety.
In university it is very different. In Germany you can't just pick and choose what you like and go for it. You choose a direction in the beginning of your studies and can choose from a group of fixed courses. Only after two or three semesters you are able to choose courses outside of your field. Since I have many interests, I had difficulties accepting this system. I changed studies three times ending up with geography. I always liked it in school. Geography is a very broad topic, relevant, and interesting. That should work for me to get a variety of topics at university, right? And anyways, to get a job I just had to do well enough for three years to get a bachelor's degree, right? So I thought. And that was the problem. I never studied for myself, I started it because it was expected.
Needless to say, I failed. University triggered anxiety I never had to deal with in school. I did have some fun courses though, and these kept me going. In February 2019 I took a university course about the programming language R and I absolutely loved it. It was only a week but I felt as if I finally found something I really liked. I searched for some online courses on HTML and CSS and really enjoyed doing this but didn't know how to go from there.
That's when I found out that there is a web development bootcamp just around the corner from where I live. I went there and talked to the people, to get some more information about this format and how coding bootcamps work. After a coding challenge and a lot of questions about my motivation, they offered me a place at their bootcamp. I decided to take a risk and commit to 3 months of intense training.
Life changing decisions
At first I told myself that I'd go back to university and finish my degree after the bootcamp. I was so close to finishing university, only one more year to go.
Well, I didn't finish university. After going back from the bootcamp where I learned how to become a web developer without actually having a degree, my motivation to finish university was nonexistent. While still at university I started to work at the bootcamp part-time as an assistant coach and really enjoyed being able to pass my knowledge and passion on to people who are in the same position as I was.
I tried to stick through university and for more than half a year I tried to ignore my growing anxiety but after a major breakdown I never went back. Instead I started to work full-time.
This decision wasn't easy but once decided, it felt as if a huge weight was lifted from my shoulders. I decided to go against the social norm and go my own way.
Obviously it is really scary and sometimes I wish I had found the right studies to finish. But I haven't.
Instead I found something I love doing and I am extremely grateful for that.
Proud to present
My name is Lene and I am proud to say:
I am a web developer working as an assistant coach in a web development bootcamp in Germany.
Since I still have to learn a lot about coding and teaching, I want to use this platform to share some knowledge and information about bootcamps. And to help anyone out there who might be struggling the same way I was.
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