This time last year I was freelancing from my childhood bedroom — A place I hadn’t planned on returning to, ever. I’d spent the last ten years in California trying to find my way, getting a degree in behavioral science and working a grueling retail schedule, while also studying programming on my own as a hobby. For a while, I’d been considering joining the military to pursue a career in compsci. I felt stagnant. I needed change. Needed direction.

So I packed up my life, flew out to see my parents in Washington State, and started making plans. I meant to visit New York, then possibly bunk with a friend in Japan for a week or two, and finally see about joining the Air Force.

My flight to NYC was scheduled to arrive on March 13th last year. The morning of March 11th, I received an email from Girl Develop It with some New York based opportunities:

LaGuardia TechHIRE-OpenCode

Over 20,000 new web developers will be needed by 2020. Are you ready? Learn to code, from fundamentals to more advanced application development in LaGuardia Community College’s free web development training program. Find out how to get a job in the tech industry with networking opportunities and job search assistance. Take advantage of this great opportunity to enroll in professional level coding classes to get you going in the world of tech. FULL SCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE to eligible students! Call us at (**) *-*** or check out our website at https://www.laguardia.edu/techhire-opencode/ and open the door to your future! Classes start in May 2018!

Full scholarships available.

You’d better believe I signed up and sent my resume along. I attended an info session a week after flying into JFK, had an interview nine days after that, then crossed my fingers for a month.

Here’s a run down of my very crazy, very exciting year:

March 11th: I read an email mentioning TechHire
March 20th: Info Session
March 29th: Interview
April 26th: My acceptance email comes in.
May 7th-18th: Open Code’s vestibule.
May 18th: Decision — our cohort of 11 waits to get acceptance into the web dev portion.
May 21st: I receive my acceptance letter!
May 29th: The Web Development mini-course begins.
June 18th: Welcome session with The Software Guild
October 4th: Java OOP Mastery project due.
October 10th: Data Driven Web Applications with Java and MySQL begins.
January 1st, 2019: I send out applications.
January 2nd: I hear word back for a teaching position.
January 8th: I interview for said teaching position.
January 9th: I get an offer.
January 14th: I teach my first class — all incredibly talented girls.
January 25th: I attend my last in-person bootcamp class.

February 2nd:

February 28th: I interview for a position at a major password manager company.
March 11th: I get an offer -- and accept!
March 18th: I start my new job on the Android team.

UPDATE
March, 2020: I interview for a new position within the company.
March, 2020: I start as an official Junior Dev for the web team!

It’s been a long but incredibly fast journey.
I’m ready for the next step.