I Never Thought I Would Be a Blogger...

...but here we are


Am I doing this because I think I am a great writer? 

- Nope.

... because I am an excellent coder?

- Very much no.         

...because I want to vent about learning to code?

- Maybe...                                                                        

...because I want to share a thought with anyone who needs some help or encouragement?      

- Definitely!                                                                                                                  


Anyways, let me introduce myself!  My name is David Berry and I have lived in South Carolina all of my life, but I love to travel to far away places.  So far I have been to 8 different countries with Iceland and Kenya topping my list due to the incredible landscapes.  

Since 8th grade I knew I was going to be a dentist.  I loved science and math and while most people I knew hated the dentist, I always kind of enjoyed going to get my teeth cleaned.  So there I was in undergrad at the University of South Carolina majoring in Biology to get into dental school, when I had a damning realization shadowing my dentist. -Working in people's mouths all day just didn't seem that appealing after all!  

So after not knowing what I wanted to major in, I stuck with Biology and made it to my senior year.  That is until one day I was studying with some classmates in T.Coop Library (Gamecocks you know the place).  I was able to explain some complex biological concept in a way that my peers understood.  To quote them: "That makes so much sense!  Have you ever thought about being a teacher?"   So that was my "lightbulb" moment and I ended up getting my Masters in Teaching and taught Biology at the high school level. 

I loved teaching, especially helping and building relationships with my students.  I even made it halfway through a Doctoral program in Technology in Education (I hope to go back and finish it down the line). I left after my 4th year so I got to see my first freshman class graduate, which was extremely special.   It was bittersweet to leave, but I needed something different and I've always enjoyed anything problem solving related.  So that led me to coding...

I heard about Carolina Code School and have been in their Immersive class for 5 weeks now. We meet for 8+ hours every weekday with projects at night and the weekends.  Around week 10 we will be designing and coding a Full Stack web app from scratch for the final few weeks of the course.

I am absolutely loving learning all the coding topics/methods, but it can be frustrating to not understand something right away (or even after an extended period).  There is so much to learn to become a competent front-end and back-end developer and I've heard it never really ends.  Even if you are a "Master" at one thing, there will always be more and new things to learn.

So I am starting this "Road of Code" blog as a way to walk through the journey, share tips, encourage others, and maybe even vent sometimes as well 😆.  The teacher in me still loves to help others, so I hope one of my blog posts are able to help someone going through something similar! 

We are wrapping up the front-end part of the course this week in React.js and some other frameworks before going into back-end development starting on Monday.  

I am quite frustrated today with the information overload, but as Dory from Finding Nemo says...  

Just Keep Swimming!   

Keep driving down that road, it will all work out!



Cheers,


David


Location: Greenville, SC, USA

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