A little over a decade ago I stumbled upon internet marketing which led to the need for a website and ultimately to learning HTML and CSS. As I started down the road I found Drupal and from there it has been a fun ride over the last 9 years.

I’ve run a couple of companies that offered website and mobile application development and I found myself building and theming websites but whenever custom work needed to be done I would always find a contractor. Deep down I wished I could code things myself but time constraints and availability of contractors always ended up winning over learning.

Currently the front-end developer skillset requirements have changed so much in the last 3 years my CSS/HTML, Drupal Theming skills simply aren’t enough to land solid, long-term employment. I decided it was time to learn. There have been many times I’ve sat down and learned the basics of several languages including Ruby, JavaScript, Obj-C, Python, PHP, and a few others I’m forgetting but I have never spent the time to fully learn any of them until now. It’s been clear for many years that to really learn how to code you have to write code regularly, just like learning a foreign language, if you’re not using it you’re not going to retain what you’re trying to learn.

There were several hours spent looking for the right platform to invest in amongst all of the free and paid options when it comes to learning Full Stack Development and after spending some time on Flatiron Schools Learn.co platform via the free Bootcamp Prep I made the choice to enroll. I was awarded a 50% off scholorship and couldn’t be happier with my decision.

It’s been nearly 2 weeks in since I enrolled in the Full Stack program online and I’m loving it.

Coding has always been something I’ve wanted to do since playing around with DOS back in the day and I’m looking forward to a long fullfilling career ahead.

Sincerely, Joshua Needham