About Me
My passion for programming and mentoring others began back in the Spring semester of 2016 when I took an online Excel course at UMSL. The class itself was a bit boring—but for the last two weeks of the course we worked with JavaScript. I instantly became hooked, and I reached out to my professor on what could I do to learn more about this.
Growing up, I was not a technical person whatsoever. While I did love playing video games, I really didn’t know much about computers—I thought programming was putting together computers. At one point I had even dropped out of college. I tried many different career paths and didn’t like any of them—But everything changed when I discovered programming.
The professor of the Excel course encouraged me to take a junior level programming course on Java over the summer with Professor Lawton. This absolutely terrified me, because I was an accounting major at the time, and I would be going way out of my comfort zone. But I knew that I needed to learn more so I convinced a buddy to take the summer course with me, and I fell in love with software development.
I remember my first day of class; I remember how I was inspired by Professor Lawton. He was an adjunct professor, and he sparked a passion in me and helped me get started in my field. I immediately took in all the advice he gave, and I went to Dev Up with my buddy later that year in fall 2016. We went booth-to-booth and asked people about the developing. By the end of the year, I was working at a help desk job with a vision of getting into software development.
Since then, I have done my best to pay it forward by mentoring. I love planning and hosting technology related events that focus on enabling new people to get into this field. I have over 6 years of professional experience. Ultimately, my dream is to inspire others in the classroom just as I was inspired.
Slalom has enabled me to follow my passions and supported me in my goals. This job aligns with my principals, and I see myself going far with them in this journey of my career as I pursue becoming an adjunct professor.