Makayla went from science to coding and found her career path with a great job
Growing up in Southern California, Makayla never knew what exact job she wanted, just that it would have something to do with science, “I love science because I love to know how things work. I get so much satisfaction from developing a deeper understanding of the things we take for granted, whether it be the stars and universe, or as small as the inner workings of an atom.”
After going to Cal State Northridge for a B.A. in Biology, Makayla struggled with transforming her degree into a well-paying job, “It took a while for me to even get my first scientific position, and when I did, the salary was not great. I was able to use the skills I learned in college but kept running into roadblocks when it came to the technical side of things. Especially in my second job as a cell therapy specialist. That job became mundane very quickly, and the lack of upward mobility did not help. At the same time, I saw colleagues of mine with coding and tech skills excelling. That’s when I started looking into coding bootcamps.”
It was a tough decision at first, “Did I really want to take out more debt on a career I was unsure of? And the first schools I looked at were not impressive, Flatiron, General Assembly, they all seemed like factories with no care for who you were as an individual, just your money and pumping you through a sloppy program. Then I found Sabio, I went to an info session lead by Gregorio Rojas (Sabio’s CTO and Co-Founder.) Gregorio was great, he seemed so knowledgeable and extremely straightforward. I remember him telling me, ‘You can make this risk worth it, but it’s not going to be easy, it’s a lot of time and effort. But if you’re motivated, you can do it.’ After reading the reviews on Course Report I was hooked.”
Makayla started with PreWork, “I can’t tell you how almost scared I was at first. I was learning an entirely new language from scratch. But slowly it all started clicking into place, and when cohort came around it was like taking a deep dive in. In just a few months I was coding as though I’d been doing it my whole life. Of course, it was a challenge, six days a week, 12 hours a day. But being thrown in, so to speak, you either had to learn to swim or drown. Plus, everyone I was learning with around me was in the same boat, we all became incredibly close. In the end, we were like a band of brothers who had gone through a battle together and came out alive and ready.”
After graduation, it only took Makayla two weeks to land her first job as a fullstack developer at Grolo, “Because I had so many positive challenges at Sabio, entering the tech workforce was like a piece of cake. Any problem or hurdle that I came across, I found this newfound confidence at Sabio that any problem was solvable if you just worked hard enough at it. They had this amazing teaching style, where the instructors didn’t necessarily give you the answers but rather guided you towards the right path for you to find them. And when you think about it, that’s as close to a real-world experience as you’re going to get. It helped me be prepared in a way that I can’t even describe.”
Now a year later at her 2nd position with a 20K a year salary bump, Makayla couldn’t be happier, “I’m making enough money to not just pay my bills, but save up. My job is even paying me to go back to school and get my masters. I got into the University of Maryland, I start this fall. I’m going to get a MicroMasters in Software Testing and Verification. I can only imagine the doors will open with my schooling at Sabio combined with my work experience. I feel truly blessed.”
For those interested in Sabio and/or coding, Makayla has come advice, “Never give up. If this is something you truly want to do, you can. I went into Sabio with zero coding experience and turned that into a lucrative and rewarding career. If you’re unsure about it, definitely put in a decent chunk of time trying out coding on Codecademy or any of the other great free coding resources out there. You’ll learn very quickly if this is right for you, and if it is, the best place for you to go to is Sabio.”
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Written by Sassy Mohen
