| | Celeste Sippel | I'm a former firefighter turned small business owner that had zero tech experience before SDG. I first learned about SDG while searching for coding schools in Florida. They were offering a test drive class at the time so I decided that would be a good place to start and see if coding was for me. Well, that class left me wanting more and I fell in love with the staff so I knew I would be attending their academy.
The academy is tough. I commuted to school every day which made the long hours even longer. But it was worth it. Mark was my instructor and he was amazing. He could take all the technical jargon and turn it into English and then break down all the steps and pieces for us. The projects start off easy and get harder the further along you get in the course. By the end of the course, you can deploy an app or website from scratch. The academic part of the academy really pushed me out of my comfort zone and I am so grateful. After my graduation the pandemic caused the world to go into shutdown but I was able to take on freelance projects successfully because of the skills I learned from SDG.
There is also a soft skills/career prep section in this academy. I came into this with a lot of soft skills so that information wasn't new to me but I could see how valuable it was to some of the younger dev students that haven't had as much work experience.
The career prep is focused on this industry and for the Tampa area. That was so valuable to me. I haven't been in the area long so I didn't have a network for the job search. Well with SDG you get to use their network and they have made great connections all over The Greater Tampa Bay. This network was key in helping me find my job.
During the career prep, they help you with your resume, LinkedIn, interview prep both the conversational part and the technical interview.
You get tons of help and support after graduation in finding a job. I was amazed at how SDG lived up to its promise to help you in this area.
I'm now working for my dream company doing my dream job. I am still pinching myself how everything worked out. I'm not going to lie it is hard but it is worth it because it is life-changing. |
