Now that I am a student at Flatiron school, and in this ne tech community I have been awarded opportunities that I was not aware of before. I applied for my first scholarship to the Ruby Conference 2019 and won!!! I was overly excited and anxious of what to expect at this conference. The conference was in Nashville TN and was a wonderful experience. As a scholar there was a meet and greet dinner that we attended that had awesome, and delightful staff members that are willing to help an up and coming developer feel, comfortable, and welcomed. They offer you tips on how to network, and to come with a plan on how to approach the conference. My plan for this conference was to network and start building my professional connections so that when it is time to job hunt it will hopefully make that experience a little less daunting. You are given a guide that is an established developer. Your guide is also there to help you make those connections or achieve the goal that you came to the conference to obtain.
The conference was three days of learning, mixed with multiple ice-breakers, vendors and events. I would say don’t be shy and just start conversations because all of the conversations that I had ended up being meaningful and thought provoking. Some of my conversation starters where How long have you been developing? What pathways did you use to become a developer? What advice would you give to a fresh Jr. Developer? These questions were great conversation starters and led to meaningful conversation, and will give you insight to how many people may have come from similar beginnings and is thriving in the community. I came across many people that attended bootcamps or were self-taught. It definitely opened up my perspective on how I will be viewed in this industry and will hopefully lead to not having imposter syndrome, because there are many people just like myself that are thriving. Throughout the conference I ate with multiple speakers, engage in activities, mingled and formed great connections.
There are also multiple lectures that are taking place throughout the day. You are able to decide which ones resonate with you and then you have multiple opportunities to learn. A few points that stuck with me from Noah Gibbs lecture “Conscious Coding Practices” were its okay to repeat a lab you learn and strengthen your skills through repetition. Give myself a time box. That means put yourself on a schedule to complete a task. Sky is that limit of the types of applications that can be written. Life is a series of small complicated task.
Some of key information that I learned through conversation is it is important to network. Have a good readme and tests, practice different coding challenges. Also apply, apply, apply. There was so much more information that I learned but I enjoyed the Ruby Conference!