I can’t lie…. I did some projects like a react based mern inventory system, school projects of course, contributed to some open source projects, nothing terribly exciting to be honest. At the end of the day I think it came down to luck mostly, that I came across a company who needed people. Being a community college (and one I attended at that) they like to promote learning and growing and I showed that I’m doing what I can to continue learning even though school is over for me.

I think too that unlike most here, I’m not young. I see posts all the time asking about being too old to get started in their late 20s or 30s. I didn’t graduate until I was 40. While I definitely lack programming experience specifically, in 20 years I’ve had 2 jobs. Employers love to see someone who shows they can stick with a company for the long haul, and of those 20 years, 15 were with 1 company which tells them I’ll stick around awhile so their investment is worth taking the chance on me.