S26:E7 - Thoughts on Degrees and Bootcamps (Johnny Proano)

Saron speaks with Johnny Proano, Associate Software Engineer at Hilton Grand Vacations. Initially drawn to code while building his personal DJ website, Johnny took the full leap with the support of his family. Johnny discusses his initial belief that a degree was necessary to become a software engineer and his decision to attend a coding bootcamp instead. He reflects on the differences between the bootcamp and college experience and shares his job search process after graduation. Show Links Partner with Dev & CodeNewbie! (sponsor) SQL Ruby Johnny's GitHub Johnny's Instagram Jonny's Website

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[00:00:05] SY: Welcome to the CodeNewbie Podcast where we talk to people on their coding journey in hopes of helping you on yours. I’m your host, Saron, and today we’re talking about thoughts on degrees and bootcamps with Johnny Proano, Associate Software Engineer at Hilton Grand Vacations.

[00:00:20] JP: When I got the call, I locked myself in my room, and as soon as they said, “We want to offer you the position of,” and they told me, it was incredible and I felt like all the things that I’ve been doing and all these things, this is the reassurance. It wasn’t just like a fluke and to hear those words come in, like, “You’re hired,” was the most incredible feeling I’ve ever felt.

[00:00:41] SY: Johnny shares how he started his coding journey in pursuit of a CS degree, why he ended up changing lanes by enrolling in a bootcamp, and where his journey has taken him today after this.

[MUSIC BREAK]

[00:01:00] SY: Thank you so much for being here.

[00:01:01] JP: Thank you. This is amazing. I’m super excited.

[00:01:03] SY: Awesome. So tell me about what it was like for you growing up. Was technology a big part of your childhood?

[00:01:09] JP: You know what? I guess for me, I would say yes. My family, not so much. My parents are from Ecuador and they were really not technological savvy, but I always enjoy it.

[00:01:18] SY: And what role did technology play for you personally?

[00:01:21] JP: I mean, honestly, when you talk about technology, I mean, I’m talking about when I was a little kid growing up, I mean, technology to me was like any new like video game system, Nintendo or anything like that. Those are super cool things that was just coming out at that time. And that always kind of like made me wonder, like, “How does this work? How can I make this like happen?” [00:01:40] SY: So gaming was really the tech focus for you growing up.

[00:01:43] JP: Yeah, that was a tech focus coming up. Yup.

[00:01:46] SY: Did you ever take any coding classes or anything?

[00:01:49] JP: This is going to be funny. So I’m also a DJ and I’ve been DJing since I can’t remember, I would say since I was like 13, 14 years old.

[00:01:59] SY: Wow! That’s really young.

[00:02:01] JP: Yeah, I know. I know. I picked it up from my cousin and it just intrigued me at that time. This is before any type of coding involvement. But when I was DJing, I would say at that time level of popularity, I needed to get my branding going and I needed a website. And I think that’s kind of where my first instances were of coding. I didn’t know kind of where to go. And one of my buddies at that time, he was going to school for computer science and he just volunteered. Heard me and just volunteered. He’s like, “Dude, I’ll do your website for you.” And I was like, “Are you sure?” I was like, “Sure. Cool!” Well, nothing came off of that conversation. Maybe just a couple of things, but there was no progress. And so I just went online and I found some no code drag-and-drop software stuff. It was very limited, but I’m talking about this was like back, I don’t remember the year anymore, and previously, everyone had MySpace. You kind of like dig a little bit of HTML here and there to kind of adjust some stuff. And I remembered that and I was like, “Well, how can I get involved in that?” And that was kind of like my thoughts on their first instance of what coding was and kind of going from there.

[00:03:09] SY: Very cool. Okay. So really it was you wanting to have a website for yourself that led to you kind of first getting exposure to coding.

[00:03:19] JP: Yeah.

[00:03:20] SY: Very cool. Do you remember what the drag and drop software was that you used?

[00:03:24] JP: The first one, I don’t remember, but the second one that I used right after that was called Sparkle for Apple.

[00:03:29] SY: Oh, Sparkle. That sounds like fun.

[00:03:32] JP: Yeah. It was, but it’s so weird because when you want something on a page and you drag and drop, it looks great, but then when it renders on the browser, it does not. Some of it doesn’t look as close as to it. If you want something centered, you would drag something like opposite from the center, like, I don’t know, on the other side to the left, and that was centering on a browser. And I would have to keep like pushing code up every time to check and it just wasn’t good.

[00:04:03] SY: So tell me a little bit more about this DJ thing. Was that something that you intended on pursuing professionally? Was it just a hobby? What was that all about?

[00:04:12] JP: It was just a hobby at first. My dad was a musician and I just think I was always involved in music in general, not necessarily playing instruments. Yeah, I got my first turntables with my first paycheck working at a grocery store and kind of went from there, but that was kind of the initial. My dad was involved in music and it was a hobby at first that later on became like a part of me. I was just competing on part of my persona.

[00:04:37] SY: Did you have plans on being a big DJ, touring world stages, that kind of thing?

[00:04:42] JP: That was the dream.

[00:04:44] SY: That was the dream?

[00:04:45] JP: That was the dream. That was the dream, I wanted to be a DJ. I wanted to be a producer and produce music. That’s kind of like the way, I guess, it goes. You become a DJ, then you get a little bit more involved with music and music theory and you go become a producer and you kind of go from there, make songs. And that was like my dream and my goal at that time. Currently, I work for a radio station as well, where my mixes get played. And that was kind of like my first involvement, like, oh my gosh, is it happening type of thing. It made me feel confident in what I was with DJing and music. And again, it grew a part of me, and yes, it was definitely something that became more than what I thought it would be.

[00:05:26] SY: What happened to those dreams? What made you decide to not pursue them?

[00:05:29] JP: You know what? There’s a lot of, I don’t want to say downside to it as well. As time went on, I got married and all that. I also had thoughts of what happens when I have a family and when I have kids, like how often am I going to have to go do a gig here and there? How often is that going to like keep me away from them? I’m a big family guy. And so to me, that’s very important. And I’m happy to say that I’ve been able to implement that into the way things are right now with my family and adjusting time and schedule. So it’s worked out great, thankfully. But obviously, I also want to keep a line there where if it’s too much, I don’t want to go. I’d rather go and coach my daughter’s soccer team and coach my daughter’s basketball team. And that to me, that’s fun. They have their lives ahead of them. I want to make sure that I get them where they need to go.

[00:06:14] SY: Okay, so you’re doing DJing. You decided to do it more as a hobby than a profession. And up to that point, were you doing gigs and were you getting paid to do it? Had it become your profession at that point?

[00:06:26] JP: Yeah, absolutely. I was having gigs. I was playing at different nightclubs, at different restaurants. I was flying. I was working at radio stations at a couple. So yeah, no, it was going great. And I think I started feeling some of that, like, “Oh man, I’m kind of overworking myself,” and I’m not seeing my fiancé at the time, and I also worked. It wasn’t like that was the only thing I did. I also worked. And so I just kind of had it there. It was a thought. And eventually when you start thinking about it and you start thinking about what you want to do, my decision was to kind of just hold back a little bit, but I will still DJ, but with like a strict line there.

[00:07:03] SY: And what were you doing for your day job?

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