Birdland

This is part two of a three part series about how I got into web design. If you haven’t read part 1, go back and read it here.

Prior to college, my experience in developing web sites consisted mainly of my own personal geocities site.

Once I got to college and moved into the dorms, I had access to a super high speed line and had access to a huge amount of information on the latest techniques being used, all I needed was a project to work on.

During my college years, I got involved with a campus christian organization called Native Nations In Christ (and still play a role to this day). The club needed a website created where students looking for christian fellowship could look us up and get information on upcoming events.

I took this task upon myself and created a quick site. The design of the site itself was probably pretty good for a beginner, but when I think back on it, I wince in shame. Anyway, this was the first web project that I took ownership of.

Once I created the first design, I then began to develop the site, making improvements over a period of a couple of years here and there.

A little sidenote

I entered college in the Aerospace Engineering program with aspirations of designing spacecraft and hoping that one day I might be able to travel in space (yeah I watched a lot of Star Wars and Star Trek).

The problem arose when I realized that the coursework involved was very very difficult. Also, I found that reading hundred of pages (without pictures), was boring. So, when I needed a break or just wanted to waste some time, I’d play around with some ideas for web sites.

After a while, I began to realize that I could probably do this kind of work for a job. I was working at the library shelving books for minimum wage and was looking for something different. So I looked around and found that a department on campus was looking for a student to do some web work. The department was Family and Community Medicine.

The application/interview process involved answering questions and also showing some of my coding examples. My boss to be checked out my work for Native Nations and was impressed by the clean code. I was hired to work exactly 40 hours and no more.

While working there, my boss then asked me if I was willing to learn XML to help him on another project thereby extending my employment. Learning XML wasn’t that hard and I continued my employment.

Seeing that I was willing to learn new programming languages, and was open to emerging web technologies, my boss offered me a position until graduation. Since I loved to do this kind of work on my free time, I was glad to accept and get paid for doing what I love.

Stay tuned for the conclusion where I will talk about making the transition into a web professional.