Why I am at Flatiron School

Emmanuel Rivera
3 min readNov 1, 2020

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One does not always have their life planned out. Some like to take one day at a time and see where life takes them. That has always been me. I try not to plan out my life because I feel it puts a lot of pressure on me and that pressure comes with stress and anxiety. The expectations can become out of control. At least… that’s how I used to think as I went from high school to post-high school. Fast-forward 8 years to 2017, the year I got married. Suddenly I find myself being more careful about what I do on a day to day basis. I have my own family now and there should be more structure. Advance 2 more years, 2019, and now I have a son. I have a wife and a son I wish nothing more than to spoil and support until my last breath. However, unfortunately due to my early “care-free” days, I don’t really have any higher-education or any major skills. If I want to fulfill my new goal to provide, I have to make a change.

Our socially distanced halloween day! Please don’t mind the pumpkins, I thought they looked scarier decayed!

I have always loved technology. I’m sure it’s common for people of my generation but my dad used to teach me the insides of a computer as far back as when I was 10 years old. He’d also always have the newest tech and would love to show it to me. Without him around anymore, my interest in computer building fell a bit as I grew up. However, my love for new tech never died. As soon as I was able to find a job, I would save up to buy anything that was cool or trending. This followed all the way until I was in my early to mid-20s which was when I met my now-wife. I started to realize that there’s more to buying new gadgets so this habit also fell (Although there are a couple things I still get every time a new one comes out).

Forward to our marriage and I find myself wanting to be more in life for her. So I finally start college. I attend Southern New Hampshire University in the IT bachelor’s program. It’s online as I am still needing to work full-time. After the first term, I took an intro to programming class and I fell in love! I thought it was amazing that I could write words on an editor and something would happen. Manipulating a program was so satisfying. It was an intro class so we did not do anything too crazy but regardless, it was fun. I immediately requested to change to the Computer Science major. It was definitely a great choice as I have been really enjoying my core classes. However, I was not expecting how difficult it could be. With my son coming in the picture in 2019, I knew I needed to level up my programming skills if I want to one day get my dream job and make him proud. Enter: Flatiron School.

My goal is to become a great programmer. I do not want to settle for okay. Mark did not create Facebook by being okay. Steve did not start Apple by being okay. I believe Flatiron School will help me reach my goal of being a great programmer to one day land my dream job.

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