No Bachelor's Degree, No Problem: Jared is making 90k-a-year just a month after graduating Sabio

Jared:

My number one question was, do you have to have a bachelor's degree for this to be a successful program? And I don't. So if you don't have a degree, you don't have an active clearance, like this is still very much a possibility. 

I was in the Navy for eight years and then I did mortgage loans for four years and I started like having this interest in coding and I had a friend that mentioned, you know, there were these coding bootcamps out there. Definitely had a lot of questions in the beginning. I know there's like a lot of bad programs out there, a lot of like less than wholesome bootcamps and stuff. So I started doing research, seeing if there was something I could use my GI Bill for and I chose Sabio. Honestly, in the beginning, I chose it because they were still doing a hybrid schedule, which meant I could get the housing allowance, which I really needed to survive basically through that four months.

Q: Did you do pre-work and what program did you choose?

Jared:

I had most of the pre-work finished by day one and then later found out that there was a 17-week program that includes like four weeks of guided pre-work, but super glad that I started the pre-work early. If there's anybody out there that hasn't started yet, like start the pre-work, don't wait. 

Q: What helped you through the challenging times at Sabio?

Jared:

I was fortunate enough that I found a group of people and we communicated every day, like we zoomed every day, whether it was for an hour or 12 hours, just really to keep each other company. I mean, it was all of us still figuring things out for ourselves. But it was nice to have that group of classmates that kind of motivate each other and keep each other accountable. 

Q: Was your cohort work challenging?

Jared:

Yeah, I think the learning never stops. The work never stops. Like, that really was the beginning of being a software developer. To me. Like SignalR specifically is one piece of .NET that I had never done anything with. So I had to do a lot of research on my own and a lot of digging to find out how to even get started. And then, you know, every day it was basically starting fresh and doing research and trying to figure out what the next step is going to be. 

Q: What advice would you give to current Sabio students?

Jared:

Stay ahead of where the rest of the cohort is as much as possible. And if that's not possible, then just never stop coding, because I think the worst place you can be is a day, even on time or a day behind where the rest of the cohort is. It really like can be damaging. 

Q: What was the job search process like?

Jared:

I think the gloves were off and like post-graduation, like, okay, like cool, you know, all this stuff, but now you need to go and prove it. I started putting in about 75 to 100 applications a day. By the end of it, I put out over 2,100. From all those applications, 10 to 15 were first round interviews with like internal or external recruiters. I got a lot of questions where people were like, Oh, do you have two years of experience with this? Do you have three years of experience with this? The main thing is to talk about what you did with the languages that you learned in Sabio, and you're going to prove that you know enough for most of these junior to mid-level jobs.

Q: What was your employer looking for in the interview?

Jared:

They weren't necessarily looking for the most experienced person. They were looking for someone that's teachable, someone that's basically not an asshole. And they're teachable. And they're not afraid to seek out answers to questions, you know, on their own. And then if they need to, they'll ask, you know, the supervisor and stuff like that. 

Q: When did you receive your offers and what were they?

Jared:

So two offers. One was for 80k, one was for 90k, Both of them are fully remote, so the 90k offer had like a 401k matching, health insurance, dental, vision, the whole nine yards. I graduated November 4th, a Friday, and I accepted the offer December 16th.

Q: Would you like to share anything else?

Jared:

For the people that are just starting. I know when I first went to these alumni interviews, I thought that they were all like tailored. Like I thought that Nancy was like curating the answers and stuff because it just sounded impossible to me. So I just want to let you know that, like, this is like actually what can happen. Nancy, is not censoring my answers or anything. And if anyone needs any help or anything along the way, please feel free to reach out to me.