Another Goal (Resolution?)

Ever since I started to delve into coding, from web development to even software development, I felt encouraged by many professionals when they said that you don’t have to be a genius to learn how to code. You don’t have to be good at math¹ to even learn how to code. In fact, I’m kind of pretty good in logic², Geometry³, and a little bit of Statistics, but other than that, I’m pretty much a failure when it came to numbers, formulas, and most of all, word problems.

Long story short, I did not get accepted to the first choice coding bootcamp that I applied for.

Maybe they should’ve informed me to get prepared for the skills test and what was going to be in it…?

I picked that one particular coding bootcamp⁴ because I’ve read good reviews from them, namely from Course Report and Career Karma⁵, plus I’m attracted to their teaching model and after-graduation job assistance program. I did pretty okay with the pre-enrollment interview with the bootcamp’s recruiter, however, it was the skills test that killed me.

I thought that the skills test involved basic computer skills, typing skills, just basic stuff, but I never expected there will be math-related questions in there as well. There were logic and comparison questions, but there were also math word problems. I only had 20 minutes and I had 50 questions. The biggest mistake that I made was that I took too much time to figure out how to solve word problems, namely from translating literal text to numbers/formulas. First question on that skills test and I already wasted about four minutes. I should have went and guessed the answers instead. In fairness, the rejection email did explain to me why I didn’t get accepted, and it was because of the skills test. I don’t remember how many questions I was able to finish (probably close to 20?), but one or the other, I failed. However, they still invited me to try again for their next cohort, which is probably like much later in 2022.

I didn’t expect that there will be math word problems in the skills test given to me. I get that it would be a way for them to determine if I’ve got the brains to “work like a programmer” whenever I came to word problems such as those, but still, wouldn’t that require the correct answer? Word problems had always been my biggest weakness in math, but for some reason, I’m kind of able to figure things out when I write them in code?⁶

Second Try at Another Bootcamp…

Luckily, this particular bootcamp wasn’t the only one my employer would be reimbursing its tuition. There were three others listed in their career advancement program. I decided to try and enroll at another bootcamp who is possibly much more popular⁷ than the previous one I applied for. One thing that kind of made me happy with this second one was that they gave us a short intro to Javascript course— the most basic of all the basics, such as what is a variable, how to declare a variable⁸, operators, comparisons, that’s about it. We didn’t get into conditional statements, functions, OOP, etc. But I guess this was also a test of sorts to see how much we understand the basic lessons for us to continue. Maybe.

After that, I received an email scheduling me for a pre-enrollment interview. My interview is scheduled at the last Wednesday of the month and the bootcamp cohort begins at the end of February and ends on my birthday⁹, so if I do get accepted into their cohort, then I’ve got a lot of things to prepare for. For instance, setting up a special schedule with my job because one of the days we’re required to attend online live classes is on Mondays. The schedule is two days a week, Monday and Wednesday. Luckily, I’m off on Wednesdays.

About this new goal…?

I checked my enrolled courses at Udemy and decided to enroll in some math courses. I’m currently enrolled in one two math courses¹⁰ and have started with both of them, but I haven’t really progressed or finished with them yet. Therefore, my new goal added to my list of goals for 2022 will be to get back into math and do better. I’ve never taken Calculus or Linear Algebra due to the nature of my major back in college/univeristy¹¹, but I have taken Statistics and Probability. Maybe I like theories and proofs, and logic plays a huge role in them. But dealing with numbers? I really fear them. Maybe if I do master mental math/Vedic Math, maybe I wouldn’t be as fearful as I’ve always been.

I avoided anything involving with complex numbers and problem solving involving numbers back then… and yet I ended up getting interested in computer science, development, programming, and such. I believed that anyone fearful of math can still be able to learn to code. That’s what I always believed anyway. The skills test the previous bootcamp I applied to (and getting rejected) somehow made me feel a little low. Low, as in, I feel like a moron for not being able to solve a word problem that may be simpler to solve than I think. I really did.

Right now, I’m going back to my past Javascript courses that I started but never progressed. I want to finally get into the course again and actually understand the material more and make more projects.

Oh yes, also, the second bootcamp I applied for also teaches Ruby (on Rails). I already had some basic grasp of Ruby (on Rails) but never progressed, so I hope I’d be able to do the same.

I’ll update again in the future when there’s any gamechangers or if I end up being a failure again.

1. although it helps in a way…
2. The fancier (?) name of that subject is Discrete Math…
3. Mainly on proofs…
4. Just for the sake of privacy, I won’t mention the name of that bootcamp…
5. I recommend checking both sites to find the right coding bootcamp for you if you’re interested…
6. I was able to do these “word problems” in my past Python courses before…
7. by name… even by their years of existence and their excellence in their teaching model? And there’s job assistance too…
8. This is ES6, so it’s *let* and *const*, not *var* like the older versions…
9. 10/14
10. Mental Math/Vedic Mathematics and Discrete Mathematics
11. Visual Communications