Kristopher was looking for a way to get out of Kansas City when he joined the Air Force. He started his career as a Linguist but swichted over to be an Air Transportation Specialist. He worked in Germany at Rammstein. After the military he continued to work overseas and came back to the states so he could attend Sabio.

He found Sabio's program when he was doing research on the VA's website. He was looking for a new career opportunity and thought coding would be a good option. He read reviews and looked at different companies and decided to take a shot with Sabio. 

Starting the class was really challenging. Each week less people would continue in the program. But he started to connect with others in his cohort and build a support group. After the first phase he had to move to California so he could attend in person at least two days a week. He bought a bed and put it in his car and lived out of his car using the showers at the campus. He liked being on campus and was able to help others as he spent time learning and growing as a software engineer. 

Early on in his training to become a software engineer he was contacted by a handful of recruiters. Because he was still in the early stages and wasn't going to complete the program for a few more months he wrote back that he currently wasn't available. He was able to reconnect with the one of the recruiters near the end of his time at Sabio and that led to the position he is in today. 

He talked about the continual need to learn and innovate. He also mentioned the importance of leaning into technologies and use them as tools. AI programs have actually helped him as a software engineer and have helped him improve. He is thankful that he took the leap and dove into Sabio's boot camp program. 

Want to learn about how you can become a Software Engineer head over to www.sabio.la/info to sign up to attend a free info session today!

Her sister's career both flexibility and paycheck were what led her to look at a career in software engineering. She didn’t do a lot of research and instead just took a leap of faith and signed up to attend Sabio’s Bootcamp program. She was able to pay for Sabio by being a surrogate. She mentioned there are a number of different financial aid options that can support you financially both with tuition and with living expenses because you can’t work and be a student with Sabio but fortunately being a surrogate made it possible for her to have enough money to not have to go into debt. There are also special programs for veterans such as VET TEC and using your GI Bill benefits. 

Besides learning to code, Linda talked about how Sabio prepares you to be a developer. With your cohort you get to work with a company building a program that they need in their business. This not only gives you skills you can put on your resume, but you can also share about that experience when it comes time to prepare for an interview. You also learn how to code and you learn how to prepare for tech interviews. And the benefits and programs that support you have only increased since when Linda was a student. As Sabio continues to grow and expand, more ways to support students continue to expand. 

Linda was able to find a job pretty quickly after graduation and she enjoyed her career but was looking for something new and today is working remotely in Hawaii for a company in Illinois. She has to get up really early to be able to work on the timezone in Illinois but she finishes her day early and loves having the flexibility of working remote. She doesn’t know what is next in the future. She is proud of accomplishing her goal not only of becoming a software engineer but also being able to move to Hawaii. She is soaking up those accomplishments but who knows what the future will hold.

Want to learn about how you can become a Software Engineer head over to www.sabio.la/info to sign up to attend a free info session today!

Additional Resources:

Want to learn more about how to use your VET TEC benefits check out Episode 9 with Alley Johnson 

Free training with Sabio:

https://sabio.la/free-coding-courses

Live training in May 2023: 

https://lu.ma/sabio

Summary:

He was able to use the VET TEC benefits to go through the Sabio Program. He was also able to save his Post 9/11 GI Bill for future opportunities. He started Sabio with no coding experience, but was quickly immersed into the world of coding. He learned so much and he got to work with the City of Los Angeles for his cohort project. It is still listed on his LinkedIn profile and was able to take his resume that was filled with his Army experience and now had experience working as a software engineer. 

He graduated in December of 2019. And as the world closed down due to the COVID-19 pandemic he was worried he wouldn’t be able to find a job. While looking for a job and sending out resumes he started working small jobs for small business owners to help create websites and resources. There is such a demand for Software Engineers that he was able to find a job over the next few months in the midst of a pandemic working OSI Express, Inc. working on building a CRM platform. 

He eventually left OSI to work as an instructor with Sabio. He helps new students go from people who don’t know anything about coding to finding their footing. He loves getting to watch them learn and loves supporting students through the program. 

He encourages people to get started with coding. There are free programs offered by Sabio that can help you learn a little about coding and see if it is something you are interested in. He loves supporting students who are following this self paced route.

He also encourages graduates to remember how much they have learned and to go in with confidence. Be confident with what you learned and if you don’t know the answer come back after the interview and share what you have learned. He felt unsure of himself before he went to his first interview. But he realized he was prepared and ready.