My junior year in Web Development was an interesting one that was filled with challenges. I want to share my journey through the couple months I spent in web development with anyone interested in learning about my experiences. I started this year coming out of my second year in Electronics Engineering Technology, a shop that I enjoyed a lot and was in with friends that I still have inside my current shop. And began my first year of Electromechanical Engineering, a short-lived shop as our teacher left after around 4 months into the school year. I then transferred to the Web Development program as a student in my third year of high school. Having already switched programs once this year I came in without very high hopes.Those quickly changed as I started doing some of the classwork and met new classmates that would help me with anything that I wasn’t very well-versed in. My first project was to make a website about my favorite animal. This was when I had to learn both CSS and HTML as well as a bit of PHP in order to get my website to function properly. Learning these languages did not bring up much of a problem as I was already experienced in C++ and Python which made learning other coding languages much easier. One challenge I overcame was my mindset when it came to coding and the habits I would have from coding in C++ and that I would try to use C++ terms within HTML. I’ve made a lot of progress so far both coding and design wise. I’m not the strongest when it comes to actual design and I’m better when it comes to development so it was hard for me to design a lot of the things I needed sometimes, and it wouldn’t end up as the best. I’ve made improvements in the design aspect thanks to the efforts of me, my classmates, and our teacher who have all been a huge help in my journey from Engineering to Web Design. I’ve also made progress on my mindset when it comes to working as a team. Usually in my old program we would work solo with most of our projects which led to me developing a mindset where I had to do everything on my own. My toughest project this year was our final project which was a 3-person team and figuring out how to work with that team and not go off on my own and do just what i wanted to do. The thing I’m most worried about is my senior year and preparation for my NOCTI. As I’m two years behind the rest of my class I’ll have a lot more work to do in preparation and catching up to my class which I feel like I’ve made progress towards. Through all of this from changing shops to finding my place in the Web Development and Design program I’ve had some tough times but my outlook on it has changed since becoming more used to the class that I now have a place in. I’m glad that I was switched into the Web program because although it isn’t something I see myself doing for the rest of my life it is an experience that I’m happy I’m getting to have in my high school career and a skill I will definitely use in the future. I’m determined to make progress towards my end goal of passing my NOCTI and I’m confident that with the help of everyone in the class I’ll be able to do it.
