This is a guest post from a student that GDI loves, Tracy Bartley. We wish Tracy the best in her new position, and appreciate her warming the cockles in our hearts. 

I graduated at the height of the “great recession” with a Master of the Arts and moved to New York City. I worked in restaurants, volunteered, interned and worked in restaurants again until I landed a salaried job in a field which I had little to no experience. Part of the job I had no experience in was website creation and management. I had never used Wordpress and the only HTML I knew was for inserting links, though I had no idea it was called “HTML”.

I ordered the “Idiots guide to HTML, CSS and XHTML”, but when the 1000 page text arrived it merely sat accusingly in the corner collecting dust and I felt more the idiot for bothering to purchase it.

Enter Girl Develop It! I stumbled across the group on Meetup.com and nearly jumped through the roof. An opportunity to learn the basics with other girls from a girl; YES, YES and YES! I was so thrilled to be able to take classes that fit with my schedule that gave me the comfort to “ask stupid questions”.

Over 6 months I took HTML/CSS, then a special HTML5/CSS3 weekend course, then Javascript, then PHP from the New York chapter. Then I moved to Austin, TX and got a job designing Wordpress pages!

GDI got me a job!

I also took HTML/CSS and PHP again from the Austin chapter. The great thing about these classes is, they are so packed with information, you really can take them twice and learn just as much.

Now I’m moving to Washington DC on a job offer in keeping with my original degree. I’ve come full circle, finally entering into the job market I had originally targeted and not (quite) on welfare or too far in debt. My only regret with the move is there’s not a GDI chapter in DC. Ladies, you’ve already got a groupie in the city, why not start a chapter there? (note to Tracy: we’re working on it!)