RoverTown

I was told to meet with the COO of RoverTown from someone I knew at SIUE. I was interested in learning programming and becoming interested in potentially working for a (or possibly even starting my own) startup company, which is why I was told to meet with the COO of RoverTown. When I met the COO, he gave me a lot of advice, told me good places to follow startup/tech news, and signed me up for some local business/startup newsletters. One of the many things he talked to me about was Jim McKelvey, the founder of Square and LaunchCode, who was also an investor in RoverTown. He told me that I should talk to McKelvey, if I ever get the chance, so I decided I would figure out a way to meet with him.

McKelvey

I figured it would be difficult, but I tried searching for McKelvey's email online for awhile, which I was unable to find. I then decided to look up some YouTube videos of McKelvey, to learn more about him, since I only knew as much about him as the COO of RoverTown told me. In the first video I found of him, he was speaking about startup companies to a group of people and on the marker board behind him he pointed to his email address, for anyone who had any startup related questions for him. So I immediately emailed him, asking if I could meet with him for even just 20 minutes to get any kind of startup advice. To my surprise, he actually replied and I got to meet with him that week. When I met with him, he didn't have a lot of free time to spare, but he told me more about LaunchCode and said that I should learn more programming and go through LaunchCode, possibly even getting a job at a startup company through it, before I focus too much on starting my own startup company. So I decided to take his advice and focus on going in that direction.

LaunchCode

As I continued going to college for a CMIS or CS degree (still undecided, but both taught programming), I was becoming increasingly bored with the slow rate that I was learning programming. At the time, it had been almost two years since I met with McKelvey over the summer. Right before my college summer break of 2016 was about to start, I received and email from one of the local business/startup newsletters that the COO of RoverTown had signed me up for a couple of years ago. The email mentioned how LaunchCode would be doing a Summer of Code class. After reading more about it, I decided that I would drop out of college to focus on that because it looked like it would teach programming at a much better pace compared to college. So that's where I am today and my interested in programming has increased, while my interest in startup companies has decreased. So I'm currently uncertain if I will try to get an apprenticeship for a startup company through LaunchCode after the class, but I'm very much looking forward to getting an apprenticeship, despite whatever kind of company it happens to be for.