Around 2014, Epperson’s kids had grown a little older and more independent. What’s more, the family had settled in Carbondale, a sleepy mountain town in the central Colorado Rockies. This slower pace of life allowed Epperson the space to begin thinking about getting back into her career, which she’d set aside years ago. It was an exciting possibility, but also an intimidating one—a lot had changed in the field of web development since Epperson had been involved in it 13 years earlier. Epperson grew up in Santa Cruz, California. From an early age, she had an artistic sensibility. She eventually found her way to starting a business hand-painting decorative signs. This was in the early ’90s, just as computers and the internet were starting to become a thing. As far as painting signs goes, all of a sudden everyone had access to Microsoft Paint and point-and-click block letters and thought they were an expert. Epperson started fiddling with the technology herself. Epperson enrolled in a web development certificate program at her local community college. Shortly thereafter, she landed an internship as a developer with the County of Santa Cruz. The public sector being the public sector, Epperson felt like things didn’t evolve all that fast at the county. Nevertheless, she stayed there for three years and says she learned a lot at that job. Thirteen years later, finally with enough time to do so in Carbondale, Epperson started thinking about snapping her professional life back into place. Specifically, she wanted to return to web development. Epperson knew she needed to learn the modern coding languages, but wasn’t sure the best way to go about it. She’d been paying the bills with restaurant shifts and the occasional freelance design gig. Turned out, Epperson had a friend who’d recently learned to code at a so-called bootcamp. Epperson had never heard of coding schools, but thought the relatively short timeframe sounded like a good fit. Like most research endeavors these days, Epperson started with Google. In the evenings after work, she’d pull up websites for different coding schools and try to imagine herself being successful in that particular space. When it came time to imagine herself at Galvanize, she says she immediately felt comfortable. Still, even though Epperson could see herself succeeding in her mind’s eye, it didn’t make the ensuing transition all that much easier. She kept putting off the final decision of whether to apply. She decided to work in stages. Step one was saving money, after that, she identified the Galvanize location that would work best for her (Boulder) and looked into where she and her kids and her mother—who suffers from dementia—might be able to live. Finally, she applied. Epperson says the moment she finally sent in the application—finally leapt back into an industry that had changed so quickly and committed to herself and reigniting her career—felt seismic in the best way. It took Epperson two years from when she first thought about getting back into web development to the day she and her family moved from Carbondale to Boulder so she could join the g44 cohort. She found someone to help her take care of her mother and her kids have settled into life in Boulder, which at first felt like a big city compared to Carbondale. What’s more, Epperson has been pleased to learn that the Galvanize program has, in fact, turned out to be the place she imagined when she first visited the website. She’s already looking forward to her job search and getting back into the field, to completing her journey. Read more inspiring stories at TechCo
