Self-teaching is a sure-fire way to save some hard-earned money to get a high-paying job as a developer today. If you search on YouTube, there are a myriad of tutorials by people that have made this work who are showing newbies how to achieve the same thing. In fact:

Stack Overflow’s 2019 developer study shows that around 86.8 percent say they learned a language, framework, or tooling without any sort of formal coursework.

HackerRank’s survey also shows 27.4 percent of developers say they’re self-taught. 37.7 percent say they supplemented a formal education with an online course, or otherwise taught themselves.

So, the real question is why are self-taught developers sprouting like weeds in the job market today?

Not So Traditional Traditions

To become a lawyer, you’d first have to pass the bar exam after 4 years of college with a Bachelor of Law Degree. And similarly, to become a doctor, you’d have to pass the board exam after 4 years of college with a Bachelor of Medicine Degree.

There is no grey area here. You need the paper qualifications to certify that you have gone through the rigorous syllabus and series of examinations that prove you are legally proficient to be in this profession. As of today, you’ve never heard of a self-taught lawyer or a self-taught doctor.

On the flip side, the way to becoming a developer is somewhat different, even though the most traditional way was to get a degree in Computer Science (CS). However, as the tech world is constantly evolving with technological breakthroughs, a CS degree no longer guarantees or even equips an individual with sufficient skills to become a proficient developer.

#programming #coding #careers #javascript