S2E4: Teaching English in Korea to Fullstack Developer with Stephen Mayeux

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In today’s episode of the Learn to Code With Me podcast, I speak with Stephen Mayeux. Stephen is a former English teacher who spent two years in Korea while teaching himself how to code. He recently returned to the States where he is now a fullstack developer.

Stephen first became interested in coding as a teacher at the University of California. His passion for new methods of teaching led him to create eslhiphop.com and myskypeteacher.com. Those early coding experiences stuck with him and he continued to learn on his own while in Korea.

In our conversation, Stephen talks about the resources he used while learning to code. He shares his tips on applying for jobs and preparing for interviews. He also discusses the importance of LinkedIn when seeking a coding job. Ultimately, Stephen believes that consistency and hard work are the keys to success in the coding world.

Laurence:
Hey, it's Laurence Bradford. Welcome to Season 2 of the Learn to Code With Me podcast, where I'm chatting with people who taught themselves how to code and are now doing amazing things with their newly found skills.

Fullstack Academy is a coding boot camp that helps people become software developers at companies like Google, Amazon, and Facebook. Fullstack also offers a part-time boot camp prep course that prepares you for admission into selective coding boot camps. Visit bootcampprep.io to learn more and get a $500 scholarship with the code learnwithme.

Hey listeners, welcome to the Learn to Code With Me podcast. I'm your host, Laurence Bradford. In today's episode, I talk with Stephen Mayeux. Stephen is a former English teacher in Korea turned Fullstack developer. In our conversation, he talks about learning how to code, applying for engineering jobs and developer jobs, and much more. If you're transitioning into tech, this episode is for you. Remember, you can get Show Notes
for this episode plus a full transcript at learntocodewith.me/podcast. Enjoy!

Hey Stephen, how are you?

Stephen:
Hey, what's up Laurence, I'm doing fine.

Laurence:
Thank you so much for coming on the show with me.

Stephen:
Yeah, thanks for having me. So what are we going to talk about today?

Laurence:
We're going to talk about a bunch of stuff, but first I want you to introduce yourself so people can kind of get a taste of who you are.

Stephen:
Yeah totally. My name is Stephen Mayeux and I'm an English teacher turned Fullstack developer. And that's the tl;dr version of my life story.

Laurence:
I know there's so much more than that. What were you doing, I know you're an English teacher, but you could just share a bit more about where and who you work with and so on?

Stephen:
Yeah totally. I've been an English teacher, specifically English as a second language, so I help non-native speakers of English acquire a better proficiency so they can get jobs in English speaking countries or maybe attend universities in English speaking countries.

I mainly taught in the United States but for the last two years I've been in South Korea. Mainly my students have been university age and sometimes a little bit older like a salary men or salary women who are trying to advance their careers. Yeah, it's been really fun. I'm really passionate about education. About a year ago I got bit by the coding bug and that's what brings me here today.

Laurence:
Yeah, how did you first kind of discover coding and start learning?

Stephen:
So, when I was teaching at the University of California, I was given a lot of freedom with what I could do in the classroom. If you're really a passionate teacher, that's the best thing a school could give you, just tons of freedom and leeway to create your own curriculum and content. I wasn't really satisfied with what was available in the teacher's room and the resources closet. We had a lot of standard textbooks, but I really loved hip hop, I still love hip hop.

I'm a big method pop head and I thought it would be so cool if I could have some kind of website or act, just devote it entirely to teaching English, predominately using hip hop songs. I got started into web development creating this WordPress site with my friend who's a frontend developer. He helped me set it up and taught me a whole bunch of things about HTML and CSS, a touch of PHP, just to customize my website.

That was my first entrance into this world of coding. It was really cool. I loved creating content and creating this community of English learners and English teachers and hip hop fans. That was a lot of fun. Just the process of creating the website was also really cool and I enjoyed that very much. Further along in my teaching career, through my other educational endeavors, I created a few more websites and I thought, 'Hey, this is pretty cool that I can create something from literally nothing.' I don't need any raw materials or any money up front. It's just like copying this abstract code into the text editor and then bam, l had like an online school and I'm getting students that way. That was how I was first introduced to it, through my teaching endeavors.

Laurence:
Yeah, that's so awesome. I think it's so interesting that you kind of began your journey through a passion project, or I guess it was related to your career at the time, building this site. I don't think you actually said the site name, did you?

Stephen:
Oh yeah, it's eslhiphop.com. So ESL stands for English as a Second Language. Eslhiphop.com. It's just a WordPress site that my friend John Bella helped me out with. A couple other sites, one I had to take down because it was like a test preparation course and the makers of the test weren't too happy that I was sharing some secrets with the students, so that one is taken down, I shouldn't have mentioned that one.

There's another one, when I was teaching English online, I know longer do this but it's still up on the web for portfolio purposes. It's called myskypeteacher.com. Really, that was when I was still quite fresh and I wasn't studying HTML or CSS, but I bought the template and that's whenever I just kind of thought, "What happens if I delete this line of code and what happens if I move it around this way?" Those are the two, ESL Hip Hop hiphop and myskypeteacher.com.

Laurence:
Awesome. So, how much time then, after you kind of began building ESL Hip Hop and these other sites, were you like, "Hmmm, I actually want to do this full-time." Like building applications and coding and so on.

Stephen:
So right about that time when I made those websites, I guess it was about 2013, 2014 and that thought had not entered my mind yet. Basically after I left the University of California, tried to make it on my own by freelancing and doing consulting and online teaching on my own, it didn't work out and that's kind of what brought me here to South Korea. The demand for English teachers is really high here. It's easy to make a comfortable living, so I said, "Okay, I'm going to go to South Korea, teach there for a couple years and kind of figure things out."

It wasn't until the summer of 2015, a year into my time in South Korea, I just started reading a lot of articles about 'teach yourself to code' and #100daysofcode and coding boot camps and Ruby on Rails and 'anyone can learn to code' and 'not everyone can learn to code' and reading all this stuff. I just remember fondly making those websites and I always felt kind of limited like, "Man, wouldn't it be so cool if I could make my own hip hop application" and "Wouldn't it be cool if I could do this or that," but I didn't know how to do any of it. So yeah, I think I just googled 'learn how to code free' and Codecademy was the first thing that came up and I started that. That's how it all started formally, about 13 or 14 months ago. Just kind of on a whim. Since then I've been hitting it really hard.

Laurence:
Yeah, definitely. So you went to a coding boot camp, am I right? Like an online one?

Stephen:
Yeah, I went to Viking Code School and I was in their flex program for about 3 months. I'm taking a pause momentarily just to prepare for my life in America. You know, moving back home, just a lot of prep has to go into that. Kind of making some big life changes as well. I am taking a pause from the program. I was with Eric and his team for 3 months. It was an incredible experience. It was absolutely fantastic.

Laurence:
Oh that's so great. Going a little off topic but I actually just moved to New York last month, or in July, this is August when we're recording this. I can totally feel you on the move. You're moving from Korea back and it's a much larger move and even just the 3 1/2 hour move for me totally just threw me off. As far as organization and productivity. Oh man.

Stephen:
Yeah, anytime you do any sort of boot camp, even if it's a flex program, like at Viking Code School where you can kind of learn on your own and go at your own pace, there are similar programs out there. Sometime like that, like a significant life event like moving to another continent or moving to another country, even moving 3 1/2 hours away, that's a significant event. You need time to pause. I don't think it's possible to commit and concentrate fully 100% and handle all of that stuff at the same time. So, I'm taking a pause. I intend to get back to it once I get settled back in America in a few weeks. I couldn't see myself doing that and handling all these job interviews and things like that all at the same time. But yeah, Eric's team is phenomenal, I really liked it.

Laurence:
That's so great. I think by the time this episode goes live you will probably be back into it. Into the swing of things, you should be moved by then. Before we started recording, to the listeners, Stephen told me, you're moving next week, correct? Back to the US?

Stephen:
That's right, yeah.

Laurence:
Wow, and how long have you been in South Korea for?

Stephen:
I've been here for two years. I've done some traveling, just for long weekends to Japan and Taiwan, but really the whole time has been spent in Korea. I haven't seen any of my friends and family so part of that time, whenever I go back, is just catching up with everybody and you gotta do that to keep your sanity. You gotta keep those connections, especially friends and family close to you. Going back it's just going to be reunion after reunion and a big homecoming. Yeah, two years, wow. Just saying it out loud, that's crazy, and it's going to happen next week. I'm excited.

Laurence:
Wow, oh my goodness. So yeah, so you haven't been home, you haven't been back to the US in two years?

Stephen:
No, no I haven't.

Laurence:
I have several friends that have actually taught overseas that spent two, and then one girl even three years before coming back to the US and, it's such an amazing experience but I'm sure, at the same time, you're also very happy to reconnect with everyone and get things going back here. I know you briefly mentioned interviewing at jobs, can you kind of touch on that? Have you been, how have you begun interviewing, when did you start?

Stephen:
Yeah, so I started about a month ago. Kind of the analogy I've been telling all my friends and all the people reaching out to me has been, okay, when you're looking for jobs and you're interviewing, imagine you're in a kitchen and you're cooking and you've got like four or five burners on your stove or your gas range or whatever, you always want like a pot or pan or something on each one of those burners. Maybe one or two of them are boiling really hot and it's moving very quickly, maybe a couple on the back are just simmering, going slowly.

For every week this month in August, I tried to have every burner on my job interviewing stove kitchen, whatever, something cooking at all times. Each week, meeting with a lot of recruiters, putting me in touch with different companies. Sometimes it's just like going through the side door and having a friend or somebody else hook me up with some interviews and get me in touch with the CEO.

LinkedIn has been really valuable with helping me get in touch with product managers and hiring managers and so forth. The only thing that hasn't really worked out very much is just going on job websites and applying blindly to any posting that requires JavaScript and this and that. Only one time that has worked and I considered that completely dumb luck.

Laurence:
Really, oh wow.

Stephen:
Yeah.

Laurence:
So only one time out of, when you say 'worked' do you mean you got an email back or you got an interview?

Stephen:
Right, I mean, for a lot of job websites, like Dice or Indeed, you go on there, you put in your location, like some keywords and apply directly or through the external application system. Usually, nothing even comes up. Not even an acknowledgement that your application was received. Maybe it's because I don't have the experience and I'm up against so many people who have experience, but only once has somebody actually gotten back to me and has it progressed into something meaningful.

Laurence:
Sit tight podcast listeners, we're taking a quick break to hear a word from our sponsors.

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It's so interesting to hear your perspective. I think just with applying to jobs in general, it can be so different for everyone and what works and what doesn't. I just have to interject here, first, you mention LinkedIn and I love LinkedIn, so I'm so glad you said that. I tell people all the time, you need to go on LinkedIn, not just for people in tech, for anyone who wants, anything career wise, being on LinkedIn is great. Glad that's been working out for you.

And then going through your personal network, I always tell people to do this as well, the reason why my thoughts applying online slightly changed is because the job I have now, I actually got from applying online. I hadn't applied online for jobs in forever and I always just, I still don't think it's the best way to get a job. I definitely think the best way is to go through someone you know, hands down, or a recruiter or something like that.

Stephen:
But sometimes it's just dumb luck and it just works out.

Laurence:
Yeah, so when I applied to this job listing, it was on LinkedIn actually, and they had no idea, the company on LinkedIn, it somehow got, an RSS kind of picked it up type thing and it got syndicated on LinkedIn essentially. The job ad, it was this one day, I remember it was a Wednesday and I was like, "I'm just going to see if there's any jobs that fit this really specific description." I had this really clear idea of the job I wanted. Only a few results showed up when I put in the key words and all the filters on LinkedIn for the search. This job showed up first and it had been posted eight hours before. It was so meant to be. I think looking back on it, it was just so crazy but I just had to share that little story real quick. But that was also through LinkedIn actually, so more power over to LinkedIn. And how great it is.

Stephen:
Oh yeah. I think LinkedIn for me, it's worked so well because when you just send in your resume, it's just like another resume on a stack of who knows how many. At least with LinkedIn, they can see your profile picture. I think this is like so much, it's just more meaningful, someone can see who you are and just put a face to your name.

So to me, LinkedIn just feels so more human. There's a human element to it and I found it's been way more responsive than just the job ads on the websites. Not saying those are completely a waste of time. Certainly try it out and maybe I'm doing something wrong, but LinkedIn has resonated for me and of course personal networks too. Just analyzing those things, maybe the human element, it's common in both, your personal network and LinkedIn and that's why it's worked for me so well.

Laurence:
Yeah, definitely, LinkedIn is so much more personal than sending in a faceless or a pdf resume or something. It really puts a context to the person, you can learn a lot about them. If your LinkedIn profile's filled out. Caveat, right? You can't just get a LinkedIn, you definitely need to put some effort in, adding some information, adding your experience. There's so much you can do with it.

Literally last season I had one episode where we just talked about LinkedIn. Me and a woman named Sandy who is kind of a LinkedIn expert. It was great. Actually I get tweets still and comments on the episode all the time that people really enjoyed it. Because there's a lot of people I think, we hear about social media all the time but sometimes LinkedIn isn't mentioned as much. But anyway, really going on a rant here with LinkedIn but that's totally fine. So, okay, I kind of want to circle back actually to what you were learning and what you've been learning. You really focused on frontend, but now you're doing Fullstack though?

Stephen:
Yes.

Laurence:
Strictly JavaScript?

Stephen:
Yeah, that's predominantly what I've been doing, is Fullstack JavaScript. You can call it like the MEAN Stack, or now I'm learning React so the MERN stack as some people are calling it. At Viking I had a chance to learn Ruby and a little bit of Sinatra and Rails, so that was really cool, just to learn programming under a different paradigm and a different set of rules, but yeah, predominately I'm a JavaScript developer.

Laurence:
Is that, has that been most of the jobs you've been applying for, trying to get an in with, have been JavaScript ones?

Stephen:
Yeah, mostly what I've been dealing with is Fullstack JavaScript jobs where the required skills are new GS, Express, MongoDB, maybe a SQL type of database experience, and a lot of jobs that I've been applying to, React and Redux and even a little bit of React Native, they always list that as a very nice thing to have, so learning React right now is super helpful and will set you apart from other applicants who don't use React.

Laurence:
So you mentioned you'd been learning React, do you have any recommended resources?

Stephen:
Just follow along with the documentation on Facebook's Net Developer page. That sort of gives you a good introduction, giving you step by step examples. A lot of people might find that kind of dry and hard to follow along. I admit, following documentation and things like that, I can see for a lot of people, that may not be the most useful kind of resource. For me, some Udemy courses have just been phenomenal. There's one particular course creator on Udemy that I just absolutely adore. I think I bought all of his courses. By the way, I've gotten no endorsement from this guy, he's not giving me anything.

Laurence:
Which person is it?

Stephen:
Stephen Grider. If you want to learn React, Stephen Grider, his courses are amazing. He's got several of them on Udemy, he's got one for React and Flux and React and Redux, there's an Advanced Redux, Meteor and React. He's got a new course on ES6 and it just, each one of his courses is practical, straightforward, and such a good value. I think I bought all of his courses, that's how much I really love Stephen Grider.

Laurence:
Yeah, that's great. I'm really glad you're sharing that because I know a lot of people really want to learn React and different things with JavaScript so the fact you're giving a good recommendation, that's awesome. Yeah, there's a few other Udemy instructors that I hear people constantly rave about. I actually have not heard, I don't think, of Stephen Grider, thank you for sharing that.

Stephen:
Yeah, totally.

Laurence:
I think we're going to wrap things up here. I just kind of want to end this conversation by asking if you have any other advice for people that are learning on their own without formal academic training.

Stephen:
Yeah, so this might be cliche and you've probably heard this time and time again, but don't give up, don't throw in the towel. Don't feel like just because you have some non-traditional background or coming from something that isn't really related to math or computer science or engineering, you can definitely do this. It's not going to be easy and it's not going to happen overnight but if you consistently put in the time and code every day and have these good habits and maintain it for a long time.

A long time might be six months, it might be a full year, even two years. Just consistently working and coding and meeting up and going to hackathons and doing all that sort of stuff, it's going to happen. You don't have to be some genius, you don't have to be talented in whatever sense of that word. It's really just a skill and you put in the time, you put in an honest effort and it will actually happen for you. Don't give up and keep going after it, it's going to work out.

Laurence:
I love it. Hang in there, have mental toughness, keep working. I tell people all the time that just intelligence is not enough. That's not going to make you learn how to code. What it takes is hard work and dedication and hanging in there. Anyone can learn it, you know?

Stephen:
I don't think I'm the most intelligent guy, sometimes I think I'm really dumb. Sometimes I think being a little bit dumb has benefitted me. I remember just late nights trying to hack away at some code and there's some bug but the stupid monkey part of my brain is like, "Keep going, keep going." Sometimes it helped and sometimes that can even be harmful.

Laurence:
I was just thinking about this the other day because I was thinking with my site Learn to Code With Me, and one of the biggest factors I'd say in success and how it got started and how it continued was how little thought I put into it. When I started the site I was not strategic. Over time I became more strategic and more, that's the best word to use, strategic.

When I had the idea for the site I just started it because I knew if I let myself think too much about it I would think myself out of it, right? I was like, I just gotta take action, I just gotta do this because if I sit on this idea for too long it's going to slip through the cracks like a thousand of my other ideas have in the past. Anyway, I love where this conversation is ending, this is awesome. So Stephen, finally, where can people find you online?

Stephen:
The best place to find me is, you can go to my LinkedIn, so find me at Stephen Mayeux right there. You can follow me on Twitter, that's another good place, @eslhiphop, my portfolio needs to be updated, so don't go there but check me on my GitHub profile, so github.com/stephenmayeux. Pretty much everything is Stephen Mayeux so that's where you can find me.

Laurence:
We'll definitely link those up in the Show Notes so thanks again Stephen for chatting.

Stephen:
Yeah, thanks for having me, this was a lot of fun.

Laurence:
I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Stephen. Again, the Show Notes for this episode, plus a full transcript can be found at learntocodewith.me/podcast. If you enjoyed this interview, head on over to my website learntocodewith.me where you can find even more awesome code related resources. For instance, my Ten Free Tips for Teaching Yourself How to Code. Thanks so much for tuning in. I would also be so appreciative if you could leave a review and rating on iTunes, if that's where you're listening of course. I'll see you next week!

SPECIAL THANKS TO THIS EPISODE’S SPONSOR
Fullstack Academy: If you’re looking for a coding bootcamp that will prepare you for your dream tech job at a top tier company, sign up for Fullstack Academy’s boot camp prep course today. Don’t forget to enter the code learnwithme for a $500 scholarship offered to Learn to Code With Me listeners.

Key takeaways:

  • LinkedIn is a great resource when you are looking for coding jobs. It’s more meaningful than just a simple resume. It allows recruiters and hiring managers to put a face to a name and makes it more personal.
  • Take advantage of the resources available to you when you’re learning to code. Check out coding groups on Facebook or courses on Udemy. Keep moving towards your goal, no matter how long it takes.
  • It’s okay to take a break once in awhile. It’s not possible to commit and concentrate fully on everything at once. Give yourself the chance to pause and come back when you’re ready to give it 100% again.
  • When you’re looking for a job, try to keep things cooking on every burner. Set goals, meet with recruiters, go to meetups, and make progress each day.
  • Don’t forget that your network can be a valuable resource in the job hunt. Friends and acquaintances can get you through doors that might not otherwise be open to you.
  • Teaching yourself how to code is not always easy, and it won’t happen overnight. It takes good habits and consistent hard work to make progress.
  • Don’t talk yourself out of the goals you set. You don’t have to be a genius or a natural talent to become good at coding. Like anything else, it’s an acquired skill. Put in an honest effort and it will happen for you.

Links and mentions from the episode:

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Fullstack Academy: If you’re looking for a coding bootcamp that will prepare you for your dream tech job at a top tier company, sign up for Fullstack Academy’s bootcamp prep course today. Don’t forget to enter the code learnwithme for a $500 scholarship offered to Learn to Code With Me listeners.