About Me

Hello, my name is Kareem Itani. This is my first time writing a blog, I wanted to share my story as a developer, from how I started coding in high school to where I am now, with two professional years of experience under my belt.

How It All Began

It all started back in high school when a teacher set up an AP Computer Science Principles class. I had taken a few AP classes before, but this one caught my attention. The teacher, who I knew from a previous class, encouraged me to join, saying, "It’ll be fun!" So, I decided to give it a shot.

The class used Scratch, which was a fun, visual introduction to coding. It wasn’t “real” coding in the sense of writing lines of code, but I enjoyed it. At the time, I thought I was headed for a career in business or accounting, so I didn’t take the class too seriously — it was just something fun to do with friends.

College Days: A Reality Check

When I got to college, I took my first accounting course. I did really well and got an A+, but I wasn’t convinced that I wanted to do it for the rest of my life, it didn't spark anything in me.

That changed when I took a Java class. The professor was the most stereotypical, movie like professor you can imagine. She started the course by telling us, "You're all going to fail. None of you are good at coding, and I won’t grade any homework until half of you drop the class." And she wasn’t kidding; she didn’t grade anything until halfway through the semester.

Even though the transition from Scratch to Java was tough, I managed to understand the concepts, maybe because of my previous experience in the AP class or maybe because I really enjoyed it. My classmates even started asking me for help, and I ended up teaching a few of the lessons, which was kind of funny. I would go up in front of the class as the professor would take my seat and I would teach concepts like methods and such.

The Struggle and Growth

Despite my understanding, I wasn’t a great test-taker, and I struggled with how the material was presented. I didn’t do well in that class. I ended up with a C. But I think that was mostly due to the professor being really uptight, after that class I would get mostly A’s moving forward. I really found a deep enjoyment in coding which helped me get through a lot of my projects and homework.

By junior year, I felt confident enough to start applying for internships. One of my most memorable moments was getting an interview at Google. I thought I had it in the bag, but they asked me about things I had never heard of, like LeetCode and web development. Needless to say, I didn’t get the internship, but that experience made me realize there was a lot I didn’t know.

So, I spent that summer learning web development HTML, CSS, React and studied hard. By the time senior year rolled around, I had a much better grasp of development, especially front-end work.

Breaking Into the Industry

As graduation approached, I applied to over 1,000 jobs. After countless applications, I finally landed a position at TD Bank. I was lucky to join a team that understood my strengths and weaknesses. I told them I was strong in front-end work but had never done full-stack development before. So my first assignment ended up being a full-stack feature update. It felt endless in a way so many new concepts and confusing files within files it really was a struggle.

That project took me longer than I’d like to admit, but it was a turning point. By the end, I finally understood how the front-end and back-end communicated with each other. Over the next couple of years, I became confident in both front-end and back-end development, pumping out features and improving my skills.

Looking Forward

Recently, I switched to a new team where I’ll be working with Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) and Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE). It’s a step outside of web development, and I have no idea if I’ll like it or not, but I’m excited to learn something new. If nothing else, it’ll make me a better programmer.

These first two years of my career have been an incredible learning experience. I’ve been fortunate to work with patient colleagues who helped me grow. I’ve learned the importance of communication and knowing when to ask for help. I’m excited to continue improving as a developer, and I can’t wait to see where my journey takes me.

Thanks for reading, and hopefully, you’ll see more blogs from me in the future as I get better at writing!