I graduated from UT Austin with a BS in Computer Science and a BA in English in 2009. I always enjoyed learning and chose to study computer science more out of a love for the subject than out of any desire to find a programmer job. Perhaps I watched "Office Space" too many times, but the whole desk-worker lifestyle seemed dull. I guess I was more interested in adventure. So after graduation, I got a job teaching English in a remote town in Northeast China (Baicheng Normal College in Jilin province, if you're wondering).

Well, I was planning to only work there for a year, learn some Chinese, and go back to the US. But I liked teaching, and my Chinese wasn’t very good after just one year, so I stayed. I ended up working at the school for four good years and helping over a thousand students from poor backgrounds, most of whom were first-generation college students. I also taught in Shenyang, Liaoning province, for one year. Then I moved to Beijing and worked for Beijing Language University (also known as BLCU/Beijing Language and Culture University).

At BLCU, I taught oral English, test prep, technical writing, and academic writing and delivered lectures on the History of the English Language, US Geography, US History, and computational neuroscientific models of language production. And again, I liked the work and had great coworkers, so I stayed for five years.

Covid happened. This is not the place to recount such hard times. The long and short of it is that I had to go back to the United States. While isolating during the pandemic, I rediscovered my passion for computer science, got a teaching certification, and began teaching at Westside High School in Houston, Texas. There, I helped students from 14 to 20 discover their own passion for coding and how it could make their dreams come true. I'm proud to say I made a difference in the lives of hundreds of high school students from diverse backgrounds. Many of them told me they'll go on to major in computer science and build a career in programming because of my class.

I loved teaching computer science at Westside High school, but I didn't care for Houston itself. Though diverse and affordable, Houston's problems with crime and automobile dependency were too much. There was also the looming issue of Houston ISD's takeover by the state government. From a teacher's perspective, the takeover meant massive bureaucratic oversight to no meaningful purpose, a myopic focus on test scores and performance metrics, a lot more paperwork, and a vague feeling of suffocation.

But I knew I enjoyed the subject of computer science, so I started working on a master's degree in computer science and saved money. It's easy to save money if you don't have a car and do nothing but work and study. I will mention here that, to further build my war chest, I took a summer camp job in Seattle, Washington. There, I gained experience working with students from 7 to 13. I taught them a variety of computer science subjects, ranging from Python to cybersecurity to game development with Lua.

So after two years of saving money, I had enough cash to quit my job and continue working on my Master's degree online while travelling the world and starting a Youtube channel. I visited Thailand, Laos, Malaysia, Taiwan, Vietnam, and Mainland China, visiting multiple cities in each. It was awesome. However, the Youtube channel had mixed success.

So what did I gain from a year of travel and making videos? I'm still thinking about that, but one thing stood out: I missed teaching. So I started Codeslate Tutoring to continue helping people and sharing my passion for computer science while escaping the bureaucracy and political squabbling in the school system.

And that's my journey.