Hello campers!
I’m a uni student, and I’m relatively soon getting my diploma, and as you guessed, it has nothing to do with web development and design. Afraid of not getting a job after college, since I don’t know anyone who did (didn’t know about the situation when enrolling), I looked up all the things I could do instead. The most tempting was web design - and here I am, learning with all of you. To get back to the subject, what are the real chances of getting a job, of earning as a freelancer? Do I need any certification besides the ones here? If there are chances of getting a job, what are the things I don’t learn here but should?
Sorry for my English and making such a long post.
Hi Amy.
What’s not worth it is forcing yourself to find a job even if it means something you dont like doing. If you can see urself be passionate about web dev, definitely do it. I wasted 2 yrs working healthcare related stuff thinking it was the only path for me. I realized i just forced myself to get a job in the related field as my degree because i didnt wamt to be one of those jobless graduates. It took me 2 yrs to grow the balls to just go for it. Once i did i loved what i was learning.
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Hey!
I absolutely agree with this!
I have been on and off programming for the last 13 years. I never really thought I can make it as a professional developer because I do not have any certification or proper training but am self-taught. However, I have always embraced doing all kinds of projects - mostly helping out with open source projects that interested me.
Now that I have been a self-employed freelance dev for the last 4 years I see this all from a different angle. Training and certifications are good and nice to have. But in the end those hiring you want to see your capabilities. And what’s better than to show them projects you are deeply passionate about? For me doing various different projects has yielded the biggest return in learning as well as work. Therefore, I can only recommend this: especially in the beginning, do every project you can get your hands on. It’s fun and makes you highly employable 
Happy coding!
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You need some experience in projects then you will definitely do the freelancing. it’s not about the certification it’s about your getting the knowledge and how to used it. create some project and show case the on portfolio.
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Regards working freelance, it’s totally possible, but be prepared for at least 50% of your time (may be more, likely to be not much less) being taken up with business-related stuff, not design/development stuff. If you do decide to do freelance work, that means you have to find the work, you have to sort out your finances, you have to maintain business relationships. You don’t need certification, but you would be running a business, and it’s hard - you have to persuade people to pay you to make things for them, otherwise you don’t eat/pay rent/pay bills/etc. Just having a portfolio doesn’t cut it - you have to approach people and make a case for why them giving you money will generate more money for them than they’re going to pay you. Highly polished examples on a shiny website — that helps a bit, but it’s just a way to catch someone’s attention for a few seconds.
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Thank you for your reply. It seems like an interesting field, something more interesting than what I’d do with my degree, but there’s this fear because as a kid and teen I showed no interest in it at all.
Searched online all the things I should learn, but often, those were just articles written by those who have never done anything similar. So, what do you think I should learn except this? Wordpress? Some programming language, but which? Java seems too confusing, but then again, I was scared of this too. So many questions… Sorry to bother, you. I’m just freaking out.
No need to worry, everybody freaks out once in a while
So, what do you think I should learn except this?
That’s something we really can’t tell you but what you have to find out for yourself. For me this whole trip started with doing print design. 2005ish there were almost no good design communities online, so I decided to do it myself and started to program. So my focus has always been on styling - only recently more on the backend of things.
So the only real advise I can give you is to experiment and try to figure out what you want to do in the future - and then chase the skills you need to achieve this. From there on you will find your way throughout the web; there are resources for all kinds of awesome things out there.
Good luck 
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