It’s so hard to believe this semester has come to an end.

When I entered this class, I wanted to enhance my knowledge of HTML and CSS (the only two coding buzzwords I could come up with at the time), and become more adept at communicating with the web development teams I work adjacent to. During our wrap-up class period last night, I realized how much further we had gone into the world of development—to varying degrees of success.

I’ll be finishing up my degree this summer and transitioning to a new life and new job shortly thereafter. As I’ve begun to seriously consider what my new options might be, I’ve noticed a lot of jobs that list basic web development skills in the nice-to-have category. In my own hiring experience, I have always responded well to communications specialists who also demonstrate basic coding skills.

Given this, I’d like to go back to some of my first goals for this class. Rather than develop a plan that will make be a better “web developer,” I’d like to focus on gaining real competency in some more basic things that will make me a stronger communicator. I’ll prioritize CSS as a first step, and hope to become really facile with the syntax and also in my understanding of everything CSS can manipulate. (Sorry, it doesn’t look like I’ll be creating any CSS paintings any time soon…)

I plan to go back to the Codecademy lessons we completed in class, and will likely look for additional tutorials on YouTube and Lynda as I find the time. Because CSS “clicked” for me at least a little bit the first time around, I’m hopeful that I can maintain a comfort with it as I make it a part of my regular practice. This will coincide nicely with a Design Communications course I plan to take this summer, where I will study the fundamentals of functional design as it relates to print and digital publishing.

I’m hopeful that I can continue to work and learn alongside development and design teams in my new role, whatever that may be, so that I can continue to learn this new language I’ve been introduced to.

Thanks for a great class and a challenging semester!