Spelman graduate Shanda Kennedy has always had a knack for tech. After she studied computer science in college, she followed up with stints as a QA Analyst and SSRS Dashboard developer. Now, she has further honed her skills with immersive programming at DigitalCrafts.
Kennedy enjoys teamwork — from flag football to taking third place on the Women Who Code Hackathon with her team Public Defenders. She is ready to be scooped up by a startup or small company. Her skills range from CSS, jQuery and Javascript to Angular, NodeJS and Python. Don’t hesitate as this master coder may just take off on her own and build her an entrepreneurial empire.
What program were you enrolled in?
I was enrolled in the DigitalCrafts Full Stack Web Development Coding Bootcamp. I graduated from the program on Friday, August 19th.
What is your previous education?
I have a B.S. in Computer Science from Spelman College.
What was your work experience before aspiring to become a web developer?
I worked as a QA Analyst and as a SSRS Dashboard developer, basically working with a lot of databases and queries.
We see that you recently participated in the recent Women Who Code Hackathon here in Atlanta. Can you tell us more about your experience?
The team I was on, Public Defenders, actually won third place! Although first place would have been ideal, our team was proud of the product and idea that we came up with. Our app, Guardian, will disrupt the public service industry and create transparency that does not currently exist.
What technology and tools are essential to you as a developer?
I love Atom editor, I was introduced to this tool through DigitalCrafts. I also cannot live without Stack Overflow for when I run into some coding or programming issues.
How do you stay informed & on top of emerging trends?
Twitter has been a big help, and signing up for newsletters has been very helpful. The new information and trends comes to my email and I can just read different articles. Also, attending meetups has allowed me to easily expand my network. I have not been able to attend as many as I would have like to in the past few months, but that number will surely increase after graduating from DigitalCrafts’ program.
After DigitalCrafts, what’s next on your list to learn?
Next on my list to learn would be Ruby and some JavaScript frameworks like React, Ember, and D3.
Are you interested in working for a startup, agency, mid-sized company, or a corporate giant?
I have worked for a corporate giant in the past and I would like to try my hand at a startup or small company. Maybe even start my own small web development company!
Interested in looking at Shanda’s credentials? Check out her website, GitHub, and LinkedIn. 
Images: Kiki Roeder
