Growing up in a little Italian village, I always preferred playing with the boys because they got to do all the fun things: climbing trees, hunting beetles and lizards, play fighting and bike racing. Since those days of fun and games I have felt the expectations and demands of my biological gender and my defiant spirit towards them has not changed a bit.

Fast forward a decade, I went to university to study Philosophy, Politics and Economics, thinking “this is the right degree to get somewhere where I can do something that matters”. I got involved in the societies where I felt like I could start doing that something: LGBTQ+, Labour and International society in particular. I read so much feminist literature, I studied how political change happens and yet, I had not found what I like to call my “niche”. You know what I mean: the angle, the point from which you can actually make a difference to someone.

Then, someone I was friends with at the time, who was studying towards an undergraduate in Computer Science, during a discussion about languages told me he knew 12 languages. I was astonished: I speak three and learning them was no joke. He “mansplained” how computer languages are kind of similar and once you learn one, learning others is only a matter of syntax. So I told him that, maybe, I was going to give coding a try. He laughed: “Girls don’t code! There’s not a single girl in my department!”.

That was the start of my coding journey.

Starting anything is generally always terrifying and coding is no different. So, I sought out safe spaces: I joined WWCode UK (through which I got a scholarship for Codesmith’s Javascript for Beginners), started an Introduction to Web Development course with CodeFirstGirls and began attending Codebar meet-ups. The support, encouragement and solidarity I received from people in these organisations is astonishing. I listened avidly to their stories and unconventional journeys to software engineering and the message was always the same: “you can do it”.

I started cracking coding puzzles, staring for hours at the same block of code wanting to pull my hair out and getting that sweet adrenaline rush when it FINALLY works. I fell in love with the immediacy of code: going from endless hours of research in academia, where time seems still and progress is slow, to being able to write a few lines and make things happen on screen was priceless. I was enraptured with the possibilities and the freedom I felt at my fingertips every new method or expression I learnt, every new function I wrote.

I also began thinking about the stereotypes around coding, how it is made to look quite exclusive and inaccessible, especially for people who find themselves at the intersection of certain identity markers; for example, those of gender, ethnicity and faith, as could be the example of a muslim woman of colour. This thought disturbed me deeply.

How can technology cater to all those different identities if it is mostly designed by the same category of people, which can easily introduce their biases into the technology? The solution is clear: the only way we can ensure that new technology we build is unbiased is to enable a wider group of people to access and be part of that building stage.

However, “[e]ven when women are choosing computer science, they can end up in school and work environments that are inhospitable". We are also less likely to enter the field - and stick with it - when female role models, mentors and collaborators are lacking.

From meeting FAC graduates (and even being mentored by some of them!) at the Codebar events, to the past few weeks of marvellous pair-programming, to collaborating with another applicant on writing the carousel, I feel like I got to really experience that safe, cooperative and inclusive environment which fuels FAC’s missions of social impact and tech industry diversification, which is exactly where I want to be.

Being part of the creation of that welcoming safe learning environment, improving accessibility to the tech industry for other women and minorities, giving others the same opportunities and help I have received from the above-mentioned organisations and, hopefully, a lot more: this is why I want to be part of FAC and why I want to become a developer, this is my niche.

Thank you for reading ♡