Student Spotlight: Charlie G.

Meet Charlie G! Not only has Charlie been a CodeWizardsHQ student for nearly a year and a half, he’s become an unofficial part of the CodeWizardsHQ team thanks to his excellent work as a moderator in our forums (he even created his own Discourse bot to help with moderation). Multiple instructors recommended Charlie for our Student Spotlight, and we couldn’t agree more!

Charlie is currently in his sixth CodeWizardsHQ class in our high school coding program and has been surrounded by tech talk his whole life — his dad, Michael, started out as a developer and has founded several software and internet companies. Charlie was coding before CodeWizardsHQ, but he struggled with the format of the typical online tutorials.

“I used to go to summer coding camps, and my dad got me a lot of online courses, but I was never good with continuing to follow through and finish the course, so he thought that something was paced around someone else’s schedule might be better for me,” Charlie says.

Michael heard about CodeWizardsHQ through a friend — his neighbor’s son was already taking courses and talked highly about the program. He liked that CodeWizardsHQ classes could be done from the convenience of home but still had live instructors, so he decided to sign Charlie up for his first class.

As Charlie continued with CodeWizardsHQ, he really looked forward to the projects he was given in each class, especially because of their creativity.

“I would never think of making what we make in CodeWizards on my own. But once you make them, it’s fun because the project is fun, but you still learn new techniques in coding,” he says.

Charlie has also gotten involved a lot with hardware, building his own computers, helping friends with their computer issues, getting his own personal computer setup just right, and even just taking apart computers to learn more about components.

In addition to his technology-related interests, Charlie loves math and science, plays trumpet and baseball, loves to ski … and makes gummy bears.

“A little while back, before COVID, I had a gummy bear business, where I made candy and sold it. I originally used a website builder, but then I wrote my own website which actually increased my business by a lot. Coding helped me create my own business and be able to show people what I can do.”

As a dad, Michael has enjoyed watching his son expand his coding skills and see his excitement with his projects, but also realizes that Charlie may just know more than he does when it comes to coding.

“I would say somewhere over the last year and a half, between the classes and his own studying from YouTube videos and whatnot, he’s kind of surpassed me in technical wherewithal. I work with developers every day, I’m on Zoom all day with work, and then I hang up and listen to Charlie talking about APIs and Javascript, checking stuff in, merging branches, you know, all the lingo,” Michael says. “I’m a little envious of his ability and that conversion happened over the past year or so.”

Although Charlie isn’t entirely sure what field of technology he wants to go into after school, he does know that coding will be a part of his life no matter what he decides to do for college and beyond.

“The world is definitely moving toward newer and newer technology. Being able to code just lets you know what’s going on, lets you control your own life. You can make your own technology, do whatever you want, or contribute to something else.”

For now, Charlie is looking forward to the capstone class for Wizard Level II in the high school program and is enjoying getting to know a new CodeWizardsHQ instructor with his current class. For kids who are new to learning with CodeWizardsHQ, Charlie wholeheartedly recommends getting involved with our forums.

“The community is probably one of the best parts. I moderate the forum and there are so many people that will help other people having problems with their code. If you need help, there are plenty of ways to get it,” he says. “Even if you don’t need help, the forum is a great place to communicate with other people who have a similar interest of coding.”

While Charlie loves the CodeWizardsHQ forums, his favorite part about coding itself, he says, is “receiving 500 errors and then getting it to work.” Persistence and a willingness to learn are what have helped Charlie progress so far with CodeWizardsHQ already and are all any student needs to start to learn how to code.

Here is what Charlie’s teacher, Lynn, had to say about him:

“Charlie is self directed and inquisitive. He spends a great deal of time exploring different languages and their uses. He works hard to figure out how things work, in class and on his own.”
Lynn Schirmer, CodeWizardsHQ Teacher