THE FULL STORY

Hi, my name is Cheyanne Kester, and I’m an aspiring Software Developer attending the University of Oregon for a Bachelor’s in Computer Science. Most of my work so far is coursework, but I am planning on pursuing more independent game projects during the summer of 2022. 
My relationship with Computer Science, or rather, how it came to be, has been a long and rocky road. I enrolled at the Unversity of Oregon, initially, to become an Architect. I really enjoyed designing buildings and rooms, so I applied for the UO Architecture School… and was sadly rejected. Now equipped with my first major academic rejection, I tried exploring the many majors at UO. I dabbled in business, entrepreneurship, and finance until I ran into an Intro to Astronomy class. I loved it, so I decided to become a physics major, with the hopes of doing Astronomy in graduate school. This didn’t work out. Physics was a lot more difficult than I initially thought, and I wasn’t all that interested in the Physics side of things; I was beginning to feel like it wasn’t worth getting a degree in Physics for Astronomy if I didn’t even like it. During the winter term of 2021, I decided to enroll in a CIS 111, Intro to JavaScript class, along with my Physics 2 class, and LOVED IT. The professor was energetic, and learning a programming language had exactly the kind of learning mixed with doing that I thrive in. 
With this, I decided to do a complete 270-degree turn in my academic career and rearranged my class schedule to start on my CIS degree; no more physics. Since then, I’ve learned JavaScript, Python, and C, some HTML, and I’m now learning C# and the many features of the Unity game engine. 
Finding my passion in Computer Science has been, as cliche as it sounds, a life-changer. It’s a tough subject, I feel like I’ve never had to work this hard before, but I love it. At the end of every assignment, I have something to interact with, something tangible that I can record and show to my mom and dad. And try as they might, they ultimately just smile and say “good job”, despite having no idea what it is I’m showing them. This is why I like game development, I can have something that they can understand to show them. If I go to my dad and tell him about a cool data structure I implemented and managed to get an add method down to certain time complexity, he’ll look like a deer in headlights. But, if I tell him about a video game idea I have or about one of the small tutorials I’ve completed, he’ll light up! I think lots of people are probably like that, so I’m starting to focus more on game development, it’s just more fun and relatable.
I’ve always been a creative person. Over my 21 years on earth, I’ve had close to a dozen hobbies, including various versions of painting, costume-making, leather-binding, and jewelry-making, and I even used to record silly review videos with my little sister. I like to think of myself as a jack of all trades, with many specialties, and always finding more. Being able to create something, with my own hands, that I can interact with and show to other people has always given me an irreplaceable sense of satisfaction.

That’s why Computer Science projects are so great to me. I get to put in all of this work for something, and then if I wanted to, I can gush about it to a family member or a friend, and just enjoy the fruits of my hard work. I’m excited to continue learning about the industry, and I hope to pursue a career full of creativity and fun hard work!