“When I was 10, my first experience with coding was very inspiring because I was able to make things that helped me do whatever I wanted on the computer. I wanted to be able to solve sudokus faster, [which] my mom would give me to challenge me mentally, so I wrote up a little program to do them for me. Since then, I felt like it was very, very rewarding to be able to make something that makes your life easier and I wanted to pursue that in the future as a career. ”
Quan Nguyen ‘25 is a part of the coding pathway with longtime Foothill Technology High School (Foothill Tech) teacher Constance “Conni” Carr and plans to pursue software development through higher education and in his future profession. However, planning to go into an already highly saturated and competitive field can be intimidating especially when acknowledging its sudden boom in popularity. Despite this, Nguyen approaches the subject with creativity and confidence rather than uncertainty or fear.
“I figured that at the end of the day, if I can’t find work in a different field, then … I could create my own program, create my own projects that can compete by its own merit instead of directly with somebody else.”
In addition to focusing on coding in school, Nguyen also focuses his extracurricular activities on this aspiration as he is a volunteer for the Ventura County Library. The library frequently takes volunteers from Foothill Tech at their different locations to assist with the organization of books and their youth programs, including their Minecraft server. The server has numerous plugins that are student coded and is primarily used in their weekly club meetings held at E.P. Foster Library. Volunteering for the server itself is easily accessible as students can help out asynchronously and through their own devices.
“I volunteer for the Ventura Library system and they run a Minecraft server [where] I work on the backend of managing the server and the players with its plugins and monitoring the way the server works and making sure it works well. There was a program, like a workshop, at [Foothill Tech] where the director of [the library] came over to talk about it, and well, it’s Minecraft. I couldn’t really resist. Once I was already on board, slowly, I started learning how to manage the infrastructure and [how to manage] a server. It’s the fulfillment of keeping something running, of maintaining it. It’s like a big machine that you help to keep chugging along so that all the little kids can then connect to Minecraft and have a good time.”
Having high aspirations for his future as a student and as a professional can be extremely stressful, and as a top-notch student, Nguyen has had his fair share of late-night study sessions or assignments that just seem to never end. However, he notes that sometimes coping with successive failures can be just as important as gaining success.
“In the moment, like during a test or doing homework, I try to block everything else and give it my all, but once it’s turned in and there’s nothing that I can really do to change it. Then I try to relax, play video games or watch something that I like so I get my mind off of grades and try to de-stress. We’re told many a time that failure is part of the journey of success. So I mean, it really hurts in the moment, but after a while, you’ve got to learn to move on and really roll with the punches … like that B on the math test, that hurt me.”
While Nguyen jokes about the value students put on their grades, he brings an important point to mind: that acknowledging that we all can’t be perfect can be your most successful tool as a high school student. Whether it was a B on a math test as he states, or a poor grade that’s received on an important final, “failure is [a] part of the journey of success.”
