In many school districts, coding isn’t a required subject that’s taught in the classroom. However, with the tech industry continuing to boom and our ever-increasing reliance on automation and digital applications, understanding at least the basics of coding is becoming more and more important. While it’s still considered an elective to many, here’s why you should consider picking up some coding skills.
Higher Earning Potential
This is the biggest draw for many. Even if you’re not considering becoming an engineer, possessing a handful of coding skills increases your earning potential by a fair bit. And it doesn’t even have to cost you anything, there are even programs available that you can sign up for in order to learn how to code for free! So while you’re possibly more interested in web development than app development, fear not. Newer industry freelancers still charge upwards of $100 an hour for their services and those aren’t even considered premium rates.
If you are interested in a more tech-intensive career, it’s going to be reflected in your overall pay. Do you like the sound of a salaried position and the stability it offers? In many parts of the country, starting compensation tends to creep above $65,000 annually. That’s for entry-level positions, mind you. As you continue to hone your skills and master more complex coding techniques, your bargaining power when it comes to your salary only increases. Coding careers are a great way to achieve a great deal of financial independence right out of the gate.
Improving Your Literacy
“Wait,” you may be thinking, “doesn’t literacy have to do with reading and writing?” In a sense, yes, but it also has to do with understanding languages. And what are different coding concepts if not different languages? Indeed, learning to code is a great way to improve your literacy in more ways than you might expect. To prove that, many educational programs are using the benefits of coding in the classroom to improve students’ other fundamental skills.
Even for the youngest of learners, coding isn’t just a concept relegated to the realms of math and science. Many teachers think of coding in terms of computational thinking, which helps young students combine mathematics and coding concepts with reading and writing capabilities. Sample projects include coding programs to help the students write letters to family members as well as reading lessons presented as coding games and puzzles.
Boosting Overall Productivity
If you’re at all familiar with the state of many industries in this country, you know that the word of the day is “automation”. It’s not a new concept, but with the advent of more advanced coding concepts, it’s steadily becoming more of a reality. Automation has numerous business applications, from streamlining production in a factory to simplifying the ordering process in a restaurant. After all, doesn’t the ability to code a program to handle some of your busy work sound appealings?
That’s precisely what professionals in many career paths are doing. Teachers are automating their grading processes by learning the basics of data flow programming, and a business owner might want to develop a program to track their internal sales reports. While there are a handful of industries that are naturally resistant to coding automation, they are relatively few and far between.
There are certainly plenty of personal applications to persuade you to take up a bit of coding, but the reality is that in our heavily tech-driven world, code is becoming ubiquitous. Whether you’re talking about a private online course or want to learn more about the possibility of in-person classes and integrating coding into the K-12 curriculum, the likelihood that coding is going to further saturate our daily lives is very high.
