Hi, my name is Jose Islava. My journey into software development has been anything but traditional. I don’t come from a technical background — in fact, I come from construction and before that I was in the military.
After high school, unsure of what I wanted to do with my life, I enlisted in the United States Marine Corps. I served for four years, including two deployments — one to Afghanistan and another throughout the Middle East. I left the service as a Sergeant, and like many veterans, I found the transition to civilian life difficult.
I eventually found work at a welding and fabrication shop in Tucson, AZ, where I worked as a welder for four years. Although I enjoyed the work, I knew I was capable of more. I remembered taking a web development class back in high school — learning HTML and CSS sparked something in me, and I never forgot that feeling.
So I took a leap of faith and enrolled at the University of Arizona as an Applied Computing major with an emphasis in Software Development. The transition hasn’t been easy, but if the military taught me anything, it's to never back down from a challenge.
Since starting my academic journey, I’ve completed coursework in Python, C, C#, Kotlin, and R programming, as well as foundational subjects like networking and computational thinking. The more I learn, the more excited I get about building things and solving real-world problems through code.
My Journey in Pictures
