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Who and Why Is Learning Java Online. A Typical CodeGym Student Profile

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As online education is getting more accessible and the demand for tech skills on the job market is increasingly growing, more and more people around the globe are using online learning courses such as CodeGym to master programming languages and acquire coding skills. Being one of the leading online Java learning courses, CodeGym is the natural first (and, in many cases, ultimate) destination for a considerable proportion of people interested in learning Java online. We understandably have a deep interest in getting acquainted with our audience, learning who our students are and why they want to master Java in order to provide them with the best possible tools to achieve that goal. This is why we frequently carry out surveys amongst our users, and stay in contact with the CodeGym community by other means. Who and Why Is Learning Java Online. A Typical CodeGym Student Profile - 1Today we would like to share with you the results of a recent survey we have conducted, trying to build up a more detailed profile of a typical CodeGym’s student. You could also call it a typical Java learner’s profile as over the years, CodeGym has been a gateway to the Java World for so many people all across the globe. Not only Java for that matter, the world of software development as a whole, as our survey shows that for a big chunk of our audience CodeGym was literally the first-ever contact with a programming-related knowledge source! Talking about love at first sight...

Geography

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. From the geographical point of view, the majority of CodeGym users participating in the survey are located in the following countries: the United States and Canada, Poland, Germany, and France as our main European markets, even though we had people from all over Europe as part of this poll. Users from Asia were the minority in our survey, but we can say that CodeGym is also fairly popular in Hong Kong and China. Ni hao!

Age

Just in case you’d want to build your own online learning course, here’s a free tip: average age of your audience is one of the key metrics, as knowing how old your users are will allow you to create a learning resource that would fit their expectations to the fullest. Like we did. The majority of our users are 18 to 34 years old. People aged 25 to 34 is, unsurprisingly, the largest percentage of our audience, almost 40%. And almost 30% are young adults 18 to 24 years old. But in general, people of all ages learn Java at CodeGym: 5.5% of our students are older than 65!Who and Why Is Learning Java Online. A Typical CodeGym Student Profile - 2

Level of coding knowledge

Another key indicator that we were interested in was the level of coding knowledge our students had when they first started using CodeGym. Funny enough, we found out that our audience consists of two perfectly equal parts: 50% of CodeGym’s students had previous experience in programming and/or some basic coding skills; another 50% are total beginners who started to learn programming first at CodeGym. And 40% of this half of our users said that they never had any contact with the programming world prior to registering on CodeGym.

Goals

What goals students want to achieve by learning at CodeGym was probably the most important part of this survey. When answering the question about goals (with multiple choices acceptable), the majority of responders (almost 70%) said they are studying on CodeGym to become professional software developers. Almost 30% also do it because they want to gain useful knowledge for their current work. And 24% of survey respondents said they are learning Java online as a hobby. Couple quotes:
  • “The COVID epidemic gave me time to do something new..”

  • “I’m interested in programming; learning for fun..”

Another 35% said they are dedicated career switchers — people who are learning how to code in order to switch to software development from whichever career path they are taking now.
  • “I want to change my job; to do something else..”

For 41% of our users CodeGym is a way to acquire new knowledge necessary for their future job. These are the younger part of our audience, people who are already learning CS or seeing programming as their first future profession.

Why are career programmers using CodeGym?

When it comes to our users who already work as software developers or at least have a relatable experience in programming, according to them, they are learning Java at CodeGym to achieve career growth and skill set advancement. Here are a few quotes from users in this group:
  • “Java is diverse and the knowledge of it helps you in understanding other languages..”

  • “I love programming and particularly the Java ecosystem..”

  • “Java is a popular language..”

  • “Good language to start..”

When asked about the other programming languages they know, if any, the most popular answers were JavaScript (16%), Python (14%), SQL (12%), C (7%), and C++ (4.5%).

Time to learn programming from scratch

How much time, in your opinion, does an average person need to learn a new programming language from scratch? This is what we asked our students with prior experience in programming to come up with. 53% of respondents said it’s 3 to 6 months. Another 27% would give it 9 to 12 months, while 20% think for an average person it takes 1-2 years or more.Who and Why Is Learning Java Online. A Typical CodeGym Student Profile - 3

Time to find the first job

We have also asked the expertised in coding part of our audience to estimate the average time that you would need to find your first job as a software developer upon completing the CodeGym course (or learning Java in some other way).Who and Why Is Learning Java Online. A Typical CodeGym Student Profile - 440% think it should take you 3 to 6 months before you’ll be able to find employment. 30% give it even less, saying it’s 1-3 months. Although the glass-half-empty part of the audience, 30% to be precise, tends to think that it will take 1 year or more for an average CodeGym graduate to find a job.
  • “It depends on the country and other factors. Thanks to CodeGym I found a job after 1 year,” said one of the users participating in the survey.

Summary

Evidently, if we wanted to come up with a typical Java learner profile, at least two major groups (experienced coders and beginners) would need to be taken into account. They obviously have somewhat different goals and objectives, but they also share a common trait, which is a strong motivation to master Java as a tool to become professional software developers and have a successful career in this field. And the first-hand experience of our users proves that learning on CodeGym truly does turn these dreams into reality.
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