Student Diaries: Olha Yarukhina
Greetings to everyone! My name is Olha, and I come from the strong country of Ukraine. In my life, two passions have shaped my experience: travelling and learning. As a result, I’ve travelled across half the globe, dedicated myself to the study of science and even created an educational course on the subject. Let’s embark on my journey full of unexpected twists together.
My life and career choices before kood/Jõhvi
In 2006, I graduated from University with a degree in chemistry and for the following eight years, I dedicated myself to teaching in a local school. However, true to my nature of embracing multiple pursuits, I also tried myself in marketing, advertising and other fields during this period. In 2018, I made a bold decision to move from my beloved hometown of Ivano-Frankivsk to Kyiv. There, I took on the role of a team leader in the R&D department, focusing on the development of educational science games.
Later on, this experience pushed me forward to my next project – one that fills me with huge pride to this day. I’ve undertaken the creation of a trilogy of workbooks named “Science” specifically designed for a private school. These workbooks consisted of a rich collection of practical tasks covering physics, chemistry, astronomy, biology, and geography, which explained, in accessible language, how our universe is structured.
Why kood/Jõhvi?
With the publication of the third book, I was offered the position of headmistress at TUMO Kyiv – creative technologies school. However, as the war in my country began, the opportunity to lead this school never materialized and I had to seek alternative pathways for my future.
At that moment, I was filled with fear, thinking it might be too late for me to transition careers and begin from the bottom all over again, unsure of the next steps to take. This is when I stumbled upon kood/Jõhvi’s Online Test. I had previously tried different paid courses, only to be met with disappointing results. However, this particular test impressed me with its interactive and unique style and I was determined to give programming another shot.
Moving from my homeland all the way to Estonia? No problem, I was more than ready for that!
School Experience and What kood/Jõhvi Teaches Us
When I began my studies at kood/Jõhvi, I felt as though I had entered a whole new reality, everything was filled with novelty and uncertainty. Being part of the program is a crazy emotional roller coaster for me. One day I may doubt my abilities, feeling like a fool, and the next day, I believe that I might be a genius. There are moments when I contemplate giving up and feel totally useless as finishing the tasks often requires an overwhelming amount of time and energy. However, my amazing teammates, whom I met during the Selection Sprint help me a lot to progress through the curriculum, so I’ll push through until the end. Perhaps it is the most valuable thing that the kood/Johvi school teaches us – to help each other in our development.
Another aspect I enjoy about being a student at kood/Jõhvi is the quality of events organized by the kood/Jõhvi team and their partners. For instance, I was happy to participate in the workshop on Open Banking API hosted by Bondora. Despite studying for only five months by that time, I found myself actively engaging in the tasks assigned. It was truly surprising to realize that I had acquired enough knowledge and skills so fast. This experience definitely fueled my passion for learning and motivated me to continue pushing myself further.
Future plans and dreams
In the near future, my main goal is to secure my first job in the IT field and as I’m already considering my future specialization in kood/Jõhvi, I am sure to choose the Game Development module, and I also have great reasons behind this choice. My long-term vision is to develop educational games specifically designed to help people in enrolling at kood/Jõhvi. Just as I created a trilogy of workbooks explaining our universe, this time I want to develop materials focused on the IT field. I firmly hold onto the belief that I will come across a team of like-minded individuals who will share my ideas and together we’ll make it happen.
I’ll wrap my whole story up with a conversation that took place approximately 6-7 years ago. During a chemistry lesson, one of my students posed a thought-provoking question: “Why should we study?”. Being one to encourage critical thinking, I responded with another question: “What would you rather prefer to do for the rest of your life?”. The student enthusiastically replied: “I would play games!”. In response, I followed the first thought that came to my mind: “Well, it’s your decision whether to spend your life playing games or creating them.”Funny enough, I thought that my own words don’t apply to me and that I’m too old to learn about “сomplicated” technologies. But can you imagine, one of my recent tasks in kood/Jõhvi involved developing my own game… It is never too late to start something new and not only to play but also to create!