Recurser paths

In addition to the amazing amount of programming that I learned from people in this atmosphere of curiosity and passion, this desire to learn and this inquisitiveness was ignited in me in a way that it never had been before.

I had the chance at RC to go deeper into the mathematical side of things, too – if you haven’t done that at university, you don’t get a lot of space to carve out time to learn something like that.

I really liked the fact that RC sounded like a genuine community of learners who were excited, and that there were career placement services - that was part of the reason I decided to go to RC instead of just jumping into the waters or doing an “official” course.

I was talking with a friend about my plan to sit in my room for three months and read Cracking the Coding Interview, and he told me about the Recurse Center. It seemed so curiosity driven; a perfect synergy of what I needed professionally and spiritually at the time.

The thing RC kind of teaches you is that you can figure anything out, given enough time. Maybe it doesn’t always make sense to do that, but you could!

That's the beauty of Recurse. You may have interest in a lot of different areas, but it's so difficult to start something on your own. But when you have someone else that's passionate about a topic, and they spearhead a project where you can join and learn and grow together, it makes the journey so much better!

RC worked really well for me from the beginning. I’m not good at structured work, I like to chase whatever is shiny and interesting, and the Recurse Center was just the right amount of structure around me to be able to go and follow curiosity to where it would lead, and learn freely, and have people to discuss things with.

I could have taken three months and worked in a vacuum in my bedroom, but I couldn’t have had spontaneous conversations with people like this, and I wouldn’t have known how to reach out and get that kind of knowledge.

I definitely never feel like the smartest guy in the room at RC, and I think it was the first place I felt real psychological safety, and that totally unlocked my ability to learn.

I think the experience of working with people who are experts in an adjacent field that helps them understand the material made me realize how much faster I learn in groups — having peers and mentors in the learning process is a huge force multiplier for my own learning.