From Math Teacher to DevRel With Leah Thompson  ## Metadata - Author: [[The Laravel Podcast]] - Full Title: From Math Teacher to DevRel With Leah Thompson - Category: #podcasts - URL: https://share.snipd.com/episode/8df45545-afdb-4b07-bb3a-820db2be103c ## Document Notes ## Highlights - **From Math Teacher To Developer** - Leah transitioned from a math degree and teaching into web development via a free bootcamp called 100Devs. - She began streaming, posting on Twitter, rebuilt projects in Laravel, and that public presence led to job offers and community invites. Transcript: Leah Thompson Yeah. So I guess going back to how I even got into tech. So I don't have a traditional background. I don't have a degree in computer science. I actually have a degree in mathematics. So I have a, yeah, a bachelor's of science in mathematics from the university of Florida. So that's kind of a degree that sets you up for grad school in math. So it's all proof-based. So a lot of it's the same math you would take if you're majoring in comp sci, but it's the proofs of it. You know, like I'm not doing like linear algebra in programming. I'm doing like a proof to show that you can. I don't know. I can't remember some of the stuff from college. My brain like got rid of it, but you can do the matricity multiplication and all stuff like that. So that is what I did. I did take a couple or two programming courses in college. I took one in C and one in C++. The one in C was so bad. I did not touch programming for like four years after. Yeah. I was like, I'm too dumb for this. I can't do it. I'm not touching this thing. Me too. So I wanted to do something more like, yeah, I want to do something more like data analytics or applied math. But I ended up going into teaching because COVID shut down a lot of the jobs I was going for. And they always need math teachers in Florida, which is where I was in general. But so I taught high school geometry. So it was like mainly 10th and 11th graders as a 23 year old straight out of college with no background for teaching right yeah my first ever job was as a math tutor so i did have that experience And i loved math so i was able to kind of break down the concepts easily so i had that but i didn't have anything with like classroom like management or like knowing how to deal with any of That like any of the behavioral stuff i didn't know about ieps any of that so i got thrown into the deep end yeah and like you said you're dealing with people who are six years younger than You and they probably don't even notice the difference you're like oh great yeah they're like my older sister's your age and i'm like great that makes me feel so good i'm like you just Listen to me so i did that for a year and a half it was a lot it wasn't really what i wanted to do. And then also like you deal with a lot of like politics in the sense of like, you have your admin and you have to do it a certain way. And then I was teaching my last school, I was teaching algebra one and geometry, which are both state tested. So it's like a lot of pressure on you for your kids to get certain grades and stuff like that. And it's just, it felt like my success was dependent on how they did that I didn't really have control over. Like you can teach them, but you can't make someone do well. So I didn't like that. So I wanted out and I ended up actually quitting due to health issues, but I quit in December of 2021. And in January, 2022, I started a free online bootcamp to learn full stack web development because I was trying to find a way to get into more applied math or something like that. I was thinking about going back to get my master's for statistics. But my husband, when I was majoring for math, he was majoring in computer science. So he ended up getting a job as a web developer doing front end, actually. And he was like, why don't you try this let's try to see if there's like boot camps or stuff you can do and i found like this reddit post about a free boot camp called 100 devs because that Like post about it blew up on reddit so i was like why don't i try this it's starting in a month i'll see if i like it if i don't it's free so no harm and then i'll to get my master's, but I tried It and I fell in love with it. Like, and that during doing this is when I also started posting on Twitter. So I'd like 20 followers on Twitter before this. So I started posting on Twitter as I was learning web development. Um, it was a full JavaScript stack. So it was MongoDB express react and node. So just JavaScript, no PHP. And I did that so from january to november i focused on that and during that i started streaming on twitch also as i was learning building out projects posting about the projects on twitter Just doing a bunch of stuff like that a little bit of freelancing and i got my first job in tech in november of that same year that's awesome That's great. As an email developer. So very, very different from what I do now. Yeah. So I started out email development, mainly doing front end stuff, doing like JavaScript, but a lot of HTML. I did that for a while. And then last year I ended up doing more work for an agency, which I got hired to be a full stack developer there. So getting into more web development again. And during that, when I started there, it was mainly just JavaScript. So on the backend, we were using Next.js and Node.js in the front end using React. Within like a month of me starting there, they rewrote the backend to be Laravel and PHP. So they were like, yeah, completely pivoted. Cause I was like, okay, I'll get Next.js experience here. And that will help me at my next job because a lot of like enterprise companies and stuff are using Next.js now. The company I actually was an email developer for, they were using Next.js on the backend. So like, okay, I'll get that experience. Within a month, they're like, nope, Laravel PHP. I'm like, okay, I like, I guess I can figure that out. Matt Stauffer Yeah. Leah Thompson I'm like, I guess I'm using Laravel. Like I'd been friends with Alexander six for a while and like, he kept talking about Laravel. So I was like, okay, I need to try it eventually. But I was like, okay, now I have to. So I started doing the Laravel bootcamp, like the old Laravel bootcamp that was on the website to learn a little bit of Laravel. Cause I was mainly doing front end stuff for work, but since we were going to use on the back and I was like I might as well pick it up and I applied for a scholarship through Laravels to go To Laracon US last year because I was like okay if I'm learning Laravel I might as well apply and we'll just see what happens it's like I'm never gonna win like you just apply to stuff you're Like I'm not gonna win this yeah I won it and I'm like oh crap I like got it like a week before and I'm like crap I guess I have to go to dallas like i guess i'm going and i was nervous because all My experience like my two two and a half years of experience as a programmer was all on javascript like i'm gonna go these people are gonna hate me they're gonna be like why is this javascript Girl here like she doesn't php and i went and everyone was so nice like i met you you were so nice i felt like i was just adopted by people like everyone was like coming up wanting to meet me So excited that i was getting into the community so i fell in love with the community and that's why i started like tweeting about laravel afterwards like i fully bought into it after Yeah and again this is like i'm not hired at laravel at this point like i'm just in love with it i started rebuilding like i had this kind of 100 hours project i built through the boot camp I learned the boot camp i did to learn web development and i rebuilt that project i started rebuilding it using laravel and reverb and all of that and i was posting about i got followed By like taylor Joe Tannenbaum and a bunch of cool people on the Laravel team. And I'm like, they're following me and I'm just building this like dumb little side project, you know? And I had people ask me to be on podcasts to talk about Laravel and I started streaming on Twitch mainly using Laravel on ([Time 0:01:34](https://share.snipd.com/snip/48e4a1e0-ef1d-4103-899e-3cf4e510e408)) - **Pick Tools Pragmatically For Marketing Sites** - As a lone marketing engineer at Laravel Leah chose tools per project and prioritized speed with Blade. - Being the sole owner of a site often means you pick pragmatic solutions, not dogmatic stacks. Transcript: Leah Thompson Think the funny thing about my position is like, I think at Laravel in general, right? If you get hired for an engineering position, like on the engineering team, you're on a team of people. Like if you're on the cloud team or the night watch team, you know, mine was like, here, you are our only marketing engineer on the DevRel team. So Leah, you need to build out this full website. You have like a week, two weeks to do it. Go forth. It's like, go for child and build this website. So I could kind of pick what I was going to use. I mean, of course, I'm not just going to be like, oh, we're not using Laravel. We're using Next Chance, you know, like we're using Laravel. A lot of times it was like picking the right tool for the job. Like if I want to build something fast, I realized I'm just going to build it using Blade most of the time. Some of the websites we built were like CMS sites. So for those, I kind of was able to like play around with what we're going to use for it. Like what works best, what does some pain points with and we have to shift for. ([Time 0:10:43](https://share.snipd.com/snip/66ddbc9b-de45-45f1-a031-6f779aac67e3)) - **Scaffold First, Then Componentize** - Start building marketing sites with solid scaffolding: layouts, fonts, then modular components. - Keep components small and reusable to avoid repeated CSS and layout duplication. Transcript: Matt Stauffer Are you like, hey, look, I have been paid to build these at the biggest, you know, most reputable company in our niche. And here's the things I've learned. Here's the three things I've learned, you know, like a clickbait kind of article. But are there any things where you're like, I have discovered in doing so that I must have this or I must never do this or anything that's kind of really just stood out to you? Leah Thompson I feel like definitely yes. But then trying to think of those things right on the spot, it's like, oh, no. Yeah. I think my Laracon US talk and Laracon AU kind of wrap up what i've learned are good ways to like break down the designs i'm given because sometimes like you're given the design our designers Are amazing at laravel so sometimes it can be intense to see that and it's like oh god i have to build this yeah in like a week so just like breaking it down and first thinking like okay what Components do i need to build out for this like definitely starting with structure because i think whenever i first was getting into development sometimes especially for emails too Emails are just like one file and done so it's kind of like build it out and then you could refactor for this you're not going to just build out a whole file of like all this crap like you need To figure out what components you need start with it kind of like broken up the scaffolding really sets the tone for the project so like doing our scaffolding starting with layouts because I think like first project like layer con us or so we didn't have like a specific like layout we were using and so then we were copying a lot of the padding stuff over and over um just like Starting with like a solid layout just building up like starting a scaffolding building up from there then doing your components using your layout and stuff like that just keeping It modularized or i'll say in like broken up and like smaller components you know that is like a big thing and then i just like starting with like bringing in fonts then working up from There i can't remember all the steps from my talk i still have to we'll we'll link it to show my lair kind of you talk yeah yeah no it's i just gave a talk that i blast gave like a year and a half Matt Stauffer Ago and it takes a little while to read because it was your whole life for a little while right and then it's time to give it again you're like oh it's not in there anymore no it's like a week Leah Thompson Before it's always like what is the talk and then it's like you asked me three days before and I just have the whole script like in my head. ([Time 0:12:18](https://share.snipd.com/snip/c54f2673-0e31-407b-be2f-89a90923cca4)) - **Build In Public To Get Noticed** - Do learn and build in public on platforms like Twitter and Twitch to surface opportunities. - Be genuine and show personality so people want to work with you, not just your code. Transcript: Leah Thompson Would say learning in public and building in public, like being on Twitter, even streaming on Twitch. Some people might not like streaming and it might not work for them. But for me, it really worked where I was able to like show people, Hey, this is me building it. And they were able to see my thought process. And I had people offer me like referrals through just me streaming on Twitch. And I actually, all three jobs that I've gotten in tech have been through social media, have been through Twitter or Twitch just people like offer me referrals i have had like job offers Just from clicking apply on linkedin which i know people are like don't click apply on linkedin like you have to network in no i went through like a really long job interview process this Year from like january to march i think i had 60 i like applied over 60 something jobs i think i had at least 20, 30 interviews. And I mean that's like interview one, interview two, interview three with companies. I was interviewing with up to six or seven companies at one time. And I had a really long process with one company. It was not Laravel. People ask me that because of how the timing was. It was not Laravel. Laravel's interview process was great, not the crazy one I was talking about. But I got a job offer from that job as well. So I've gotten job offers from like companies just by clicking apply on LinkedIn. So I would say do that. But I'd say like you're more likely to get the best jobs by networking and by like going to conferences and connecting with people or by posting on Twitter. I would say if you are building in public, though, be genuine. Like don't just go on there. Just like, here's what I built. Like, do go on there and be like, here's what I built, but also show your personality because you want people to connect with you as a person, because they're more likely to go, okay, I Really want to work with this person. So it's like, this other person might have like more technical skills than you, but if they really like you as a person, I think you would be a good fit for their team. You're getting the job. Yeah. So I would say that's a really big part. Yeah. Matt Stauffer I say that all the time with a hiring ([Time 0:18:12](https://share.snipd.com/snip/af21d630-2a08-416e-a173-9d0be77b71ff)) - **Start Speaking By Writing Full Scripts** - Apply for talks and push yourself to speak even if you're terrified; start by writing a full script. - Practice by recording and rehearsing with friends to refine pacing and confidence. Transcript: Leah Thompson Man, I guess my secret is to basically push yourself off the cliff is what it feels like. It's like, yeah, I was terrified. Like, I know people can see me doing all these things and be like, oh, yeah, she can do them. But I can't do that. Like she's doing them. She's great at public speaking. She's not scared. Like, no, I have social anxiety. My first time going to Laracon U.S. Last year, I walked in. It was my first ever tech conference. I walked in. I got really scared and I hid behind a trash can for the first 15 minutes because I panicked when I saw all the people. So it's like, no, I get terrified to do these things. But just doing them, just putting yourself out there, I feel like, has, I don't know, led to where I am today. If I just stayed nervous to even apply for my first ever talk, like I wouldn't be on my sixth conference talk now. Like, I don't know if I ever would have taken that plunge, you know, you just have to start applying. Like I'd say when you're trying to think of talks to give, think of something that's interesting to you. So the way I thought of like one of my talk ideas, which is using React with Inertia.js, it's because when I was at a conference last year, I was talking to JavaScript developers because It was a mainly JavaScript conference and no one knew what Inertia was. Like if I was saying my tech stack was like Rilt, React, Inertia, Laravel, and Telwind, they're like, what's Inertia? And so I kept having to answer that question. I was like, that would be a good talk, like especially to give at JavaScript conferences because a lot of JavaScript devs or anyone out of outside of like the Laravel spirit, like they Don't really know what inertia is. And inertia is like super useful tool. So like that would be a good talk. So anything like that, where you feel like you're having to explain it, or you just think it's really interesting, those would make good talk ideas. And then once you have the talk idea, it's just finding conferences you think that talk would be a good fit for and just applying for it. When it comes to the actual, I don't know, like how do you speak at conferences? Like how do you get through the talk on stage? I would say, especially like when you're starting, planning it out really helps. Like obviously you have to have your slides and stuff, but writing a full script, writing a full script, putting those in your speaker notes, I would say. So my first few talks weren't live coding. Um, and so I was able to like have my speaker notes at this point. I feel like I kind of wing it because my last few talks, like did not really have a full script for them, did not have speaker notes because I'm live coding. I just I like have it's kind of like Aaron Francis like how he does talks I think for he has like the main talking points and then he just goes off of those and just like talks I guess like he Would normally explain them and that's how I've started giving my talks but whenever I started I had them like fully written out like full full speaker notes that i kind of didn't stray From i had my slides i like had everything practice like i ran through my talks like eight different times i'd say and i would record myself and then listen back to them i'd put them on like Youtube unlisted and send them to my husband and my friends and make them listen to them yeah i think my first ever talk roxy who you know roxy was there at that conference and I made her And our other friend Richard come up to my hotel room and I like made them watch my talk at least two times in person. So just doing stuff like that, because then if you have, especially like a person in front of you, who's listening to the talk before you give it to other people, you feel better that it Doesn't sound dumb, you know? And like, you're able to, as you give the talk, you're able to see like, what feels natural? What should I change? What can I do better about it? And if you're really scared of public speaking, maybe you get up there, you give a talk, you hate it. If that's the case, then don't feel like you have to do it again. But for me, I got up there. I was super nervous before I got up there and I had so much fun. ([Time 0:21:19](https://share.snipd.com/snip/e1bfdade-aeaa-4370-b33c-ae4dd08b57a7)) - **Stream What You Love And Share It** - Try streaming what you enjoy and cross-promote it on other social platforms to build an audience. - Engage viewers, read chat, and befriend other streamers to grow visibility and network. Transcript: Leah Thompson So I'm trying to think of like deciding what to stream, I guess for me, because I had like started using Twitter to build in public. And for whenever I was like trying to change careers, I didn't have a job. So like career changing was my life. You know, I became one of those people who's like programming like all day, every day. Like I'd be up to like two in the morning doing leak code and stuff. And I'm not saying to do that because that was a little crazy. And I did burn out really bad, especially afterwards, trying to balance that with working a full-time job in tech. Do not recommend, but I would say if you have something like you do all the time and you enjoy doing, then that would be a good thing to stream like people even stream crocheting and like Making crafts you know they stream art if you really like drawing i would say anything that you really enjoy doing you're able to be more engaging about you know because you you love doing It and people like seeing you do things that you enjoy like that's a big part i would say so I would say start streaming that or trying to like create streams for that. But when you're trying to get like a platform on there, you're trying to get viewers. I would say leverage any other social media you might have. So like I had Twitter. I think I had, I think I had like 3000 followers on Twitter at the time. So I posted about it. Like even before my first ever stream, I was like, hey, I'm going to start streaming. Here's my channel. So before my first stream, I already had like a hundred followers just by people on Twitter who went to follow me. And then I posted like in advance, I posted like, Hey, I'm going to be on tomorrow at this specific time. Here's the link for my channel. And then whenever I went live posted the live notification on twitter so like again i was already like getting people to go to it before i started streaming and then i posted whenever I was live and then people went and joined and then afterwards i posted like a little recap like here's the project we built on stream because i was like pretty new to programming like I started streaming on twitch like three months after starting 100 devs so i was still just i just started javascript because mainly it was html css in the beginning just started javascript So i was doing like little little projects on stream so i was able to build that whole project in like four hours or so so it was like one stream i built the project and then i would tweet about It or i would do like a code wars or leak code problem. And then I would tweet about it and like be like, here's my solution or here's how I solved it. So again, like, cause that's already what I was doing on Twitter was taught, like learning in public, talking about what I did that day for programming. But now I was kind of tying it in with my streams. So through that, I was able to get like a lot of people from Twitter onto my streams. But then building the audience and stuff like through Twitch, I would say the more you stream, the more people will kind of like organically see your streams, especially if you have Like so many viewers. Like I think my first, my first stream, I had like 20 something viewers because of just like from Twitter. But then I started streaming more. And as I would get chats, like, obviously, I talk a lot as this podcast is proof, but I would read every single chat. So I'd always try to read every single chat, try to answer help people. And as I was like working through the problems and stuff, I would also talk out loud and explain my thought process. So trying to make it like as engaging as possible. And I noticed people just kept showing up like the same people would show up and they were kind of building friendships with them. And that just helps you. I don't know, like if you're able to connect with your viewers and they're more likely to come back and that helps build your kind of audience. And then also going on to other streamers on their streams, like not to promote your own, but just to become friends with them, you know, because if you're doing this, you're on it a lot, It makes sense to go and befriend other streamers, be in their chat. And then they might read you, you can rate them, which is like bringing your audience to them or them bringing their audience to you whenever they end their stream. And that helps like, you're kind of like combining your audience. Like, so you're able to get some of theirs. They're able to get some of yours. I don't know if I'm explaining this well, but basically like, I don't know, just making friends with other streamers, which is more able to build your network through the specific platform. Like I built my like friendship network through Twitch. So I'm friends with people who are streamers, which helps you also get different advice because maybe they had other things work for them that I didn't think about. And I could do that. Just, I don't know, stuff like that. I know that might seem like a lot of work for just one platform, but if you like streaming, then it's something that's fun to do. ([Time 0:28:45](https://share.snipd.com/snip/78e98fb7-dbb3-4af2-ad1a-ef6a87796c9b)) - **DevRel Can Let You Teach And Code** - DevRel at Laravel blends coding, teaching, and conference work so Leah can still code daily and speak as part of her job. - This hybrid role can reclaim teaching experience and keep you technical while doing community work. Transcript: Leah Thompson Wasn't laughing at the question. I was laughing because it's just like, no, this is not my dream job. Like saying, but no, this is definitely my dream job. And this is my first ever dev rel adjacent job too. Right. My other jobs before this were as an email developer. And when I was working as an email developer it was at a um e-commerce company like a really big one that had like five six different brands under it and i was one of the only two email developers So pure development my next job was a full stack developer at an agency full development so i was basically doing devrel stuff for fun you know like building a public and doing streams Like building a community yeah yeah i was just kind of doing it for fun and realized like hey i like this and i'm able to leverage my teaching background by doing this so being at laravel I've gotten to kind of lean more into that you know even though i am still doing a lot of coding, which I was kind of scared to go into DevRel because I thought I wouldn't be able to code because DevRel is different at all different companies. So some companies you're more just marketing. So you're trying to sell their products, you know, which doesn't feel genuine. You're, you basically just feel like they're a salesperson. I was like, I don't want to do that. Like, and I don't want to not code because that would be like losing a limb like i love to code and solve technical problems and here i'm able to do that like i code pretty much every single Day unless i'm like at conferences even though though at laricon us i was coding the whole time in the hallways and everything and then had to give my talk but i'm able to really leverage That so i'm able to code every day still which I enjoy and solve hard problems and build cool things like our learn website, which is really cool to work on. But then I'm also able to speak at conferences and go to conferences like as my job. So I don't have to use PTO because it's part of my job. Like I'm going, I get to hang out with my friends and like be in the community. And I am doing my job by doing it, but something that i truly enjoy you know like it feeds back into my like want to build things and like keep talking about laravel um so it's just been really Nice like actually getting to try like devrel which i was curious about and realized that i do enjoy it because i'm so able to code and i'm able to use my teaching background. So it doesn't feel like me teaching was just like a waste, you know, it's like, I'm able, even when I give talks at conferences, like it feels like I'm getting the parts I really enjoyed About teaching back. So I feel like I'm able to really grow as a developer here. Cause I also get a lot of freedom and the stuff I build and I get to, don't know, try different things coding wise, but also I get a lot of like feedback, but then also getting to like dive Into DevRel stuff and eventually do content. So it's been the perfect mix for me, I feel like. And going forward, this will help me if I do want other DevRel positions or stuff like that. ([Time 0:37:06](https://share.snipd.com/snip/023d7640-dcc7-44a8-acf4-de7ec8a4c9e6)) - **How Laravel Learn Was Built** - Leah built the Laravel Learn website with help from Chris and Josh and used Filament for the CMS admin. - The stack is Laravel on the backend, Blade on the frontend, with Alpine.js and Mux for video. Transcript: Leah Thompson Don't think it's secret sauce. If it is, I guess, forgive me. So like the website, like I fully built out the website like the whole thing chris helped some and then i think josh helped some too usually it's like we'd have a site it's like leah go build This and then like as we're getting close to deadline something chris and josh would dive in to help too i know josh and christoph like did the course for it but i focused on building out The full website so for the cms portion of it we're using the same thing we are for the blog and community, which is we're using filament. Basically, they have like the admin panel and do that side of things. So we're using filament. And then besides that, it is just Laravel on the back end and then Blade. ([Time 0:40:34](https://share.snipd.com/snip/0a37221f-a493-4194-8bf1-298dfc23b16e))