When Aeone Singson graduated from Seattle Central Community College with an associate’s degree in computer science, her prospects for a career as a UX designer had never seemed bleaker.
At that point, she had spent years going to school on and off while working full-time minimum wage jobs to pay for tuition. When she finally received the financial aid she needed to finish her associate’s degree in 2014, she still had to hustle between three campus jobs to make ends meet. By the end of it, the two most traditional paths to a tech career — a bachelor’s degree or a bootcamp — didn’t seem financially feasible without a job guaranteed at the end of it.
