Erica Stevens:Divine Timing
"It was divine timing—when I got hired, it was like my prayers had been answered."
A phone call can change your life. Few know this better than Erica Stevens.
Bright and ambitious, Erica spent years actively seeking out experiences that might unlock the kind of satisfying career and stable life she had dreamed of, only to be met with unexpected detours and disappointment.
After a series of false starts and dead ends, Erica's perseverance and resourcefulness paid off in ways that would transform her career and her life.
A native Brooklynite with Southern roots, Erica says her childhood felt like a Spike Lee movie – full of brownstones, block parties, and neighbors who looked out for one another. Her life was so rich, Erica thought she and her family were, too.
"I didn't know we were poor until I grew up and I looked at pictures of how we dressed and where we lived."
Despite the distraction, Erica still made sure to earn her GED. "I didn't really have a plan in life for a long time," says Erica. "I just knew that going to school somehow amounted to success."
After briefly attending college for fashion merchandising and later accounting, tuition and expenses proved too steep. Wanting to avoid taking out any loans, Erica was forced to drop out. She soon found a program for young adults that connected her with a meaningful internship, but she had to supplement her income with unsatisfying hourly-wage jobs.
"At one point I had four different side jobs but I was still barely able to pay for rent and cover my other expenses. And they were all the kind of jobs where you clean up for somebody else, take care of somebody else's situation, and then you come home and you're too tired to care of your own self or house."
Still, Erica found her way to the next opportunity. After researching job training programs, she was accepted into one such program, and placed into a digital advertising internship at a big tech company. At first, it seemed glamorous. However, Erica realized that whenever a challenging issue emerged, she was instructed to escalate it to the engineers for resolution. Once a young girl full of ideas but unsure of her path in life, Erica was now a woman with a crystal clear focus: she was going to be a software engineer.
Erica eagerly dove into her newfound pursuit, using a popular self-learning website to learn how to code. It was thrilling and she quickly leveled up, completing multiple courses and learning different coding languages. Still, in the end, Erica found that for all the practical skills she had acquired, she lacked the experience to apply her skills meaningfully.
Once again, Erica took to the Internet, this time searching for coding programs. She landed on Pursuit. Specifically, she says, she was drawn to its straight-to-the-point mission statement: connecting participants with real jobs in tech. The promise was backed by clear outcomes.
"Pursuit helps people get jobs. I want one of those jobs."
The Pursuit Fellowship was challenging, and Erica struggled through the program as personal issues became increasingly difficult. "Life constantly tried to get in my way," she says of this time. Her father, who had been supporting Erica, fell ill and could no longer help her. Soon after, her living situation became unstable and at times, she was without a permanent address.
Through it all, Erica says she found a community, camaraderie and support at Pursuit. "We were going through everything together. It was really like a family, and they didn't let me give up," says Erica. She had instructors and staff members who were committed to helping her at every turn, from providing a Metrocard scholarship to finding paid learning opportunities.
Once she graduated, Erica applied to several jobs. She had been interviewing at a Fortune 500 media company for a few weeks. Though she was excited at the prospect of landing her first job as a software engineer, the interview process was nerve-wracking and Erica was at times filled with self-doubt. "At every single stage, I was confused that I had somehow made it to the next level."
And then, it happened. She had gotten the job at the Fortune 500 company. And, not only would she finally be a software engineer, but she would also earn a six-figure salary – far more than she had anticipated coming into the program.
Erica refers to this turn of events as "divine timing," as she would learn just a few months after receiving her offer that she was pregnant with her daughter June. In retrospect, Erica says, "Getting that job is the only reason I was able to have my daughter. When I got hired, it was like my prayers had been answered."
Today, Erica has paid off her income share agreement and continues to work at the Fortune 500 company, without any debt owed for the program that helped to make her new career possible. She lives with her three-year-old daughter in a luxury apartment building in Brooklyn. Though she initially focused on climbing the ladder as quickly as possible, she now says her goal is to work on interesting projects and learn about modern technology. She gets excited talking about topics such as augmented reality and Web3.
"I've always had this fascination with learning. Now I feel like I've found this thing that I can learn about forever."
