Meet Jordan Mason - a software engineer, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill alum, and Bold Idea mentor. Learn how he went from a sports journalism career to the technology consulting team at Credera.

What is something many people don’t know about you?
Before my career in programming, I was a sports journalist. I’ve written for the Dallas Morning News, appeared on WFAA and Fox Sports Southwest, and produced highlights for ESPN just to name a few stops.

How did you become interested in technology and programming?
My first brush with coding was in a computer science class at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. I became interested in it as a career later in life when my brother completed a coding bootcamp and offered to show me the ropes.

What did you study in college? Journalism. That computer science class came the semester after I had just completed my internship at ESPN, so at that point, I wasn’t interested in pursuing a career in programming just yet.

What are you working on now?
For nearly two years now, I’ve been helping a retail client dip its toe in ecommerce, working on a variety of workstreams that include SEO enhancement, inventory visibility, ADA compliance, and implementing a system to reserve items online for pick up in store.

What have you gained from being a mentor? What was your most memorable moment while mentoring? Learning to code changed my life in a very short period of time, so I’ve wanted to pay that forward since getting my foot in that door. But building relationship with mentees and showing them someone who believes in them, and seeing the effect that has on them, has been the most rewarding part. My most memorable moment isn’t one – it was all the times I helped a mentee accomplish a task they didn’t believe was possible before we started the assignment.

Is there anything that you wish you could tell your younger self about coding?
All of the technology that fascinates you is mostly powered by a person and/or team that knows how to code. You can not only improve the technology that powers businesses and the world around us but you can help create it.

What is it about Bold Idea's mission that really connects with you?
Like I said, coding changed my life, so the opportunity to pay that forward was a no-brainer for me. If I can be the spark that helps a passing interest turn into a career for even one student then, for me, it’s worth every second.