In mid-2018 I started learning Python by reading textbooks and watching online tutorials. I had absolutely zero background in computer science, but it seemed interesting so I continued to try. At some point, I decided I wanted to do a master’s degree in statistics, so I began to work on more statistics-based programming. That’s when I found SciPy. I became (and still am) fascinated by the idea of open-source software that is completely free to use and supported by a community of diligent programmers.