Veronica Vergara

Veronica Vergara is a Technology Software Engineering Associate after graduating from Per Scholas Chicago in 2021. 

Previously, Veronica had worked as a pharmacy technician for several years until her daughter was born. Veronica’s daughter suffered from serious health problems, so Veronica quit work to focus on her daughter’s health. A year and a half later, Veronica’s daughter’s condition had greatly improved, and Veronica began preparing to rejoin the workforce. She knew that she wanted a job with flexible hours which would allow her to work from home if necessary. Her husband worked in IT and she admired many features of his job, including its flexibility and good pay. Veronica had tinkered with IT and tech over the years and had discovered that not only did she enjoy it, but she was pretty good at it too! With this in mind, she began researching tech education programs and soon came across Per Scholas.

Veronica eventually graduated as the valedictorian of her Per Scholas End User Desktop Support cohort. She was impressed with how the teachers made sure that the students could not only solve problems but could also explain their work to fully grasp the concepts. She also appreciated the course’s focus on preparation for employment after graduating. 

“Throughout the program, you are working on being ready for the moment the program finishes,” Veronica recalled. “From week one, we were creating our LinkedIn profiles, working on resumes…we would have guest speakers that ranged in different fields in IT. We were able to make connections with them, pick their brains a little, and learn about the different paths and options in IT. As soon as the program was done, I had my LinkedIn with several connections, an idea of what type of IT I wanted to do, and my resume ready. What I think makes up a well-rounded employee is both soft skills and technical skills, and I think Per Scholas has really developed a great way to round those out.”