I Created a Portfolio Site
Tags: career, wordpress
Published: 2019-12-02 19:46:33

This semester, I’m taking a professional development course in the Engineering Education department. As a part of that course, I was asked to put together a portfolio which I was pretty excited about. Naturally, I wanted to share that portfolio with you.

## Portfolio Requirements

Since I put together this portfolio for a class, there are obviously some requirements. For example, I have to have all of the following:

1. **About Me / Homepage**
  - Who are you? (What is your background? Where are you from?)
2. **Education / Experience**
  - Links to downloadable CV and Resume.
  - Link to downloadable cover letter. This can be either academic or industry focused per your targeted professional goals.
  - Skills and experience that you want to highlight. 
  - LinkedIn.
  - Memberships in professional societies with links. 
3. **Teaching**
  - Link to Teaching Statement (downloadable). 
  - Teaching experiences / viewpoints you want to highlight. 
4. **Research** 
  - Link to Research Statement (downloadable). 
  - Research experiences / viewpoints you want to highlight. 
5. **Personal Highlights**
  - Interests, hobbies, community engagement, other.

Of course, I don’t necessarily have all of these items in my portfolio. For example, I excluded links to the CV and Resume for privacy reasons. On each of these documents, I include my address which is not something I am comfortable publishing.

That said, I think my portfolio goes above and beyond these core requirements which should make up for the lack of links to certain documents.

## Portfolio Tech Stack

Before I share my portfolio, I just wanted to take some time to share how it was built. Like many of my websites, I used WordPress. Of course, I used a different theme: the Total theme by [HashThemes](https://hashthemes.com/). Honestly, I only chose Total because I wanted something lightweight, and I only needed the most basic of features. After all, I have no plans to blog on my portfolio.

In addition, I used the same 1&1 Ionos hosting that I use for The Renegade Coder. In fact, I can have up to 5 websites on my current package, so I just tacked it on at no extra cost. Now, I have three websites on the same hosting package with room for two more!

Beyond that, there’s nothing really exciting about how this portfolio was put together. For this course, we were allowed to use tools like Wix which apparently make portfolio building easy. That said, I wanted my own domain, so I didn’t go down that route. In addition, I didn’t feel like learning any new tools.

## Portfolio Reveal

At rate, let’s finally reveal the portfolio. Naturally, I chose a domain named after myself: Jeremy Grifski. In other words, you can learn all about me at [jeremygrifski.com](https://jeremygrifski.com/).

Also, you can find a link to the portfolio in the navigation bar at the top. Lately, I’ve been fiddling with that navigation bar, and I think I’m finally content with how it’s turned out.

### Layout

At any rate, the portfolio features seven main pages:

- Homepage
  - Features a picture of me, an about section, links to main pages, and student testimonials
- Awards & Certifications
  - Lists awards and certifications by organization in reverse chronological order
- Education
  - Lists education by university in reverse chronological order
- Experience
  - Lists experience by company in reverse chronological order
- Leadership & Service
  - Lists leadership and service opportunities by organization in reverse chronological order (with pictures)
- Projects
  - Lists software projects by organization
- Tools
  - List proficient software tools like Git and Python

In addition, you’ll find links to documents and other content in the footer. For instance, you can read my teaching and research statements.

### Content

If you then dig into each of these pages, you’ll find that the entire portfolio is written in third person. In other words, I describe a lot of my experiences from the perspective of an outsider. Honestly, I’m not sure that was the right way to go, but I like it.

In addition, you’ll find a ton of links throughout to various articles, videos, and projects I’ve worked on over the years. Hopefully, that’ll drive some traffic to my work, but who knows.

Also, I made sure to use bold text to highlight anything in the portfolio that I felt was important. For example, I highlighted university and employer names, so people could quickly see the breadth of my experience. Outside the bold, I explain the significance of that role or project.

## Portfolio Feedback

Overall I’m quite pleased with how the portfolio turned out. Why not check it out and share your thoughts? I’ll be getting some feedback from my peers, but you’re welcome to help out as well.

In the meantime, I’m looking to grow my network of support. In particular, I’d love it if you [ran over to Patreon](https://www.patreon.com/TheRenegadeCoder) and pledged your support. If not, no sweat! I have plenty of ways for you to get involved. For instance, you can [check out my YouTube channel](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpyoVwOqYRlSAEUPEn7P9hw), [follow me on Twitter](https://twitter.com/RenegadeCoder94), or [hop on my mailing list](https://newsletter.therenegadecoder.com/).

With all that said, thanks for taking some time to check out my work! I appreciate it.

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