Inside DELTA: 5 Questions with Stephanie Johnson

Stephanie Johnson is learning how to shred. On the guitar, that is. 

She wants to be able to play the solo in Prince’s Purple Rain, which is considered by many to be one of the greatest guitar solos ever recorded. 

A fan of 1980s and 90s rock, R&B and gospel music and a master air guitarist, Johnson was listening to Prince about a year ago when she had an epiphany. “Why play air guitar,” she said, “when you can play the real thing?”

So she got herself a guitar and began a course of self-study. In addition to Prince, she’s also been working on some Bon Jovi riffs — another favorite 80s band — and is making a lot of progress.   

What is your role with DELTA?

Johnson joined DELTA as a Junior PHP Developer in the Academic Technology division in August of 2022. She is part of the team that ensures DELTA’s custom applications are up to date and constantly evolving to meet the needs of the NC State community. 

PHP, short for PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor, is a widely available programming language used to create, test and implement dynamic and interactive websites, applications and programs. Much of Johnson’s work involves using PHP, along with coding languages HTML and MySQL, for web application development and integration with DELTA’s various custom applications. 

Before coming to DELTA, Johnson was a web programmer with the NC State College of Engineering. Her supervisor at the time, Margaret Hudacko, suggested Johnson apply for the DELTA position, knowing she would likely lose a great programmer and employee — which she did. 

“Margaret was a supportive supervisor and mentor,” Johnson said. “She helped me spruce up my resume and did some mock interviews to help me prepare.”

Reporting now to Jonathan Champ — whom Johnson describes as “a fantastic supervisor and an absolute fountain of knowledge” — she always feels supported and encouraged, especially on those days that feel overwhelming. 

“Things are going really well,” she said. “Jonathan is such a champion for me as I learn and grow in my job, giving me small projects to help me build skill in increments. He’s a big advocate for learning by doing.”

What is a project you have enjoyed working on?

As another testing season wraps up, DELTA’s exam proctoring application has been front and center in Johnson’s mind. 

She is currently working on adding improvements to the application involving upgrading the campus exam locations to be pulled from a central database by an admin, rather than having the locations hand-coded in. The upgrade is designed to increase the efficiency of site scheduling and reduce redundancies. 

As well as working on the back-end development of the project, Johnson got to see the proctoring application from an end-user perspective.

“I was able to see firsthand how part of the software works while volunteering during exams,” she explained. “The experience really clarified the process, app functions and student use patterns for me. And it was cool to interact with the students.”

Having attended college in the days before virtual testing was commonplace, Johnson marvels at how sophisticated and seamless the exam process is at the DELTA Testing Center. 

“Whatever happened to paper and pencil?” she laughed. “And scantrons!?”

What is your background?

Though she was born in New York, Johnson moved to North Carolina when she was one year old and has been here since. Her father was a recruiter for the U.S. Air Force, and they lived in Charlotte and Raleigh before settling in Garner when she was four. 

She enjoyed a happy childhood, babysitting her younger sister, mastering the clarinet and playing video games — lots of video games. Her dad bought her an 8-bit Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) console in the late 80s, on which she played Super Mario Bros. and every other Mario game, along with favorites like Tetris and Tiny Toon Adventures. 

That NES, in fact, was the spark for Johnson’s lifelong interest in computer science and programming. She remembers thinking as a kid, “I wonder how pressing this combination of buttons on the controller makes Mario jump on the screen?” 

In high school, she nurtured her continued interest in computers by taking two years of programming classes. She also enjoyed anatomy and biology classes. After graduation, she headed off to North Carolina A&T torn between wanting either to study computer science or enroll in pre-med — or maybe something else altogether. As a first-generation college student, she faced some unique challenges in navigating the unfamiliar terrain of higher education. 

At orientation, excited and nervous about starting college and being on her own, Johnson scanned the list of undergraduate majors. 

Computer science was listed — but had been inexplicably crossed out. 

Johnson took it as a sign that she was meant to pursue pre-med and pivoted. For two and a half years she took increasingly challenging biology courses at A&T, and she did well — but she just wasn’t feeling it. 

“Programming was always in the back of my mind as what I was meant to do,” she said. “My parents encouraged me to pursue my passion and not stay in a program I wasn’t fully committed to.”

So she left A&T and returned home. Enrolling at Wake Tech, Johnson completed her general education requirements (no science classes needed!) and reignited her passion for computer science through various programming courses. From there, she transferred to Meredith College. As a working, non-traditional commuter student, college life was vastly different from what she had experienced at A&T. 

“It was like going from one extreme to another,” she said. “Took some getting used to.”

Johnson graduated in 2004 as one of just five women earning bachelor degrees in computer science. With no real experience in the field, however, she found it difficult to get a job and ended up in customer service for CitiBank’s credit card division. 

While dealing with credit card customers over the phone was not quite what Johnson had envisioned doing after college, there was a silver lining to the job: Emerson, her future husband. The two had been hired at the same time, started dating shortly thereafter and have been together ever since. They dated for several years before deciding to marry. 

Wedding planning ensued: dresses were purchased, flowers arranged, save-the-dates sent, reception halls rented and decorations ordered.

By February everything was ready for their April nuptials. April 2020, that is. The month of international COVID-19 lockdowns and all the fear and uncertainty those early months brought. 

Faced with a difficult decision, Johnson decided not to postpone the wedding, instead marrying (at a 6-foot distance) in front of just the minister and their parents.

No guests, no reception, no cake, music, flowers or decorations. 

“It was definitely bittersweet,” Johnson said. 

The couple is hoping to finally have their reception in the next year or two. This time, with all the friends, family and accompaniments they missed out on the first time — many of which, like decorations, flower arrangements, party favors and her dress, Johnson has kept stored away all this time. (She still fits into her dress, which is more than many of us can say almost 5 years after getting married!).  

Johnson first began working at NC State in 2011 for the facilities division, where she worked in customer service for several years while beefing up her computer programming skills through courses in SQL, PHP, HTML, API [application program interface] and other developer training programs. 

In 2018, she joined the College of Engineering IT team, continued taking courses through LinkedIn Learning and Wake Tech, and created the perfect foundation for success in her current DELTA position. 

What is something people may not know about you?

Johnson held one other job prior to her NC State and CitiBank days: she was a 911 operator for the New Bern Police Department. 

She had an aunt on the police force there, who believed that because Johnson had a computer science degree, she’d be perfect operating a computer to conduct 911 dispatch. 

“She thought that because the dispatch system was computer-based, it would be a good transition job for me to develop my skills after college,” Johnson explained. Unconvinced of the applicability but needing a job, she pursued and was offered the position. 

Even in a smaller, quiet town like New Bern, it was a high stress environment. Car and home accidents, heart attacks and strokes, assaults and overdoses were common calls. 

“I lasted six months before burning out,” Johnson said. “No matter the issue, the people calling were always panicking. My job was to not feed into that panic, but instead to calm them and gather information quickly. It was intense.” 

The emotional stress and psychological trauma took its toll, and Johnson transitioned to an administrative position in the department. Her training, however, continued to pay dividends in her future customer service roles. Someone at CitiBank calling in angry because they incurred a service charge?

For Johnson, that was a walk in the park. 

What do you do outside of work?

Johnson still loves to play video games, and she takes her gaming seriously: she maintains both a YouTube channel and a Twitch account of her gameplays, under the handle GohanChicGaming.   

She’s not trying to monetize her gameplays, or even gain tons of followers. She just wants to keep a digital gameplay record of the hundreds of games in her collection. 

“I want to play every single game I own,” she said, “and I still have unplayed games I bought back in the days of Blockbuster.”

The Blockbuster games are mostly for the PlayStation, her platform of choice, and she bought many of them by the fistful in the company’s waning days when it was offering volume discounts on used games.

Recent streams have included play on Tomb Raider 3, Street Fighter Alpha and Resident Evil. Her gameplays rarely include commentary or include her face, though you hear her occasionally speaking on her Twitch streams. 

“I don’t want to get all dolled up or even out of my pajamas to stream my gameplay,” she said. “I just want to play the games.”

Not long ago she streamed a complete play of Silent Hill, a psychological survival horror game released in 1999, because she didn’t have a memory card for it. The stream went for 9 hours, 17 minutes. “Thanks for hanging in there with me,” she yawned when she beat the game. “Good night!”

Remarkably, she still has that original NES from her dad — still working after more than three decades — and about a dozen games for it. There’s Super Mario Bros., of course, and some other oldies-but-goodies. She still plays it now and then, with a touch of nostalgia. 

When she needs a break from gaming, Johnson enjoys crafting, spending time with Emerson and their families, traveling, listening to music, and practicing her (air and real) guitar. 

She’s not quite there yet with Purple Rain — but keep an ear out for her at next year’s DELTA talent expo.