Recent CS graduate wanting tips on next steps in career

[dpatel304]

I majored with a Bachelor's in Computer Science in 2010. Been working for a very small company since Nov 2010. Pay is good, but I feel like I could do better (~$58K in Dallas,TX), but I really do love my job for now.

My question to all you who have been in the field for a while: What should my next move be? I want to further myself in my career, and want to know a good way to start. Honestly, I will say that my coding skills suck, and I don't think I can get into a good master's program (my GPA was ~2.8). I'm good at my job, but we simply code in C and C# and don't really do anything complex.

I was thinking looking into the security type of jobs, but I honestly don't know much about it. Something like a professional hacker. If I were to do that, I've heard that getting various related certificates is the way to go.

I would like to further my education with a Master's, but I'm afraid my low GPA will prevent me from getting a decent education. Now that I've got some real world experience, I really think taking more CS classes would do wonders for me. It was really hard for me to grasp a lot of things during my Bachelor's, just because I was not applying it yet.

One thing that someone recently advised me, which sounds smart, would be to learn Mandarin. That sounds like it would be a very wise move for the future (I'm 26 now, so I have a lot of time left in this field).

Anyway, just wanted to know some pointers as to what I should do from here on out. I've honestly felt like I've wasted these 2 years at my current job. I mean, I've got some solid experience under my belt, which helps a lot. It was hard landing my first job without some solid experience, so the job alone will do wonders for me, but I feel like I need to be doing something outside of work to further my education.