I used to agree with this but what I've seen in practice is a lot of people who have half-assed their way through beginner tutorials but have no actual practica

I used to agree with this but what I've seen in practice is a lot of people who have half-assed their way through beginner tutorials but have no actual practical grasp of how to do a non-guided project. What she's done is pretty difficult -- executing a new concept daily -- and it's amazing she managed to keep it up when most others would drop out/fail. I personally think "a lot of knowledge" comes through those lost hours spent fixing obscure, annoying problems and bugs and inconsistencies that force someone to really think through how that system works.