Have you tried running Dokku[0] on a VPS?
edit: For context what I was already using was manual docker on a DO box. While I recognized that Dokku would make it more seamless and easier, my issue was managing and securing the DO VM itself. I didn't see how Dokku would help that scenario
If I were working on a project with a corporate budget then using Heroku or a different style of architecture like serverless would be a no-brainer
If he learns any sort of dev-ops infra management he's just wasting his time.