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Ask HN: What should I tell my cousin who wants to go to a “coding boot camp”?
51–60 of 152 posts
Re: Ask HN: What should I tell my cousin who wants to go to a “coding boot camp”?
#52She should not go in cold. She should work through "Learn Python the Hard Way" or Chris Pine's Learn to Program first, at least, before committing to something like this. I did a bootcamp some time ago. Everyone who came in completely cold failed the program. Standards now might be such that she survives the program, but she will be unhirable. If it's a finishing school after putting in much work on her own, then maybe it makes sense. Assume every number you see related to job placement to be fraudulent at some level. Getting a job coming out is likely to be difficult - the market is saturated with bootcamp grads. All that being said, if she finds out she really, really likes programming before starting the bootcamp, puts in months of work beforehand, and is willing to put in thousands of hours outside of work in the years that follow, then go for it.
Re: Ask HN: What should I tell my cousin who wants to go to a “coding boot camp”?
#53Someone I know graduated from Hackbright, the bootcamp for women that has a decent reputation but also fairly expensive. It's been a couple of years and she hasn't gotten a programming job, I don't even mention it anymore. So your mileage might vary. I'm deeply skeptical of anyone from a bootcamp, to be honest. I think if you can really learn something and get your foot int the door with a small startup, then it open…
In defense of Hackbright, I have hired multiple grads from there and had we had the room, hired more great candidates we talked to and all were great. Consistently produced good candidates. Just like any class though, there's going to be a distribution in results.
Re: Ask HN: What should I tell my cousin who wants to go to a “coding boot camp”?
#54> As a positive point, all the females in our cohort got dev jobs, including the only one who actually failed the class. Startups are pretty aware of the gender discrepancy and actively looking to hire those with double x chromosomes. Not complaining about affirmative action, just wanted to give you as full picture as possible You should be complaining! Especially given the rest of your story. This kind of thing is s…
It's called "positive discrimination" for a reason. We're positively discriminating to the benefit of women (or minorities, or whomever) now, to make up for the decades of negative discrimination that these groups have suffered.
Don't think it's fair? Interesting feeling, eh. Not very nice, eh. Be glad you haven't suffered it for literally your entire life.
Re: Ask HN: What should I tell my cousin who wants to go to a “coding boot camp”?
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
As a dev in Denver who routinely interviews candidates from some of the nations top bootcamps, i can corroborate these claims. Many graduates from these programs are hired by the bootcamp itself, as tutors or web devs. Rarely are these hires profitable to the school, instead the are done strictly to maintain the placement statistics that are paramount to their continued enrollment.
Uh... I don't normally do this, but any chance you guys are hiring? I'm in Denver looking for an entry level position. I can do machine learning
Constructive criticism since you had the courage to publicly inquire: was there something about the commenter that made you feel machine learning was a targeted approach? I can't immediately see anything particular about the commenter or the company (in profile), so my first impression was that you were using a buzz word.
Also I recognize that a forum is really not conducive to this, but perhaps you could quantify what you mean by "do machine learning"...what sort of business deliverable would you contribute?
Overall though, you might want to just aggressively hunt for the person's email and pitch in private :)
Re: Ask HN: What should I tell my cousin who wants to go to a “coding boot camp”?
#56She should not go in cold. She should work through "Learn Python the Hard Way" or Chris Pine's Learn to Program first, at least, before committing to something like this. I did a bootcamp some time ago. Everyone who came in completely cold failed the program. Standards now might be such that she survives the program, but she will be unhirable. If it's a finishing school after putting in much work on her own, then may…
No familiarity with bootcamps specifically but, even with more traditional CS degree programs, this seems to be good advice. I don't program professionally but have done some on the side for a long time.
Even checking out some of the "Intro to Programming" MOOCs from better institutions, it was pretty obvious to me that I'd have been utterly overwhelmed going into any of these cold as a student. If even a text editor or a command line is a new experience, there's just too much foundational knowledge/experience that has to be gained to move forward with what you're actually supposed to be learning.
(I know there have been efforts at places like CMU to teach intro courses that are actually real intro courses.)
Re: Ask HN: What should I tell my cousin who wants to go to a “coding boot camp”?
#57> As a positive point, all the females in our cohort got dev jobs, including the only one who actually failed the class. Startups are pretty aware of the gender discrepancy and actively looking to hire those with double x chromosomes. Not complaining about affirmative action, just wanted to give you as full picture as possible You should be complaining! Especially given the rest of your story. This kind of thing is s…
It's called "positive discrimination" for a reason. We're positively discriminating to the benefit of women (or minorities, or whomever) now, to make up for the decades of negative discrimination that these groups have suffered. Don't think it's fair? Interesting feeling, eh. Not very nice, eh. Be glad you haven't suffered it for literally your entire life.
Something seems off to me intuitively about "positive discrimination", as you've described it. It doesn't really seem fair to be unfair to an individual because, in the aggregate, that individual's group has been unfair to others in the past (and even the present). Sort of feels like an emotionally charged way of righting the wrong, rather than a rational one...or even an effective one.
Re: Ask HN: What should I tell my cousin who wants to go to a “coding boot camp”?
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
Uh... I don't normally do this, but any chance you guys are hiring? I'm in Denver looking for an entry level position. I can do machine learning
Constructive criticism since you had the courage to publicly inquire: was there something about the commenter that made you feel machine learning was a targeted approach? I can't immediately see anything particular about the commenter or the company (in profile), so my first impression was that you were using a buzz word. Also I recognize that a forum is really not conducive to this, but perhaps you could quantify wh…
I brought it up since his profile pointed me towards a dating site, which is prime ground for predictive analytics. Also, the website didn't have a "careers" section that I could readily find.
Re: Ask HN: What should I tell my cousin who wants to go to a “coding boot camp”?
#59I just want to point out that anyone giving advice on this issue, as with anything else, will have their own personal biases. For example HN has a high percentage of startups and "bleeding edge" tech companies which may value skillsets and credentials differently then say a midwest enterprise software company. If your cousin needs advice gaining entry to midwest enterprise companies, it may be more valuable to pose this question locally or else risk giving the wrong advice to your cousin.
Re: Ask HN: What should I tell my cousin who wants to go to a “coding boot camp”?
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
Constructive criticism since you had the courage to publicly inquire: was there something about the commenter that made you feel machine learning was a targeted approach? I can't immediately see anything particular about the commenter or the company (in profile), so my first impression was that you were using a buzz word. Also I recognize that a forum is really not conducive to this, but perhaps you could quantify wh…
I brought it up since his profile pointed me towards a dating site, which is prime ground for predictive analytics. Also, the website didn't have a "careers" section that I could readily find.
Hm, fair enough, that does seem to follow. Good luck :)