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What I Learned from Researching Coding Bootcamps

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Re: What I Learned from Researching Coding Bootcamps

#51

Post by austenallred »

katpas wrote: post #42
austenallred wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The incentives for the bootcamp model are just so completely broken. You suck in people with promises of a career, have them pay $10k each, and if they don't get a job it's somehow their fault. It's really hard for word of mouth and reputation to kill a bootcamp because the demand outstrips supply right now. You could really suck, buy users with advertising, and make a killing for a looooong time. I truly hope the fu…

At the course I did the model was the education is completely free, if you then get a job afterwards you're expected to let the bootcamp try to get a recruiter fee from the company that hires you. Or you stick around, freelance out the space on the projects they help you find and then give them a 10% contribution of those earnings and also teach the next cohort how to code. Seemed to work pretty well.

That model works as well, but then the school is disincentivized from getting you work at most companies that don't pay a recruiting fee. If we get a recruiting fee we deduct that from the total owed.

Re: What I Learned from Researching Coding Bootcamps

#52

Post by sethrin »

watwut wrote: post #48
twoshoes wrote: post #39

Companies here value skills in specific programming languages/tech stacks over skills in core Computer Science. They are hiring bootcamp graduates (who are overall weaker), over stronger applicants, just because the bootcamp graduate will hit the ground running quicker. It makes learning Computer Science in university less valuable, since university graduates lack knowledge in specific programming languages/tech stac…

I see a bit of problem with it too. However, someone who learned "about memory management, virtual memory, I/O subsystems, CPU schedulers" should have easy time to get up to speed in same stack as bootcamp graduate. Bootcamp graduates have to learn basic concepts during bootcamp (that computer follows instructions, how conditions and loops work, how to debug systematically, how to split task to smaller ones, etc). CS…

There are good and bad code schools, but knowing about compiler design and binary trees is probably not going to help you that much with your web monkey job. I think you and many others drastically overestimate the value of the CS degree, and you certainly don't appreciate the difficulty of being able to learn several complex web stacks in a few months starting from zero. The pace set is brutal if you already know the languages.

CS grads should ideally know nothing about the practice of programming. Dijkstra never wrote any code except with a fountain pen. A CS course should give you his skillset: being able to analyze programs in an academic sense. This is assumed to be representative of job performance by people who have no other measure. At the very least it should not be expected that it takes less time for the CS grad to pick up the bootcamper's skillset than it took for that person to acquire it. Most likely it will take far longer unless you're focusing on resume-driven development. The reality is that CS courses aren't likely to give you much of an edge in a coding bootcamp, let alone the workplace. In the long run there may be an advantage to the CS degree if the bootcamper can't pick up the relevant bits on the job, but otherwise the real difference is that you can expect the bootcamp grad to be productive immediately.

Re: What I Learned from Researching Coding Bootcamps

#53

Post by kylethayer »

Fifer82 wrote: post #50
paulpauper wrote: post #49

A year and a half ago, my wife, Kristen, was an English teacher. Now she is a full-time software engineer at Microsoft. I followed her journey with excitement as she went from writing her first “Hello World” program, then her first full stack web app, to getting an apprenticeship and finally a full time job. Damn that is impressive

Is it a case of who you know?

It's not in the sense that I didn't have any connections and she got in on her own. It is in the sense that I have a CS degree and have worked in industry. I helped her on occasion get past a bad explanation in a tutorial and I could talk her through how technical interviews work.

Re: What I Learned from Researching Coding Bootcamps

#54

Post by watwut »

sethrin wrote: post #52
watwut wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see a bit of problem with it too. However, someone who learned "about memory management, virtual memory, I/O subsystems, CPU schedulers" should have easy time to get up to speed in same stack as bootcamp graduate. Bootcamp graduates have to learn basic concepts during bootcamp (that computer follows instructions, how conditions and loops work, how to debug systematically, how to split task to smaller ones, etc). CS…

There are good and bad code schools, but knowing about compiler design and binary trees is probably not going to help you that much with your web monkey job. I think you and many others drastically overestimate the value of the CS degree, and you certainly don't appreciate the difficulty of being able to learn several complex web stacks in a few months starting from zero. The pace set is brutal if you already know th…

I strongly disagree with "CS grads should ideally know nothing about the practice of programming." and it does not even describe real life CS grads. Not knowing theory is a problem, knowing also practice is not a problem.

If you was able to learn compilers and implemented one ( as most of those courses require) then you not just have aptitude, but already can read code, can debug, learned to split code to smaller chunks developed etc. In practice, all CS already encountered databases, sql, at least one Web framework, did projects etc.

Web stacks are not that complex and complex parts repeat between frameworks. They seem complex if they are first thing you learn.

Re: What I Learned from Researching Coding Bootcamps

#55

Post by wikibob »

austenallred wrote: post #23
pulpwave wrote: post #18

I used to teach front-end development at a bootcamp several months ago. What once was a great opportunity to share my 15 years of experience with various startups and fortune 500 tech companies ended up being a nightmare with management. First and formeost, I liked most of my students. They came from all kinds such as: Background Actors, wives of programmers, students, military veterans, teachers, and a hodgepodge of…

The incentives for the bootcamp model are just so completely broken. You suck in people with promises of a career, have them pay $10k each, and if they don't get a job it's somehow their fault. It's really hard for word of mouth and reputation to kill a bootcamp because the demand outstrips supply right now. You could really suck, buy users with advertising, and make a killing for a looooong time. I truly hope the fu…

At Lambda you charge 17% of the first two years of salary (down from 3 years previously).

At a salary of $80,000 that's 27 thousand of tuition. That seems extremely expensive for a non-accredited education.

Re: What I Learned from Researching Coding Bootcamps

#56

Post by wikibob »

kylethayer wrote: post #53
Fifer82 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it a case of who you know?

It's not in the sense that I didn't have any connections and she got in on her own. It is in the sense that I have a CS degree and have worked in industry. I helped her on occasion get past a bad explanation in a tutorial and I could talk her through how technical interviews work.

I think a post from you and her on what she did during that year between deciding to enter tech and getting the job at Microsoft would be incredibly interesting and helpful.

Particularly, what resources did she use? More top down things (Udacity, FreeCodeCamp, jumping into building projects), or bottom up (online computer science classes, Berkeley CS61, SICP, etc).

Thanks!

Re: What I Learned from Researching Coding Bootcamps

#57

Post by AndyMcConachie »

sethrin wrote: post #24
AndyMcConachie wrote: post #11

But do bootcamps train people to program well? The metrics they measure against are money and job based. Which gives me the impression that we either don't know how to determine if people know how to program, or that no one really cares. We need some kind of standardized test or similar. I know of the Advanced Placement CS exam[1], but we need something more practical and not focused on a particular language. [1] htt…

Nothing trains people to program well. Colleges teach fundamentals like lambda calculus, but fail to teach practical skills. Bootcamps have the opposite problem, and the actual industry seems to assume that trained developers spring up out of the ground like sowing dragon's teeth. The requirement of 'not focused on a particular language' is actually something that I would be forced to disagree with. That leads to thi…

I didn't know abotu HAGGIS, thanks for that link.

I vaguely remember that in the 1990's the US Advanced Placement test for CS was done in Pascal. The point has to be a focus on fundamentals. There are fundamental data structures and algorithms that any programmer is useless if they don't know, and I doubt people are learning these at bootcamps in 6 months.

> Colleges teach fundamentals like lambda calculus, but fail to teach practical skills.

College CS programs in the USA are focusing more and more on appeasing recruiters and HR folk with keywords than in teaching CS fundamentals. And I think that's a tragedy.

Re: What I Learned from Researching Coding Bootcamps

#58

Post by austenallred »

wikibob wrote: post #55
austenallred wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The incentives for the bootcamp model are just so completely broken. You suck in people with promises of a career, have them pay $10k each, and if they don't get a job it's somehow their fault. It's really hard for word of mouth and reputation to kill a bootcamp because the demand outstrips supply right now. You could really suck, buy users with advertising, and make a killing for a looooong time. I truly hope the fu…

At Lambda you charge 17% of the first two years of salary (down from 3 years previously). At a salary of $80,000 that's 27 thousand of tuition. That seems extremely expensive for a non-accredited education.

The pricing was never three years. And built into that is expensive instructors (hailing from Stanford, Berkeley, NASA), small class sizes, potential default, and the ability to attend all other LambdaSchool classes in perpetuity.

So for about the price of 1 semester of private tuition (or about 50% more than the top bootcamps), it's not unreasonable, especially when attached to a guarantee you'll be paid $90k/yr while you're paying for it. It's capped at $30k so that's the maximum payback.

Not sure what the pricing will be long-term.

Re: What I Learned from Researching Coding Bootcamps

#59

Post by kylethayer »

wikibob wrote: post #56
kylethayer wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not in the sense that I didn't have any connections and she got in on her own. It is in the sense that I have a CS degree and have worked in industry. I helped her on occasion get past a bad explanation in a tutorial and I could talk her through how technical interviews work.

I think a post from you and her on what she did during that year between deciding to enter tech and getting the job at Microsoft would be incredibly interesting and helpful. Particularly, what resources did she use? More top down things (Udacity, FreeCodeCamp, jumping into building projects), or bottom up (online computer science classes, Berkeley CS61, SICP, etc). Thanks!

The article has a link to her blog in that first paragraph (though links on Medium don't stand out that much). FreeCodeCamp was one of a number of things she did.

Re: What I Learned from Researching Coding Bootcamps

#60

Post by sethrin »

watwut wrote: post #54
sethrin wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are good and bad code schools, but knowing about compiler design and binary trees is probably not going to help you that much with your web monkey job. I think you and many others drastically overestimate the value of the CS degree, and you certainly don't appreciate the difficulty of being able to learn several complex web stacks in a few months starting from zero. The pace set is brutal if you already know th…

I strongly disagree with "CS grads should ideally know nothing about the practice of programming." and it does not even describe real life CS grads. Not knowing theory is a problem, knowing also practice is not a problem. If you was able to learn compilers and implemented one ( as most of those courses require) then you not just have aptitude, but already can read code, can debug, learned to split code to smaller chu…

Condescending, incoherent, and wrong. If you think that CS is about how computers work in practice you should take that up with Dijkstra and Knuth. It's an absurd position. If you think that 'can read code, can debug' is the benefit of a university education then what about that takes four years to teach?

I'm a self-taught programmer. I talked my way into my first coding job with no experience and learned as I went. For the theory side of things I went with MIT and Stanford's online coursework, and the relevant papers when appropriate (e.g Turing 1936, Shannon 1948, McCarthy 1960). These days I'm getting into Haskell and J -- I hate being outgolfed by the array languages. Recently I audited a couple courses for a local coding academy. At the coding school, the default expectation is that you will be working with a framework that you have no prior knowledge of, possibly in an entirely new language, and expected to complete three to five projects per day, with specifications, unit and integration tests, and a meaningful commit history, five days per week for twenty-odd weeks. Most people require significant amounts of study time outside of class. This is not descriptive of CS coursework. It's almost like there are two related-but-distinct bodies of knowledge are being pursued in different ways!

If you have the idea that bootcamps are easy then I definitely invite you to try one sometime. Discard the idea that what the university and bootcamp are offering are somehow equal. A CS education may or may not be a better preparation for a career in programming, but it's not good job training, and that's on purpose. If things were otherwise, coding schools would not need to exist, would they?

A CS degree is a loosely-correlated proxy for being able to code. It happens to be very easily measured. This leads small minds to believe that it is a good proxy, especially if they happen to have CS degrees. I'm sure the rationalizations and condescension come naturally.

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