I'm going to go with the assumption that the "Ajacks" written on the board in the second photo is meant to be a pun/joke?
As Coding Boot Camps Close, the Field Faces a Reality Check
111–120 of 289 posts
Re: As Coding Boot Camps Close, the Field Faces a Reality Check
#112If you go to a bootcamp you loose the struggle. The struggle to choose your domain: Web, Mobile, Embedded, Databases etc. The struggle to choose the programming language(s) / technologies to learn. The struggle to choose in which order and from where to learn them (for free). The struggle to choose your Code Editor / IDE. That's a lot of time spent learning about technologies to make the right decision for you, and g…
Let's face it: People that go to bootcamp on the whole are not in the same set of people that have passion for programming. Most of those people discovered very early on their passion for computers, and either went to school for it, or are self-taught and don't need a bootcamp. I'm not saying it's impossible to meet someone that didn't know they looooved programming until they were 35. I'm just saying that most of the people in bootcamp are after the promise of salary to the exclusion of having a passion for computers.
Re: As Coding Boot Camps Close, the Field Faces a Reality Check
#113Earlier quoted context omitted.
Bootcamp dropout, here. I 100% agree. I left The Starter League after the first semester when I realized the buyer's remorse of paying more per day than tuition at MIT. The prices for bootcamps simply aren't worth it, especially given the numerous online and self-paced options out there... many of which are free. How my story ended: I left the bootcamp and took a few Udacity Nanodegree programs for $200/month and (fu…
I definitely agree that there are less expensive options out there, but self-study isn't for everyone. Also, one of the main benefits of these boot-camps are their career counseling services. At the end of the day, if you're able to increase your salary from $30k to $80k, the extra $15k on a course seems well worth it.
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Re: As Coding Boot Camps Close, the Field Faces a Reality Check
#114The US Navy gets some IT work done by Information Systems Technicians. It's not clear from the job description, but they seem to be something between software developers and sysadmins. They have 24 weeks of training, which is comparable to a long civilian bootcamp. Anyone know if they're any good? https://www.navy.com/careers/information-and-technology/info...
And you get loaded up with a bunch of very relevant people skills like management skills, and it will teach you all the je ne sais qois about yourself that you normally see in commercials for the military. Stuff like discipline and perseverance and drive. There are few other places in the world that will hand a teenager as much responsibility, trust, and purpose. There are some kids out there handling millions of dollars' worth of equipment. Plus, you can travel, you'll get into the best shape of your life, and they'll even give you a free pair of boots.
Re: As Coding Boot Camps Close, the Field Faces a Reality Check
#115Sort of off topic, but in the second picture the whiteboard says "Ajacks" (and not ajax, for asynchronous JavaScript and xml). Makes me wonder how fast and loose they were playing with instructors, unless this is just a staged shot, or maybe a joke I didn't get. Not that you need to know what the acronym stands for (hell, no one I know uses the technique to get xml anymore anyways!), but it is weird to see the detail…
> ["Ajacks"] Makes me wonder how fast and loose they were playing with instructors...
IMHO, there's too many jargon-jockeys in this field and not enough people who can truly explain things. Getting the acronyms strictly correct is the least of the problems.
Re: As Coding Boot Camps Close, the Field Faces a Reality Check
#116This is very similar in content and sentiment to the item linked in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14831918, so I'd like to echo my comments from that thread:
> Two specific coding bootcamps that 1) had been acquired by for-profit education conglomerates and 2) underwent relatively rapid expansion into second and third tier tech markets went out of business.
> As evidence of a larger trend, this article cites a single quote from the CEO of "a private lender and an alternative accreditor for the fast-growing boot camp sector." This is unpersuasive.
This article quotes Ryan Craig of University Ventures vs Rick O'Donnell of Skills Fund, to nearly the same effect.
So: big name closures of two bootcamps with similar pain points and acquisition contexts, vs. seemingly healthy expansion and unchanged placement rates for schools like Flatiron (mentioned in the article), Hack Reactor, App Academy, General Assembly, and so on. Further consolidation in the field wouldn't surprise me, but are we really observing a trend worth reporting on?
Re: As Coding Boot Camps Close, the Field Faces a Reality Check
#117As someone who interviewed dozens of bootcampers I can give some insight.
1) Most of the bootcamps teach the basic of front-end, and a lot of them, teach by doing without explaining a lot of basic concepts. They are basically money grabbers and throw these people out of the door as fast as possible to get their money back.
2) A lot of the students are in for the money, not for the love of the job. Sorry, but it's true. I don't mean to include everyone, but out of 30 students, only 2 kept working in my previous company, they weren't good developers, but they loved the job and kept learning and improving themselves. Nothing wrong with pursuing a good paycheck, but in developers world in order to keep being relevant in the next 2/3 years you need to keep sharping your skills.
3) The best developers I worked with are the self-taught guys/girls who learn on their own before they even hit the college. The most boring developers I work with, the the ones who only learn to code while in college and never developed any interested to learn before that. But the most horrible devs I work with came from boot camps. Not their fault, it's just how bad these bootcamps are.
Re: As Coding Boot Camps Close, the Field Faces a Reality Check
#118Who gives a shit where or how you learned to code. What a stupid and indirect way to filter candidates. Just show me what you've done. Send me repo links, production code, or even just the end result with some sort of proof that you actually built it. That's the best part about any craft - practicing or building something creates tangible results. If you don't already have a portfolio, get to work on that before you…
That's great for front-end guys, but it's frustrating to me as a back-end developer to have expectations that I can show live examples of my past work to potential employers when I've spent years designing and building enterprise internal systems which have no visible result outside of the code itself, which is under strict NDA.
I get it, development is a craft, it's easy to judge the quality or experience level of a coworker after having to deal with their PRs for a month or two. However, it's not like any toy project I could throw on github is going to have real relation to the actual work I do, and trying to replicate e.g. some of the third party integrations I've written internally as public stand-alone packages is going to get me fired and sued by an overprotective employer.
This isn't a hypothetical fear either, multiple times I've gone through phone interviews to a "lets review some of your past work" stage, and my "I can't legally show you any of these things, but here's general descriptions of some of the major internal projects I've led or handled solo" has resulted in failing to make the next interview round.
Re: As Coding Boot Camps Close, the Field Faces a Reality Check
#119Attention code boot campers: if you literally have any other relevant experience for a software engineering job, my advice is to just leave the code camp off your resume and focus on that. And then, your experience from the code camp will come through positively in the actual technical interview process. Hiring managers are under a deluge of underqualified code boot camp candidates, who are trying to effectively get…
As one of those under-deluge hiring managers, I've found that candidates have already begun hiding their bootcamp / academy education during the application process. It is still pretty obvious, though: the resumes are all the same format, as are the application channels and techniques, and experience levels. I'd recommend these individuals look toward internships, as I haven't found one qualified for a full-time job…
Is a bootcamper over age, say, 30 going to be able to get an internship? The problem there is that internships are generally regarding across the industry as being for fresh college grads.
Re: As Coding Boot Camps Close, the Field Faces a Reality Check
#120Most coding bootcamps are a complete waste of money. Ever since I launched https://edabit.com , I've noticed a ton of traffic coming from these bootcamps and I'm not sure what to think of it. On the one hand, I like the free promotion but on the other, I can't help but feel as though these people are getting ripped off (considering they can access the site for free).
Apologies for (slightly) off-topic, but I have a question about edabit. How much of a beginner can a user be and still get value rather than frustration from time spent on the site? I've been wanting to learn some real modern programming beyond HTML/CSS & some JavaScript for aeons, would your site be the place to do it if that's my current base?