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Lambda School leaked documents show poor performance over the last two years

businessinsider.com

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Re: Lambda School leaked documents show poor performance over the last two years

#291

Post by blululu »

mbesto wrote: post #283
edgefield wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every time I’ve seen a company bought by private equity, it spells the beginning of the end. The strategy always seems to milk every last drop of cash from the business, without any long term sustainable plan. As an anecdotal case, I visited Sea World over the summer and half the concessions and shows were closed. It was still expensive and crowded and and there were service bottlenecks everywhere. Long lines for a b…

> Every time I’ve seen a company bought by private equity, it spells the beginning of the end. I regularly work with PE firms. You can't paint the whole industry with one brush stroke. I've seen more than a handful of companies get bought by PE to become very successful for everyone involved (PE, management, customers)...and the opposite. That being said - it's very common to see companies in the large cap space ($5B…

> While you might have had a poor experience, the rest of the market may have been willing to wait in 15 minute lines for $10 bottles of water. If you disagree with PE, the easiest way to "stick it to them" is to vote with your wallet. Simply stop going to Sea World and you'll see PE change their tune pretty quickly.

Ironically this is exactly the sort of attitude that the parent is complaining about. You could never grow a business with this mindset, but you can coast and cannibalize one just fine. Nobody likes 15 min lines or $10 water bottles; they tolerate them because there are other experiences that are worthwhile along the way. You remove these experiences and you are basically just screwing people who are going off outdated information about the quality of the experience. Voting with dollars is fine but there is a big information asymmetry and a hysteresis effect of having a quality brand reputation (built over years of not trying to screw people). Any voting with dollars is years removed from the results.

Re: Lambda School leaked documents show poor performance over the last two years

#292

Post by xzel »

mbesto wrote: post #283
edgefield wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every time I’ve seen a company bought by private equity, it spells the beginning of the end. The strategy always seems to milk every last drop of cash from the business, without any long term sustainable plan. As an anecdotal case, I visited Sea World over the summer and half the concessions and shows were closed. It was still expensive and crowded and and there were service bottlenecks everywhere. Long lines for a b…

> Every time I’ve seen a company bought by private equity, it spells the beginning of the end. I regularly work with PE firms. You can't paint the whole industry with one brush stroke. I've seen more than a handful of companies get bought by PE to become very successful for everyone involved (PE, management, customers)...and the opposite. That being said - it's very common to see companies in the large cap space ($5B…

In respect to Sea World the more realistic strategy is either run at a minor loss until the real estate is profitable or squeeze dry ASAP and sell. Or the timeless play of load it with debt, payout themselves and declare bankruptcy.

Of course there are other PE businesses that are ran with only minor changes. I have a friend whose firm invests in dermatology offices and has created a network of small offices nation wide. From my understanding they really do try to keep the same staff on and mostly do back office changes but that’s his word so take it for what it is. I personally find large scale PE work pretty soulless but there are definitely firms that care about the companies they take over.

Re: Lambda School leaked documents show poor performance over the last two years

#295

Post by cm2012 »

el_dev_hell wrote: post #254
cm2012 wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only people to who can afford to go to school to broaden their education without a clear job benefit are those born rich. In other words, the people who used to go to college pre 1970s.

> The only people to who can afford to go to school to broaden their education without a clear job benefit are those born rich. I respectfully disagree. I've spent an enormous amount of time inside universities (as both a student and employed as an engineer). The vast majority of students have no clear job benefit at the end of their degree. Most students are studying something with no obvious job correlation. The la…

I think we completely agree. Unless you have a clear job benefit (like studying CS) you should only go to college unless you're already rich and it doesn't matter.

Re: Lambda School leaked documents show poor performance over the last two years

#296

Post by sunny--tech »

LudwigNagasena wrote: post #269
sunny--tech wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can’t compare uni and bootcamps because they’re a false equivalency as someone else pointed out. The sole purpose of a bootcamp is to get a job afterwards. That’s why they market their job placement rates so much. Uni, video courses, and MOOCs are for education. Not everyone uses them to get a job, so job placement for a video course or uni compared to bootcamp doesn’t give you much info. Anecdote: I did a self-p…

How many people who go to college don’t treat it as a bootcamp? I doubt it is more than 2%.

Are you talking about just people in the CS program or all university programs? My first pass through college was in oceanography and I definitely didn't treat it as a bootcamp. I had no idea what my job prospects would be like after graduation. I just knew I liked the ocean.

In terms of CS, I'm sure most of them are going for a job. But the fact that those who aren't isn't 0%, it makes it difficult to compare.

Also, the reasons for people not graduating college and not graduating from a 3-6 month bootcamp will likely differ as well. 4 years is a long time. There are many reasons why someone might drop out. So again, comparing graduation rates and job placement rates between uni and bootcamp won't really tell you much useful data, especially if you're trying to compare which one prepares students better.

And just to be clear, I'm not saying Uni is better or defending it. I have my own with college [1]. But I see too many people trying to deflect criticism from bootcamps when those criticisms are very well justified.

[1] Is a Computer Science Degree Worth It?: https://betterprogramming.pub/is-a-computer-science-degree-w...

Re: Lambda School leaked documents show poor performance over the last two years

#297

Post by maxerickson »

sokoloff wrote: post #226
908B64B197 wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm extremely skeptical of bootcamps, especially after learning that some of the TA's at Lambda are hired to help with teaching as little as two months into the program as students[0]. I guess that counts toward their "placement" stats! Not only that, but Lambda seems so desperate that they will offer a fresh grad at no cost to any company for a 4 week trial period. [1] I don't think I've seen a single hire out of a…

We definitely have a few career changing bootcamp grads working out for us (no STEM background, nothing to indicate they were "almost there" on their own, turned into fine employees). That said, the hit ratio from bootcamp graduate to productive hire is incredibly, incredibly low. I think there's a place for bootcamps, but I'm not sure most bootcamps are operating in that space. I don't know how to fix it, but I did…

Lambda isn't aligned with students though, their goal is to sell the ISA for maximum value while minimizing instructional costs.

There is some natural overlap there, but that isn't the same thing as alignment.

Re: Lambda School leaked documents show poor performance over the last two years

#298

Post by willhinsa »

cm2012 wrote: post #230
rossdavidh wrote: post #110

So, I learned to code at an odd program at Univ. of Texas - Austin, essentially a bootcamp for coders that began in the 1970's and still runs today. They take about 9 months to get you to a beginning programmer level, then you program (for UT administration) up through a kind of apprenticeship. It worked very well, and the washout rate has historically been about 10%; that is, 90% of those initially admitted go on to…

That the dirty secret of all higher education. The value of the credential comes from the screening, not the education. Research shows people accepted to ivy league schools who don't attend have the same future incomes as the people who attend.

Because we as a society decided that IQ testing job applicants was illegal, we created the behemoth that is our student loan crisis. Fun times.

Re: Lambda School leaked documents show poor performance over the last two years

#299

Post by LudwigNagasena »

sunny--tech wrote: post #296
LudwigNagasena wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many people who go to college don’t treat it as a bootcamp? I doubt it is more than 2%.

Are you talking about just people in the CS program or all university programs? My first pass through college was in oceanography and I definitely didn't treat it as a bootcamp. I had no idea what my job prospects would be like after graduation. I just knew I liked the ocean. In terms of CS, I'm sure most of them are going for a job. But the fact that those who aren't isn't 0%, it makes it difficult to compare. Also,…

> But the fact that those who aren't isn't 0%, it makes it difficult to compare.

It is irrelevant for the other 99%, so it doesn’t make it any harder to compare it.

> Also, the reasons for people not graduating college and not graduating from a 3-6 month bootcamp will likely differ as well. 4 years is a long time. >There are many reasons why someone might drop out. So again, comparing graduation rates and job placement rates between uni and bootcamp won't really tell you much useful data, especially if you're trying to compare which one prepares students better.

Sure, the comparison shouldn’t be that simplistic.

Re: Lambda School leaked documents show poor performance over the last two years

#300

Post by antasvara »

mbesto wrote: post #283
edgefield wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every time I’ve seen a company bought by private equity, it spells the beginning of the end. The strategy always seems to milk every last drop of cash from the business, without any long term sustainable plan. As an anecdotal case, I visited Sea World over the summer and half the concessions and shows were closed. It was still expensive and crowded and and there were service bottlenecks everywhere. Long lines for a b…

> Every time I’ve seen a company bought by private equity, it spells the beginning of the end. I regularly work with PE firms. You can't paint the whole industry with one brush stroke. I've seen more than a handful of companies get bought by PE to become very successful for everyone involved (PE, management, customers)...and the opposite. That being said - it's very common to see companies in the large cap space ($5B…

The issue is that a company purchased by PE often has built up a positive image of their brand. Sea World probably has thousands of positive reviews online; by the time the online consensus catches up to the reality of the experience, it's very easy to be fooled. That's where the money is made: when costs are cut but the brand still has a positive perception.

PE doesn't have to change their tune; by the time consumers realize that the product has changed, the firm has already made their money.

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