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Dev Bootcamp Shutting Down

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Re: Dev Bootcamp Shutting Down

#211
post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Federal loans (90% of all loans) come with income based repayment plans that charge 10% of your disposable income and are cancelled after 20 years if you don't pay it off. The income based repayment plans are also retroactively available to all Federal borrowers. It's not actually as big of a problem as it sounds.

10% of your income for 20 YEARS. Man, it is funny that people get mad at Bootcamps like app academy for charging 20% of your income for a single year....

App Academy nearly tripled my salary in all of 6 months! The motivated people I met and what I learned about the industry, not including the technical skills I obtained, have easily been worth double what they ask for.

It ended up costing 1/4 of my 4 yr degree. I admit, that it's not a magic pill like their marketing will have you believe. That's my one gripe, with how they portray themselves. You have to be motivated and driven to succeed and realistically, not everyone can handle the complexity and speed at which they teach.

They really give you the bare minimum but it's an amazing little boost. It's up to you build yourself up from there.

Re: Dev Bootcamp Shutting Down

#212

Who needs bootcamps? All you need is a decent machine and an internet connection to learn. That's how we learnt "web" back in the day. Cynical me hopes all commercial (and often spammy) bootcamps and conferences and meetups die a quick death. Also death to the hipster culture in tech. /rant over

Why stop at bootcamps? There are so many resources on the internet, most of which are free, that can replace all of the knowledge universities have to offer and then some. Someone could learn astrophysics through Google searches.

But that's not a reasonable position across the board. Of course universities offer more than mere information, and I would say that bootcamps(at least DBC) focus mostly on those other things and far less on the information. By that I mean learning to code at home online isn't going to give you the same experience as spending days or weeks hacking on your first mobile app with a bunch of other people, non stop, while chowing on beer and pizza. Yes, there's tremendous value in that, especially if you need to learn to work on a team and self-organize. In theory, you can emulate that environment on your own, but there's a reason people pay for that kind of experience. A person of novice experience can't or won't come up with a substitute for that. It's an introduction to a world, of sorts. At least it was for me.

Re: Dev Bootcamp Shutting Down

#213
post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's effectively how it works in the US as well for most people. Federal loans (90% of all loans) come with income based repayment plans that charge 10% of your disposable income and are cancelled after 20 years if you don't pay it off.

I did not know that. So why all the noise about how expensive tertiary education is in the US?

Not everyone qualifies for government loans.

Re: Dev Bootcamp Shutting Down

#214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ya, we're kinda like App Academy except not a bootcamp (a longer, more exhaustive CS program), online (so you don't have to move to San Francisco), and with no down-payment (because most of our students just don't have $4k, even for a down-payment).

Please add a Java based web development option (ideally with JSF), I'd join in a heartbeat. The web dev is too javascript / front-end centric, and the CS (I'd assume) is too math-centric. Java / JSF / MyFaces is the best of both worlds, imo. No need to write most front-end javascript, 80% of dev time can be spent on business logic.

Aren't most bootcamp grads being hired for frontend roles?

Re: Dev Bootcamp Shutting Down

#215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't believe they are cancelled ever. There is a special condition that if you work for the federal government for 20 years, they can be cancelled after 20 years if they aren't paid off, but AFAIK, that's it, and you have to attempt to pay them off during those 20 years. If there is a new exception, please let me know. My wife has some.

If you opt into the income based repayment plan they are cancelled after 20 years of payments. I'm not sure how they retroactively count payments made under old repayment plans if you switch now.

I can't believe we're acting like taking 10% of disposable income for 20 years is a good deal

Re: Dev Bootcamp Shutting Down

#216
post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's effectively how it works in the US as well for most people. Federal loans (90% of all loans) come with income based repayment plans that charge 10% of your disposable income and are cancelled after 20 years if you don't pay it off.

I did not know that. So why all the noise about how expensive tertiary education is in the US?

Not every loan is a federal loan. Additionally, federal loans almost NEVER cover the full amount of university, unless you're at a state school or community college.

My federal loans covered about 1/8 of my tuition.

Re: Dev Bootcamp Shutting Down

#217

Hard to compete against things like Lambda Academy where there's no up front cost and you only pay if you get a job: https://lambdaschool.com/computer-science

Love the quote from "ANONYMOUS LAMBDA SCHOOL STUDENT" on their landing page.

They really couldn't find anyone, even someone that you could lookup on LinkedIn to give a reasonable quote?

Re: Dev Bootcamp Shutting Down

#218
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Trouble with anecdotes is that it is not data. I'm happy for your brother but that still doesn't change the fact that most bootcamps are overpromising and underdelivering on their promises of gainful employment. It's simply not possible to learn to program in bootcamp time frames. I'm certain if we saw actual numbers it would not be a pretty picture. For the truly motivated it is much better to go to recurse.com or j…

Love your use of speculation to counter my anecdotal data. Incredibly intellectually dishonest. It is possible to learn enough programming to within 10 weeks to get a job programming. Of course they won't be the best programmers at that point. But I've hired bootcamp grads and have had other friends go through, and they have been positive outcomes. Yes, that is anecdotal data, but it categorically proves false that "…

+1 to justin's comments. It's true that an anecdote isn't a complete data set, but it is one data point. Further, it's one more data point than the pure speculation that dkarapetyan's comment provides.

Let me add a 2nd data point- as a 2013 DBC grad, I would still be in my previous career (completely unrelated to engineering) if I hadn't attended DBC. My instructors and classmates were instrumental in helping me get out of a job I hated and into one I love. It wasn't a perfect experience, but it was a life-changing one, and I'd do it again in a heartbeat.

> For the truly motivated it is much better to go to recurse.com or join a learning Meetup.

Speaking of data, care to provide any which supports this opinion?

> most bootcamps are overpromising and underdelivering on their promises of gainful employment.

You generalize about an entire industry without providing evidence, and then you use that generalization to denigrate a specific company within that industry which may or may not buck a trend. A trend which you haven't even proven exists, btw. Nice.

Re: Dev Bootcamp Shutting Down

#219
post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Federal loans (90% of all loans) come with income based repayment plans that charge 10% of your disposable income and are cancelled after 20 years if you don't pay it off. The income based repayment plans are also retroactively available to all Federal borrowers. It's not actually as big of a problem as it sounds.

The loan forgiveness entices people who wouldn't otherwise buy the education product and further inflates the sticker price of education.

I highly doubt that. Almost no one looks 20 years into the future like that.

Re: Dev Bootcamp Shutting Down

#220
post #21

I find bootcamps to be an interesting industry. The general perception is that they're learning institutions, but that couldn't be further from the truth. In reality, bootcamps are technical recruitment agencies. Companies are realizing that smart, motivated people with no CS degree can still oftentimes excel in the majority of positions (primarily app development.) The problem is finding those people. Bootcamps have…

You've also just described MBA programs.

They're not free upfront though...?
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