Coding Boot Camps Get the Boot: Why the Industry Is Shutting Down

You are totally correct. The default view makes it looks like Chicago had 1 closing and no openings. Zooming in reveals multiple openings in Chicago.

I think there is more information that is let on here. I've talked with some folks at prominent bootcamps who are likely to be shutting their doors or hard pivoting soon if their revenue situation doesn't drastically improve.

> Bloomberg ran an article stating many students were still not prepared for the tech industry even after their extensive training.

If you look at bootcamps as an education/career on a platter, sure. But they're no different than how a typical school should work; you get as much out of the experience as you put in. My experience at Dev Bootcamp was that those who put in the effort and had the right perspective were the ones who made it into the field after their graduation. Some people, actually many, simply don't have what it takes to be a programmer, and that shouldn't be seen as a failure on the part of bootcamps. It'd be one thing if few to none of the graduates from bootcamps succeeded in their profession, but that's simply not the case. I and many people I know wouldn't be where we are now if we didn't have the kind of bootcamp style education where we could dedicate our time to educating ourselves and hacking on shit. Yes, yes... we might have been able to do that without paying a bootcamp, for "free", yet we'd be paying the overhead of organizing people, consistently getting people together to spend time hacking on projects, etc. I was lucky enough to get one other person to hack on a project with me after bootcamp – everyone else was either too busy or out to make money from the free work of others. I'd much rather spend $20k to go to Dev Bootcamp and be able to hack with people on Node.js & Ruby projects, be in the bay area, and go to hack-a-thons every other night than spend far more than that sitting through a bunch of non-tech classes I hate to come out with some abysmally outdated skills in PHP & Java.

Just because some bootcamps have shut down doesn't mean that the model itself is a failure. Though I had some minimal experience coding on my own prior to bootcamp(let's just say I could make Hangman in Python but had no idea what object-orientation was), I was able to become proficient enough to build a live YouTube chat(before YouTube had that) with shared video controls... as a result of the experiences I had through Dev Bootcamp. You CAN learn to code in a few months, but you have to want it enough. Strange as it may seem, not everyone wants to succeed as much as others. Even if 80% of bootcamp graduates didn't become programmers after the course, that's no reason to see the bootcamp model as a failure. Not everyone is cut out for it, and yet it has changed the lives of numerous people. Though I'm sad that Dev Bootcamp is no more(which I'd still argue is a result of terrible management both prior to and after the Kaplan acquisition), I hope the idea of coding bootcamps can evolve to be more successful.

As someone who went to a boot camp, this doesn't surprise me at all. I don't think it's worth it for most people. BUT, I don't see them going away entirely. I'm thrilled with the boot camp I went to, and would do it all over again. Hear me out...

> Are Coding Boot Camps Worth It?

- If the first time you're touching code is at a boot camp, it's not worth it. By the time I had started a boot camp, I had been reading books and doing tutorials on and off for 2 years. Thinking in terms of product life cycle, and your programming skills are the product, you want to go to a boot camp at the beginning of the growth phase.

- If your instructor or TA is a graduate of the program, it's not worth it. We had instructors who had worked at F500 tech firms and a small class size. To me the real value was having 3 months worth of access to someone who in many cases made hiring decisions at those companies.

- If the boot camp focuses more on their curriculum more than their people, it's not worth it. Curriculums are garbage, it doesn't matter what language you learn, you should be learning how to think like a developer. It's not all about focusing on the instructors too, if you've been self-studying for 2 years, and your peer doesn't know how to open a text editor, they're going to hold you back. You want a boot camp that is selective with their applicants.

- If you're doing it for money, it's not worth it. You're not going to make an average salary right out of the school. In fact, you probably won't even be a full-time employee, plan on being a contractor for the first year. If you don't know how to find work on your own or research how to, knowing how to program isn't going to change anything.

- You're starting at the bottom, every opportunity good or bad is an opportunity to learn. Paid or unpaid take it, eventually, you will have enough opportunities to start saying no to less valuable opportunities, but until you're 100% booked, you're a yes man or yes woman. In fact don't wait until graduation.

- If you can't afford to take 6 months off and devote them entirely to programming, it's not worth it. I had saved for 2 years, paid off my debt, and instead of using the remaining money for a down payment on a house, I paid for tuition/living expenses to dedicate 3 months of uninterrupted time. I know I was fortunate enough to have this opportunity, but if you're going to do it, you need the resources to do it right. Otherwise, continue with self-study and find a mentor at a meetup.

- If you're not in a tech hub, it's not worth it. San Francisco, Seattle, Austin, Portland, Chicago, New York, Toronto, Vancouver, Denver, or Montreal are good. Maybe Boston or Atlanta, don't know enough about the tech scenes there.

- If you have medical/family issues, it's not worth it. It is stressful if you have any other things going on in your life sort them out first.

I've seen a lot of people fail, but it is still very much worth it for some people. I went to a boot camp to accelerate something I was already doing. What is said about boot camps applies to education in the broader sense as well. In many cases college isn't worth it, but it doesn't mean you shouldn't go.

University education is absolutely an overcrowded space. Most colleges do not live up to their cost. Students are starting to notice and choose other options.

It's also well known theres too many law schools and too many lawyers. It's a bad market to enter into now.