Chegg Skills

I had a really great experience with Thinkful's Engineering Flex program. I learned a lot of valuable tech skills and had tremendous support from my mentor and the Thinkful community.

The only thing I'd caution prospective students on is that the program is an enormous amount of work - particularly if you lack any prior programming experience. So if you work full time, have kids, or other competing obligations, then you should plan accordingly and be aware that projects may take longer than you anticipate. But that's because you will learn a lot!

Thinkful's UX/UI Flex program was an incredible experience. I feel confident in my ability to excel in the interview process and perform the required job skills and continue learning from those around me.  The instructors/assessors were excellent and gave specific constructive feedback, though it seemed like the expectations around the assessments were unclear making it difficult to pass on the first attempt.  My mentor wasn't as available as I'd thought, though that may have been an isolated experience.  My ASMs (academic advisors) were AMAZING and went above and beyond to make my experience and seamless as possible.

Completing Thinkful's Engineering Immersion program was the best decision I've ever made for my career. A year ago, I had just learned what a for loop is. Now, five months after graduating from the program, I've just accepted an offer for a full time position as a software engineer.

Though this program focuses on web development, the concepts learned will transfer broadly across many different pursuits in software engineering. By the end, you will be experienced with JavaScript, HTML, CSS, React, some Node and SQL, as well as data structures, algorithms, various backend libraries, and important fundamental programming concepts. You will be skilled at developing responsive, dynamic, full-stack web applications using technologies relevant to modern workplace requirements.

Committing to this program will require 40-60 hours per week. The majority of that time will be spent paired with a different student every day, walking through the lesson(s) of the day, and working through exercises and/or problems together. There are three big projects toward the end of the program, two of which are web apps that you will come up with from scratch. The last project is a team project with 3-4 other students. These are great to feature on your online portfolio after finishing the program.

I recommend studying a bit of JavaScript before starting the program, but it is certainly not required. Overall, the curriculum is solid and sufficient, though you might sometimes have to research certain details from outside sources because some of the lessons are somewhat wanting of more detailed and nuanced elaboration. There are a few sections that favor simplicity and a straight-to-the-point approach at the expense of thoroughness, which is not always a good thing. Luckily, you are given a mentor and a team of senior developers that you may consult at any moment during your day, and they will jump into your video session to walk you through your issues.

When you finish the program, you are paired with a career coach and given many tools to help you in your job search. These were crucial to my success as a job seeker; I really can't speak highly enough of Thinkful's dedication to its students' success after graduation - I certainly benefited from it.

If you are considering Thinkful, I think it's a great option.

Thinkful has one of the better career services I've heard! After you graduate from the course, they have amazing career coaches that pair you up with different job applications and they help you throughout the entire job application journey, from cover letters to networking. I have learned so much about the job hunt, thanks for Thinkful! For the main course itself, it is what you take/make of it. Seek feedback and help because it is hard to get help if you don't ask. They have a help center, but ask your mentor for good feedback and they will give it to you. I believe that every graduate from here has an equal right to succeed and this isn't an easy ride. UX is difficult and it's becoming such a saturated field, so work hard and rewards will come. 

Thankful was a great experience and led to me getting a job less than a month after graduating. I’m now building the experience I need to excel in my field. My professional coach was extremely knowledgeable and helped me connect what I was learning to how it would be helpful. After the graduate the career team is very knowledgeable and encouraging in what can be a very trying time. Anyone who has job hunted before can tell you how miserable it can be. But they are extremely knowledgeable about what you have to do and when you have to do it in order to start getting results. Would definitely recommend Thinkful to anyone looking to get in to the tech industry. 

I started the Thinkful Digital Marketing program back in late 2020 and the whole experience was top-notch, to say the least. I learned so much about today's digital marketing tactics such as creating and understanding buyer personas, social media marketing, email campaigns, google analytics, SEO/SEM, and so much more! I also love that the grading system has high standards for all the assignments, especially when working on your resume and cover letter. Overall, I enjoyed the whole program very much and I highly recommend anyone looking to expand their horizons and learn a new, valuable skillset for your future endeavors. Thank you Thinkful team!  

Thinkful's Software Engineering Immersion course is a 5 month, full-time course, where you learn HTML, CSS, and JavaScript for the purpose of creating full-stack web applications with modern tooling that is widely used by employers today, and it was a top-notch experience. The teachers, assistants, dedicated mentor, and career support were very knowledgeable, experienced, and helpful throughout my time there. We even had a teacher that had her doctorate in Computer Science and taught the data structures and algorithms part, which was arguably the most difficult section! That being said, your experience is entirely what you put into it: they give you all the guidance, tools, and even a $1500 / month stipend (if you qualify for that), but you need to put your best effort into it and ask for help when you need it, no matter how trivial the problem you encounter seems. The most important part, for me, is to make sure you can see yourself doing this and what you do after graduation! It's vital that you continue you're learning and working on projects, as you apply for your first job in the tech industry. My only gripes with Thinkful was on my final capstone. I decided to use a newer standard in the React.js framework (React Hooks, instead of Class-based components), and I had to refactor my code to use the standard that was taught in the curriculum. I feel that I should have had to do all that and even gotten extra credit! I also feel they should add React Native, which is almost exactly like React but for dedicated mobile apps, which I feel would make an excellent addition to the curriculum and valuable, after seeing it's prevalence in my job search.

 Participating in the UX/UI Flex program (prev. Product Design) at Thinkful has been a great way to jumpstart my career in design. The coursework was challenging, but realistic, and I was able to learn skills that I use in my current design work. Thinkful places a high emphasis on iterative design and the design process, which has been invaluable when I've applied for jobs or been asked to explain my decisions to clients.  The biggest selling point for this program, however, is the design mentors. Having someone who has been in the design industry for years provide feedback, tips & tricks and resources from their own experiences was truly invaluable. I'm still in touch with a couple of my mentors, people I know I wouldn't have met without this program.  After the program we had help from career services, which was nice. We had weekly design challenges, meetings with our coaches, resume and portfolio reviews, and most important to me, a community of supportive designers to bounce ideas off of and share resources with.  Overall, if you're looking for an avenue to enhance your design skills or make a career change (like I did), I would recommend this program.