Dev Bootcamp

I had a wonderful experience attending Dev Bootcamp! When I started, the only experience I had programming was a college course in C++, and it had been 10 years since then. The staff, fellow students, and alumni worked together to create a supportive environment. It's been over a year since I graduated, and I'm still amazed at how much I was able to learn and grow in just a few months. They didn't just teach me how to program in Ruby, HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. They taught me how to approach learning ANY programming language. I didn't truly appreciate that until I was asked in my current position to rewrite a code script in 8 different languages...only 1 of which I had any previous experience writing in (Ruby). The fact that I was able to complete this daunting task with only months worth of experience programming is a huge testament to the dedication and skills of the Dev Bootamp teachers, as well as to their challenging curriculum. 

Deciding to go to Dev Bootcamp was hands down one of the best decisions I have made. I was part of the first San Diego cohort, so I may be biased but they have the best staff in the best city. The instructors put their everything into it and make sure you're learning and growing as long as you put in the work. 

Having Phase 0, the remote, part time portion was a nice intro into what DBC would be full time. I was able to work and get through phase 0 and get my feet wet a little for the full time portion. It is fast paced, but not too fast for retention. Dev Bootcamp also has a great presence in the community and encourages the same of the students. Because of this and help from the careers team I was able to get a job just a few weeks after graduating. 

I came out with the confidence and knowledge to find a dev position and also got to meet and collaborate with some truly kind and thoughtful people. If you're in San Diego and are thinking about it, talk to Kimbra ASAP. 

The San Diego location of DBC is awesome. Great view, space, and arrangement. The staff here is friendly and courtious while providing all the support needed to help you through the program.

The challenges are tough and time consuming. Expect to be here 7 days a week for 10 to 12 hours a day (you won't even realize where the time goes). The direction for your learning is provided but to actually learn the concepts/material, you need to put the time and effort into it. There were many times that the teachers would stay late to help people with challenges and questions they have (even though they don't technically have to). You can tell that all the staff truly cares for the success of each individual that comes through the doors.

Definitely prepare yourself for the journey and it will be hard (especially on relationships outside of DBC). The outcome and transformation is absolutely worth it and I would do it again if given the chance/time/money.

I had a really bad experience at Dev Bootcamp. l found the teachers to be unhelpful and in a rush to leave at the end of the day. They told us that they are available to help, but when I asked, they never had time. 13k is a lot of money to be on your own throughout the program.

A lot of the material is rushed through, so it’s hard to pick up the concepts and retain them. They let you repeat phases, but tend to ignore you even more if you have to repeat a phase. I didn’t feel like the instructors cared about my success. 

The environment is very clickish. The instructors have their favorites. The environment is also hard on introverts or anyone who thinks for themselves. They say that they are open to feedback, but they will just tell you that “maybe this place is not for you” after you forked over 13k and quit your job, if you question the lack of help you are getting or question anything at all about Dev Bootcamp. 

There is not a lot of support to find a job. The curriculum is not very unique, and is largely self-directed, so I would recommend doing free tutorials online and going to meet ups, and looking into other paths to learn code. Definitely make sure to do your research. It can be a very costly and disappointing experience.

Pros:

+ They use specific languages and technologies to learn "how to learn" quickly in the ever evolving world of tech.

+ The goal isn't just to make you an engineer, it's to make you a better person.

+ The instructors, mentors, and staff really care about your learning and well-being.  The program is intense and everyone pushes you to your limit, but they also know when and how to help you decompress.

 

Cons:

- You get in what you put out, but your experience is also impacted by individuals who don't care about the Engineering Empathy, being respectful to others, dealing with difficult conversations, or providing feedback in a constructive manner.  There isn't much that the mentors and staff can do about individuals who act rude or pridefully outside of class or when the mentors aren't around.

- Some topics could have used more focus or been taught in a way to provide more effective emphasis, like JavaScript and testing.

- It would be fantastic if each cohort were slightly smaller and each session lasted a week longer.

The program I think worked well when there was a considerable dearth of talent in the web dev space and programs like this could easily provide developers that companies could train. That being said, in more recent times, Chicago has becoming saturated with Jr Developers coming not just from DBC, but GA, HackReactor, etc.. The neccessary reaction by these programs is to escalate their quality but I don't think DBC has done that. Instead, they've pursued quantity over quality. The result is that now every 3 weeks DBC graduates roughly 18-30 grads who are entering a job market where companies now can ask for much higher demands of their jr devs than in previous years.  

Overall I wouldn't say I regret doing a bootcamp, but given the current tech environment, I don't believe DBC adaquetely understands the challenges facing current grads, choosing instead on focusing on getting as many students through the door as possible. 

In reference to the Chicago location.

Dev Bootcamp tries to show that they're different from the rest of the bootcamps out there due to their engineering empathy classes, but its all terribly fake. I know, I was in these classes. 

They are really good at showing themselves as a great school by sponsoring meetups and events, showing they're helping the community such as women in tech meetups or people of color tech meetups. Its all an act to portray their beliefs. They are doing these things because its a huge advantage to advertise their school to the poor souls at these meetups. 

I felt like an outsider at the entire time by the staff. They were very subjective in who they liked and wanted to help more. They emphasize the issues in the tech world such as the lack of women/people of colour, but then don't even manage the same issues in the classroom. They hang out with the white crowd, pull jokes together etc but look at you weird and walk away when you like to join in. Its funny how segregated it gets in the classroom. If you are a woman, be prepared to be talked over, ignored and automatically treated as a nobody by the males. Its quite difficult when you have to work as a group. If you raise this issue with the instructors, be prepared to be treated as a student from nursery "tell them to stop". Yeah sure, like I haven't done that already.

They assign you to an advisor in which you cannot change if you don't learn well from them. He was a brilliant programmer, but a terrible teacher and even more terrible person. I felt like I was a waste of time for him and he was getting frustrated with me. His personality was cold and impatient towards me. At first I thought it was due to his nature. But as I watched him with other students that are white, he was the cheeriest and nicest person I'd ever seen. What a great way to learn. Its hard to separate these issues and focus on the lesson at hand when they arise day in day out. There's a reason why they have a therapist in the classroom (which by the way doesn't keep anything confidential amongst the instructors). I felt unsafe in this environment. 

I wanted to build my confidence as well as knowledge at Dev Bootcamp due to their views of the tech industry. But it was all the same. I left and found a better bootcamp that focuses strictly on the curriculum and none of the spewing of their "one love" anecdotes. Many of the students who aren't white admitted to me about this as well as not being able to find jobs. The whites were obviously oblivious and had no problem finding a job. 

So if you're white, enjoy.

I was at a civic tech hackathon this passed weekend called Codeswitch. It opened with a panel of speakers talking about inequities in the tech industry, especially around race and gender, and what can be done about them. The conversation ranged widely, and at one point the panelists were lamenting the lack of companies where the goal of bettering the world can be on par or even a priority over making money. One of the panelists said something like, "we haven't figured out how to hack human compassion yet..." implying that's why so many companies fail to benefit communities.   In that moment I thought to myself, "actually... Dev Bootcamp is kinda doing that already with engineering empathy..." I wasn't sure how to articulate it effectively during the panel discussion, but I at least wanted to share the thought with you.   I have to admit, going into DBC I was skeptical of the empathy stuff. After participating, I was struck by how the organization prioritizes its effort to teach empathy in the industry, and the way I could see that hacking compassion among students. Especially as coding bootcamps proliferate, I think it's really special that DBC is prioritizing empathy in such a big way. I hear about various organizations providing financial support to women or people of color who want to code which is great, but DBC is taking another necessary step that I think people don't realize is possible. I'm really glad I had a chance to see it in person, as I reflect upon it, I'm slowly figuring out how to share its value with others.