Le Wagon

Montreal Batch #63 2017

My name is Lionel and I'm from Belgium. I'm a 3D Graphic Designer but I've always been interested about Web Development, especially Web Design. I'll give you some life context so that you can understand why Le Wagon was such a game changer for me !

After my studies, I worked few years in Belgium as a graphic designer but then I decided to leave my comfort zone and travel the world. I've been to Australia, New Zealand, and Asia during more than a year, working as a freelancer to carry on my trip. During my studies, I gained a set of skills combining rigour, technique, and creativity but something was missing : coding.
I knew le Wagon for a while but I was working and was busy on some projects, so not able to apply for the bootcamp while I was in Europe. But when I was in Indonesia, I received my canadian visa and at the same time I heard Le Wagon will do his first batch in Montreal in February 2017. It was a sign and the perfect timing so I told myself, LET'S DO THIS ! My only regret ? I didn't apply earlier !!!

It was an amazing experience and I'm still in touch with most of my classmates and teachers. Le Wagon is not only an amazing community, it's also a family. After Le Wagon, with one of my classmates, we've decided to work as freelance Web Developers during our freetime and after only 3 weeks I found a job in a great startup as a Front-End Developer ! Plus, I'm also now a Teacher Assistant for the next batch and will do my best to give the students the best experience possible, as I got.

Honestly, I'm really impressed by what we learned in just 9 weeks and I'm so glad I did it because I can now combine my graphic design skills with web development. So don't hesitate guys, it's 200% worth it and you won't regret it for sure.

My journey in coding started way before I actually wrote my first lines of code. I have always had an immense curiosity on how everything behind our screens worked, and nevertheless, it took me 5 years to place myself in that spot. Why 5 years? Because I spent 4.8 years doubting if it was the right decision to take. Today, I encourage people to do it on day one! It will take you 2 months with Le Wagon to make this shift in your life!

This is my story: I graduated as an engineer in Buenos Aires - Argentina, and immediately started working for LATAM's top airline. During my first 2 years, I designed Argentina's domestic commercial schedules, and for the last 2 years, I worked in Chile in its headquarters as a team leader assessing operational KPI and projects. Both were amazing jobs, but neither my dreamed one. I wanted something that could let me drive and decide for myself every day. It was then when I realized I should follow my passion for coding. The corporate world wasn't going anywhere, and the benefits of doing the boot camp were way bigger than staying in my company... What's more, I was just thinking from the knowledge perspective!

What's best is that the boot camp has several benefits that one cannot see when applying. You get to meet people from all over the world and learn how other cultures address same pains - in my case, +15 different countries! You surround yourself during 9 weeks with positive people and at the same time enter Le Wagon's amazing coder community. By choosing the city you can enjoy living during 2 months where you always wanted to; not to mention awesome anecdotes you might take home! I'll never forget Barcelona's culture, food, weather, and parties!

With regards to Le Wagon, I am proud to say that it gave me more than what I expected. Teachers were not only professional but also at the distance of a question - even now after the course! Knowledge was handled in the right doses so as to push us one step closer to self-independence learning and coding! I believe they manage to create an amazing coding school not only because they have amazing coders, but also because they have great people working there.

I spent the last 4 years advising companies in the field of mergers and acquisitions. I have always been driven by fascinating entrepreneurship stories and very passionate with new technologies. Founder stories nurtured my entrepreneurial spirit from an earlier age. However, I frequently felt frustrated when I wanted to give life to my projects. Tired of brainstorming and generating new ideas without executing them, I decided to join Le Wagon in order to have the tools required to build a fully functional MVP.
Before Le Wagon, I had absolutely no knowledge of code. I tried online courses, but I found them too theoretical and I had some difficulties to get the big picture. The methodology used by the Wagon is highly effective. Courses are well structured and deeply focused on practice. Qualified teachers explain key concepts in detail, while a large proportion of the day is dedicated to practical exercises.
During the last two weeks, you code your own project and understand how to work successfully as a team. At that time, it all comes together, from the design to the development of web applications. I had the opportunity to develop a product I had in mind for a long time. My team and I were able to build a property management software for landlords (Zenkey) in only two weeks. I was really impressed by the solution we developed in a short period of time.
Joining Le Wagon means also becoming part of a family. Former students are either working in successful startups, as developers or product owners, or are running their own business. More importantly, this community of entrepreneurs and developers will support you in your future challenges.
By the end of the bootcamp, you will be able to build your own web application from scratch and you will have the basics to keep learning new frameworks. I am now able to fully apprehend the technical issues related to digital projects. Hereafter, I want to use these new skills in building my own company. I am deeply convinced that this bootcamp helped me save time and money in this journey.
Whether you want to strengthen your technical skills, design and build your own product or become a developer, do not hesitate to join Le Wagon.

Before I started Le Wagon, I was working as a finance analyst in a large corporate organisation. After graduating from a business school, that seemed like the ideal job. Soon I realised it wasn’t, but it took me a long time to figure out what I actually wanted to do.

I started coding because it seemed that it might be a useful skill no matter what my future plan would be. I started with taking some courses at Codeacademy and realised that I actually really enjoyed doing that but also that its really hard to learn it on your own. I started looking for immersive programs to learn it faster and better and thats how I ended up at Le Wagon.

The nine weeks were an amazing experience. The first weeks were quite tough but the help from the teachers and buddies helped a lot to really get the basics right. The thing I loved about the course is the project we did during the last two weeks. It was great to put the learning in practice and work together in a team to make sure we really understood everything. We worked on Frida - an online art school. It felt like a major achievement to present our demo on demo day and we delivered something I’m still very proud of.

I would highly recommend Le Wagon, it opened so many doors for me and I couldn’t imagine myself in my old job anymore. It’s sad that it’s only nine weeks so enjoy it while it lasts!

I have been part of the Wagon Bordeaux Batch #67.
I coded when I was in high school but in university I chose to study Social Sciences. For years, I though I can't retake my programming passion. But, three months ago, I knew le Wagon. My first impression was mistrust, I can't believe be able to learn coding in just 9 weeks. I did some research and meet some Le Wagon alumni, everybody recommended le Wagon. Then I decide to enroll.
The 9 weeks were one of the most amazing experience in my life.  The pedagogical curriculum is made to encourage you to learn. Everyday, we had to learn  a couple of new concepts.. It was hard, but this is the only way to learn a lot in a so short time. The pace is military, you can't stop and rest, you must learn, learn, learn... A lot of effort but it's worth it.
Now, I feel confident to continue learning programming (Yes, because a good developer never stop learning). I'm doing some freelance projects and working in my MVP.
If you are interested to enroll in Le Wagon, just watch the Demoday videos (https://www.lewagon.com/demoday/67) , you will see the amazing projects you will be able to do after 9 weeks.

Before Le Wagon I was working as a Venture Capital Analyst and before that I was a Credit Analyst for Bpifrance in the innovation department. With my degree and working experience in engineering, the logical next step for me was to get technical skills to open up other doors. I tried to enrol for Le Wagon in Paris but it was full, so I decided London was close enough.

My experience at Le Wagon in London was amazing! The teachers and the students were all amazing people, everyone was working very hard but in a really nice atmosphere. Everyday after the morning lecture, you work with your designated buddy for the day on several exercises in order to perfectly understand the new topics. If you are stuck or have any question on an exercise, other students or teachers are always there to help you fix your problem. At the end the day you realize that you know way more than when you woke up; you have a live-code to practice your new skills  as a group and then it's beer time, you talk with everyone and make very good friends.

At the end of the 4th week, you can pitch a web app idea so other students can vote for it, and develop it with you as a 3 or 4 people team during the last two weeks. I personally pitched my own idea and it was selected. My project was about making an app that based on your tastes suggest you a recipe that you could cook and generate its shopping list. You can see the result here: www.hubert-cooks.com

As a conclusion I'll say that Le Wagon is a really important step in my life, I met new friends for life and finally found something that is really useful and really enjoyable to do: to code!

I love Le Wagon for so many reasons!

One being this thing they call ‘reboot’ – little “Are You Okay?” checkpoints integrated into the curriculum right at the beginning. You’ll live-code in a smaller group, tackle problems together and more importantly, work at a slower pace. This really helped me solidify certain concepts I was struggling to grasp and gave me the confidence I needed to progress.

Highlight numéro deux! Le Wagon’s teachers and teaching assistants are awesome – I mean, how else did I make it till the end!? All them know exactly what you’re going through – most of them did the bootcamp themselves! – so raise lots of tickets (Le Wagon speak for ‘putting your hand up’), get the help you need and don’t worry about asking silly questions.

And of course, I love the community! Learning alongside an altogether lovely group of people made those tough days so much better. When I started, I wanted the course to end ASAP. Fast forward a few weeks and I couldn’t imagine learning to code anywhere else. The Demo Day after-party is also a riot …I’ll leave it at that!

Thank you Le Wagon for helping me become a designer who codes! YAY!!!

I had just graduated from my business degree in December but I felt that what I learned was too generic, with so many people graduating in business I thought I wasn't offering anything different, so I thought a full-stack boot camp would be a good way to differentiate myself. I did wonder how there were so many reviews of 5 out of 5 stars on the internet. But after I started reading a few of those reviews I started to get more and more convinced. The application process was by far the smoothest and easiest I have experienced, including a quick online form and a telephone interview with Ed the manager of the London Bootcamp, one of the coolest guys I've met. The course was very intense, and in the first two weeks I felt like most of the concepts I was taught did not have time to sink in, but soon I realised that when you are fed so much information so fast, the brain needs more time to process and store the information. In fact in the weeks that followed concepts that were a blur before were clearer and manageable. Moreover, I think this was because everyday you learn a new feature or concept but they build on what you learnt in the past days. In any case if you're having difficulty with any topic there some very nice technical assistants that will spend loads of extra time helping you out with topics even out of class hours. During the last ten days of the course we had to make an website in a team of 4 people I met 7 weeks ago. It gave me a whole new perspective in terms of workflow. No matter how much theory you've learnt in class about how a team is supposed to work together it's a different case when you are applying those concepts in real life. I learnt that the most important thing in a team is good communication (from experience this time) and secondly a supportive atmosphere. I have done several team projects in the past but none of them gave me this sense of a satisfying environment. I really enjoyed my time at Le Wagon and would recommend it to anyone.

I was part of Le Wagon Batch #74... TLDR: it’s a life changing course to take.

Unlike most of my cohort, I didn’t use Le Wagon as an opportunity to change career and become a developer. Already working in the tech industry, I felt it was important to learn to code in order to understand product development more deeply and also what developers go through. I also wanted to get enough coding chops so that I could contribute to side-projects. In both of those areas the course was a resounding success.

In particular, Le Wagon London were great. Amazing teachers, great atmosphere, and a very product centric course meant we had a lovely time and learnt a ridiculous amount in 9 short weeks. It really was one of the most intense things I’ve ever done - they’re not kidding when they say 2 years of learning in only 2 months. What’s even better is that the overall opportunity cost is quite low; 9 weeks long and c. £6k.

Given the commitment, I’d recommend the course to anybody who’s even slightly curious. Technology is taking over the world and being able to understand/ do web development (a core technology stack) will be a huge help in future proofing your profile. It may even open your eyes up to an exciting career in web development that you didn’t previously think possible - the jobs are definitely there. Good luck!

Three months ago, there was Jules: a front-end web developer working remotely on CMS such as Wordpress, Prestashop..

Now, there is Jules from Le Wagon: a junior full-stack developer, who knows and understands what is under the hood :wink:

The truth is: I am that (new) guy.

I started with a few basic skills (html, css..), my clients were pretty satisfied but I was not.

My lack of knowledge was frustrating for me: what if a client wanted a website “from scratch”, how could I do if it required more skills than expected, especially if it involved the “back-end”? (the hidden part of a website).

To answer these questions, I decided I would find a way to improve my skills.

I talked about Le Wagon to some friends, and they were dithyrambic: just do it... if you can.

During the bootcamp, some of the most essential skills I acquired were to think and work as a developer, as well as to be able to understand the lines of code produced by other developers. It’s important as it shows you different ways of thinking and problem-solving.

This bootcamp is more than just an intensive 9-week coding program that teaches you all from programming to designing a web product, it’s a real family and an amazing tech community that you join. The teaching staff is very dedicated and helps you out throughout the whole length of the bootcamp.

I now have left my first career behind and I have started a new one as a freelance frontend developer. Of course I’m still in the middle of that path but I now know what I want to do and how I can achieve it. I’m also a Teaching Assistant at Le Wagon Paris now.

Therefore, if you want to know how to build your own digital projects to understand what a MVC model means, but also to be able to work and clearly communicate with developers to get things cleaned and done, I would recommend you this program.

Le Wagon batch#48 Paris

Le Wagon is clearly the best training experience I had in my life. The pedagogy is really perfect, pushing you into learning by doing and manipulating all the core concepts of programming by blocks that you later assemble to be able to create a project from A to Z. At the end of Le Wagon, you are autonomous to strengthen your knowledge in programming and learn new languages.
More than just acquiring pure technical knowledge, you also learn the best practices to work on a product-oriented web project with other people. The community is awesome and supportive, during and after the end of the bootcamp. You are part of a family and can find other alumni glad to help you out all around the world.

My name is Mathieu, I was part of batch#70 for 9 weeks which took place in Paris from April to June 2017. 

Before joining Le Wagon, I was already a student in computer sciences but I was looking for a faster way to get expertise and get a job .

A friend of mine, who had done the program, told me about Le Wagon and explained that he was designing a product and wanted to rise his start up shortly.

He told me his experience was awesome and that it would be for me a great opportunity that I should not miss.

During my interview, I felt confident and I felt like I was about to immerse myself into this place for 9 full weeks.

On the very first day, four of us got there one hour in advance, impatient and excited to start this new adventure. Those four people became subsequently my friends.
This experience was amazing, we have been supervised by Teachers and passionate Teaching Assistants. We were ready to give the best of ourselves. And we knew for a fact that they were going to lead us to success.

Sometimes, I even forgot to get lunch because of being too much focused on coding.
Despite the toughness of the first few weeks, our good mood and the share of our motivation, there was a pretty good atmosphere .

Every single day, you get to work with a different person which brought a rich social and human dimension to this learning experience.
Numerous meetups and afterwords were organised in order to make us get a deep dive into the tech world.

Afterwards, we learnt about databases, the Ruby Language and web front-end, then we finished the four last weeks with Rails that were, to my mind, the best weeks I have ever spent in my life!

The real difficulty was to learn how to code in groups as well as to respect the due date for the projects such as the Airbnb-clone.
I succeeded in joining a passionate group led by an artist whose project was called Let's Curate. The aim is to put artists in touch with each other so that they can organise an exhibition together.

Le  Wagon will remain in my memory forever. I learnt a lot of skills, I made a lot of friends but I also earned a family.

Nowadays, I am working in a Parisian Web Agency and as a junior Ruby on Rails Full Stack Web Developer.

I think that it was one of the best experiences in my life and I know it was hard but would do it again. You should try it as well. You won't be disappointed.