Towards Bootcamps

Introduction

I have been a Computer Science student since August 2010. My quest for a traditional college degree followed a repeating pattern of going to school for a semester or two, running out of money, then spending a year or two paying off the tuition I owed before finally being able to start up again. As you might can imagine, I reached a point where I was completely over this cycle.

In January 2019, I hit another one of these blocks. I owed almost $5000 from the previous semester and could not enroll. I likely could not pay off my balance in time to enroll for the next semester either. This stressed me beyond belief. I would spend several hours tinkering with degree plans trying to figure out how to complete a degree just that one semester earlier, even if it took taking 21 hours every semester. I had plans and backup plans and backup plans to my backup plans, but I still lacked money.

This is the state I was frozen in until August 2019.

Finding an Alternative

By August I was already searching for alternative paths into a more fulfilling career. I had begun an online course to prepare for the A+ certification exams, I had begun trying to come up with projects I could do that might allow me to learn skills that could go on my GitHub or LinkedIn, but nothing was really sticking. Then something serendipitous happened.

I was looking to start listening to more educational content on my way to and from work, given that it was an almost two hour drive at the time. I had been listening to an audio book to learn some Spanish, but it was getting dull. Thinking I could get some ideas for what to learn by listening to current software engineers, I googled “software engineering podcasts”, and of course, Software Engineering Daily was on basically every list I found. I followed and in that first week of August, they had a discussion with the founders of Career Karma, an app designed to help guide people towards coding boot camps.

I had heard of coding boot camps before, but never really considered them a possibility. Listening to Ruben and Artur actually confirmed many of my fears, but they also discussed that these boot camps could be tremendously successful. They discussed pitfalls to watch out for and how and why they went about creating their app. The entire episode in worth listening to, whether or not you are interested in coding boot camps. You can find it here.

Finding a Home

After listening to the podcast, I decided to try the Career Karma app and began considering my options for boot camps. To start the process, I wanted to have a clear vision of what I needed in a boot camp. I sat down and made a list of my strengths and weaknesses, and related them to features of boot camps to help me narrow down the very long list. I could not afford to work less than full time, so I needed a boot camp with online or part time options. My employer is pretty flexible on my schedule, so the actual time structure was less important than the raw number of hours. I also didn’t have the funds up front to pay for it, and didn’t want to take out any more student loans. This meant that I needed to filter my search down to only boot camps that offered Income Share Agreements. In my research I also came across many horror stories about constantly changing curriculum at different programs, so I tried to eliminate programs where that was a common complaint (and in one case, a boot camp that included it as a selling point). Most importantly I knew I had to make this count, so I focused on boot camps that have solid reviews and employment numbers.

Eventually, I narrowed my list to three programs, and began applying. My top choice was Flatiron’s Data Science course, and so i applied for it first. There were many reasons for Flatiron being my top preference. It had a structured online option, I was able to qualify for the ISA, and the reviews seemed to match up closely with what the program was pitching. What had me sold more than anything else was how thorough the prep course was. It included tutorials on HTML, CSS, Python, among many other topics. They also had a wonderful advising staff who walked me through the application process.

Luckily, I never had to apply for another boot camp. I am now a student at Flatiron, and am nearing my first major project! I will post an update to this blog after every module as a window into the program for others who may be interested, as well as a way to document my progress towards a new career!