| > You're selling people something they can "sell" to others (marketable skills). Of course we are, but that's part of any career motivation so I'm not sure I see this as criticism. "I went to university to learn XYZ skills, which are marketable to the industry and people I want to work with...". At the end of Uni most people are lucky to get an internship. Students leaving our program are looking for exactly that, at best a junior position or their first couple small freelance contracts. Its not that I disagree with the claim that many, most, maybe almost all bootcamps fail to educate their students on the status they leave the course in (before they do the course) and on how to effectively approach the industry, but that's business side unfortunately. I also don't see it hurting the industry at all, but that's not what you're saying. What you claim is that it hurts the individuals who are misguided, therefore the guinea pigs. Totally fair. We work pretty closely with each student and though we might sell big at signup, the conversations before enrollment are all based around realistic expectations and getting them psyched to start the long haul towards a new career. Of course I could just be saying that, but its one way we try to define ourselves and the quality of our students. I'm not sure I understand the Facebook comment. Do you work there? I had a friend at Facebook and there were all sorts of CPD programs available to him in different formats. He did several I believe... I keep coming back to the topic of traditional education because I think that's where the saturation and awareness should be happening, instead of the bootcamp level. Lots of governments and school systems working towards this. We actually launched something today which is part of our first attempt at helping this effort along, providing training specifically designed for teaching teachers how to teach code, as that's currently the ed system's biggest barrier. Would love your thoughts on the concept, not as a business but as a way of advancing technology, filling the "skills" gap by creating early awareness, and then putting bootcamps in a position to advance people with perspective should it come to that...
http://bit.ly/teach-the-teachers |