How to choose a coding bootcamp
You got into some coding bootcamps. How should you choose which one to go to? Advice from an alum on what questions you should ask.
I attended a coding bootcamp (Hack Reactor, now Galvanize) in Fall 2018. I’m very happy with my decision, but it wasn’t easy! I got into multiple programs here in New York City, and had a hard time figuring out which coding bootcamp would work best for me. The experience inspired me to write a blog post about advice I’d shared with friends many times before about questions to ask when choosing a grad school program, and now that I’ve reflected on my bootcamp decision I want to share the questions that were most helpful to me for that as well.
First and foremost, as with any educational program, the most useful answers to your questions will come from current students and recent graduates who did the program in the same city as you. Ask the schools to connect you with students, show up to their events, and even send LinkedIn messages to recent alums (I had some success with all of these).
In addition to asking these questions, I went to on-campus events for all the programs I was admitted to while I was studying to prepare for their application processes. Programs will typically have mini-bootcamps, “JavaScript 101,” or some type of study hall to provide you an opportunity to check out the campus, meet people, and ask questions. The events are a great way to find people to ask questions to as well — the mini-bootcamps I went to were all taught be recent graduates.
Specifically in choosing a coding bootcamp, these were some of the most important questions for me in making a decision.
People
- How did you like your cohort?
- Class sizes:
- To admissions representatives: How big are the class sizes? What is the student-instructor ratio?
- To students: How did you feel about the class sizes? Was having a larger/smaller class size a benefit or a drawback to you?
- How do you feel about the quality of the instructors?
- Does the school encourage people to stay healthy and take care of themselves during the program?
Curriculum
Before you ask people questions, do as much of your own research as you can. One thing to make a note of is how many hours per week each program is. You can also find details on the curriculum online, though it’s still helpful to get students’ impressions of how comprehensive it was.
- How do you feel about the quality of the curriculum?
- How comprehensive is the curriculum? For example, how many of the most popular front-end and back-end frameworks does the curriculum cover?
- How much time does the program spend on learning algorithms? (Note: these are critical for interviews! The amount of time different bootcamps spend on algorithms varies a lot.)
- Does the curriculum cover just one language (e.g., JavaScript) or more than one?
- If your program taught more than one language, how helpful was that?
- If your program taught one language, what impact did that have? Does it make enough difference that you would have chosen a different school?
Job Search and Alumni
- Did you feel like you were interview-ready at the end of the coding bootcamp, or was there more work that you needed to do?
- What are the school’s relationships with employers like?
- Alumni base:
- To admissions representatives: How many local alumni are there?
- To recent alums: Given that the local alumni base is relatively large/small, how much did that impact your job search?
- What kind of help does the career services provide?
- How helpful was the career services help? Were there things you wish they would have done that they didn’t?
- Did most of your cohort have success finding jobs quickly?
Financing
For coding bootcamps, information on financing/loans is generally prominently displayed on the website. If you do have questions about the possibility of payment plans, whether there are scholarships, etc., it never hurts to ask the admissions representative.