Matt Upham

Posted on Oct 22, 2019

5 Reasons why you should NOT go to a coding bootcamp

#beginners #webdev #codenewbie

I went to a coding bootcamp 2 years ago. From my experience and people I met, these are reasons why someone should NOT go to a coding bootcamp.

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5 Reasons why you should NOT go to a coding bootcamp

You don’t like software and/or technical thinking

coding is not for everyone, it's really painful to do it if you don’t like it
you probably won’t perform well on the job if you don’t enjoy it

Influences from family & friends

do it for the right reasons (money should be a side effect, not a main purpose)
if your parents pay for it, you’ll most likely fail (internal motivation is needed)

You can’t take time off to devote yourself, build habits, handle stress

it really is 80 hours a week (if you do the 3 month programs)
you need to build a solid routine (if you can’t, you’ll fail)
lots of stress, if you don’t cope effectively you’ll fail

It’s really expensive

~$20k+ is a ton of money (yes, not all bootcamps are this expensive, but many are)
no guarantee for a job
job placement stats are bs (they’re usually manufactured / inflated)

You can learn on your own (Seriously)

you can find most of the material online for $50 or for free
FreeCodeCamp, OdinProject has the same and/or more material than the bootcamp
great inexpensive courses on Udemy, Coursera, Frontend Masters, etc

What are your thoughts on coding bootcamps? Yes, they have their flaws, and it’s not for everyone. But the high-quality ones are not completely terrible.

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Top comments (3)

Nicole Wilbur • Oct 23 '19 • Edited

What are the stats on average (or even a feeling based on the word on the street) regarding how long it takes to get a tech job after a bootcamp vs after an equivalent self-study do you know? I'm doing full-time self-study right now a la 60 hours a week. Here's example data for what I'm trying to gather enough data to decide:

def cheapest (self_study, bootcamp, months_till_job_self_study, months_till_job_bootcamp):
    monthly_salary = 5000
    if (self_study + months_till_job_self_study*monthly_salary) < bootcamp + months_till_job_bootcamp*monthly_salary:
        print ("self-study is the cheapest route")
    elif self_study + months_till_job_self_study*monthly_salary > bootcamp + months_till_job_bootcamp* monthly_salary:
        print ("Bootcamp is the cheapest route")
    else:
        print("Please enter valid integers")
cheapest(600, 10000, 5, 1)

George Mauer • Oct 23 '19

You got a bug in that code... If the numbers work out to be equal then it will tell you your data is invalid 😉

But really I'm seeing times of about 1 to 6 months for most grads depending on the market, their flexibility with moving and how good they are at the search.

As for whether you can learn on your own... Maybe. I mean an awful lot of people clearly did. But it's a years process, not months, keeping up motivation is tough, all curricula (free and paid) are mediocre at best, and learning to work with other developers is a huge part of the job.

Nicole Wilbur • Oct 23 '19

LOL. Tks. I'll go fix.

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5 Reasons why you should NOT go to a coding bootcamp

Top comments (3)

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