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)
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:
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.
LOL. Tks. I'll go fix.