[HN Gopher] Boot Camp: A Business Saga
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Boot Camp: A Business Saga
Author : jseliger
Score : 10 points
Date : 2022-06-10 15:52 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (betonit.substack.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (betonit.substack.com)
| MarketingJason wrote:
| Disclaimer - I ran a bootcamp and took the course on my way out
|
| Specific to web development, I found you should really only
| consider a bootcamp graduate as a self-taught front-end
| developer. The bad news is they'll usually have a very limited
| experience with a small number of technologies and probably a
| very limited understanding of them, like most self-taught
| developers.
|
| The biggest benefit I saw to bootcamp grads was their previous
| experience and the barrier to entry in taking the course:
|
| It's not easy to find a junior web developer who has experience
| in the industry, speaks the executive's language, has an eye for
| design, etc.
|
| It's also difficult to take some courses (tuition, not working
| during the course, entry tests). Of course this depends on the
| school, but this would _usually_ mean only people with the
| desire, aptitude, and financial means (like from a previous
| successful career) would be able to join the course.
|
| I have no experience with design, security, data science, and
| other courses. To be honest, I pushed back on offering those
| since I didn't see companies hiring essentially self-taught
| juniors (except maybe design?).
|
| One other point I'd make is we had a surprising number of CS
| degree holders in our programs. If you aren't picked up on a
| career day or internship (or your school doesn't have any/many)
| it seems like alot of students get lost.
| akanet wrote:
| General Assembly is also dramatically overstating its student
| outcomes. They claim 99.7% placement, a total farce.
|
| https://twitter.com/fulligin/status/1452658647994015748
| 908B64B197 wrote:
| For everyone reading, being on the hiring side I would advise
| against bootcamps. We pretty much stopped recruiting from those
| because the signal to noise ratio was just too low.
|
| It seems a lot of bootcamps teach with rote, rather than by
| looking at the underlying concepts. My favorite example is git.
| I've seen bootcamp grads claim they can use git, but what it
| really meant is that they memorized a few git commands and as
| long as they don't stray too far from those, they can sort of
| work using git. But cherry-picking, rebase, proper branching
| forget it.
|
| I'm extremely skeptical of bootcamps, especially after learning
| that some of the TA's at Lambda (the most famous one) are hired
| to help with teaching as little as two months into the program as
| students[0]. I guess that counts toward their "placement" stats!
|
| Not only that, but Lambda seems so desperate that they will offer
| a fresh grad at no cost to any company for a 4 weeks trial
| period. [1]. And that's, sadly, the most high profile one out
| there.
|
| I don't think I've seen a single hire out of a bootcamp work out
| in the end. Except a few cases where the person actually came
| from a STEM degree from a good school (and more crucially,
| already had some exposure to programming during the degree) but
| it's unclear to me that they actually needed the bootcamp and not
| just a good primer on modern software development and something
| like the Missing Semester [2] or a few classes at their school
| covering software engineering.
|
| Notice there's no "Law Bootcamp" out there.
|
| [0] https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/02/lambda-schools-
| job-p...
|
| [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25138610
|
| [2] https://missing.csail.mit.edu/
| butbutbut123456 wrote:
| I dunno. I work with a bunch of bootcamp grads and they're
| good.
|
| We spend a bunch of time mentoring though.
|
| I haven't met someone I can't mentor and have solid within a
| few months
| 908B64B197 wrote:
| > 54 minutes ago
|
| > user: butbutbut123456
|
| > created: 56 minutes ago
|
| > karma: 1
|
| Weird how every time some bootcamps are mentioned there are
| brand new accounts posting about how great their grads are.
| [0]
|
| [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29260605
| threatofrain wrote:
| Many bootcamps are somewhere on the order of 3 months. That's
| not enough time for a conceptual _or_ rote framing of skills
| for any dev domain. If people do come out with fundamental dev
| skills that would be due to their own volition.
| giraffe_lady wrote:
| > good primer on modern software development and something like
| the Missing Semester
|
| That's... what a boot camp is? It's been 5-6 years since I was
| involved with one and the marketing has always promised a lot
| more than anyone could deliver, but the best ones were always
| basically that.
|
| 2-3 months is enough time for a motivated person to get the
| basics of a framework, and enough of the abstract mechanics of
| modern web development that they can implement solutions that
| are adequately described to them.
|
| Yes that's very "junior" and yes they will have huge gaps in
| their understanding of software "under the hood." But honestly
| a _lot_ of modern web development benefits from but does not
| require that knowledge at the beginning. They will fill those
| in an astonishing amount over the first year working if
| supported properly.
|
| I know that hurts to hear because we know our work is complex
| and difficult. But not _all_ of it is, and it 's not necessary
| that you master the hard parts before beginning the work at
| all. That practical insight is still valuable and one we should
| take to heart.
|
| I always seek out code school grads when hiring because
| honestly they tend to be pretty interesting confident people
| who know how to take calculated risks and work as part of a
| team. They almost all had other careers first and bring
| surprising and valuable experiences and skills.
|
| Hiring someone fresh out a code school is a responsibility for
| sure, they truly do need more and different kinds of support
| for their first six months or so. But one like 2+ years into
| their career? Not all great programmers are great developers
| you know? but code school grads tend to overperform their
| technical ability in my experience.
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