[pincubator]

A while ago, someone wrote to Systers (a highly activated women in CS e-mail list) the following, which is highly accurate:

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What a great business model Grace Hopper Academy has.

First, you find women who are very smart and highly motivated. You make sure they are highly motivated by making them take the first part of the course online. (Massive Open Online Courses have a completion rate of 10%, and the vast majority people finishing them already have a Bachelor's degree). The cost to run the online course is very cheap, and now you are guaranteed to have easy students only.

You then teach these easy students Javascript stuff for one semester. (13 weeks).

Then you take 22.5% of their year's paycheck once they have a nice job -- and they will have a nice job because they are very smart and motivated. If they make $70,000, that's $15,750 a pop.

A state university education in Ohio is $12,000 for 15 weeks by the way. Other bootcamps range from free to $21000 with median around $8000. (Grace Hopper Academy is not the only one to get tuition paid via a cut of your pay after graduation either). http://www.skilledup.com/articles/the-ultimate-guide-to-codi...

The Dean of Grace Hopper Academy has no academic credentials listed whatsoever, nor is there any information about the instructors. Do they have academic credentials? Do they have industry experience and teaching experience? Do they have names? Are any of them female?

Buyer beware.

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PS: The exact link to the discussion is somewhere in the Systers archive..

[dhenu2]

Makes sense. I'm a woman with a BS degree already from a highly-ranked college, still considering applying to this school, however, because:

I don't have the upfront money to pay tuition for other private schools. Total cost of a college degrees to job is ~$100K which is way higher. I don't want to spend 4 more years and accumulate a ton of loans. Colleges also don't share the risk with me of getting a job. This makes me think this school has much more incentive to educate me well. My undergrad college took my tuition whether I got a great job out of it or not (which I didn't :P). The school is new though so I'm a bit weary of not seeing a track record. I'm going to do more careful research now before applying.

[Kalium]

A business like this has a strong incentive to get you a decent job for a few years after graduation, because that's how they get paid. The incentives of a regular college or university are longer-term, and play out over the course of decades. These are alumni networks, alumni donations, legacy students, general reputation, and so on.

As a result, this business has incentives to teach you what will be profitable for them in the near future and neglect the medium to long term. A college's incentives favor the medium to long term, with a corresponding potential short-term sacrifice.

[giaour]

Also, remember to consider the alternative of not getting more formal education. Going to a bootcamp will qualify you for a junior-level position, which you could also compete for by reading a couple of books and putting together a portfolio.

Source: my BA is in French literature, and I moved into a software engineering career with a Safari Books Online membership and a portfolio.

[dopamean]

This is how they all operate. I used to work for MakerSquare which is now owned by Hack Reactor. Both schools have very selective interview processes and the point is to select highly motivated people who already have great qualifications. We were even instructed to screen for hireability (sp?). Then we teach them the basics of "software development" which really amounted to Javascript fundamentals and introductions to some commonly used frameworks.

Despite what was in my view an education that lacked a lot of depth the students were able to put together some impressive projects. Particularly impressive for the many who really hadn't written a line of code before they got involved with the program.

I've heard people who run bootcamps say things like "we're revolutionizing education" but I have to say I really didn't see anything revolutionary in the 15 months I was an instructor. What I saw was a process that took highly motivated people and gave them the tools they needed to get what they want.

[FSgrad]

Full disclosure: I'm a recent graduate of Fullstack Academy, the organization that is overseeing Grace Hopper Academy. Grace Hopper is going to use the same curriculum that Fullstack uses.

"You make sure they are highly motivated by making them take the first part of the course online... The cost to run the online course is very cheap, and now you are guaranteed to have easy students only."

While it's cheaper to run an online course than an in-person one, it's by no means cheap. The point of the first third of the course is to bring everyone up to speed and make sure everyone is competent in basic HTML/CSS/JavaScript. Considering the highly motivated students taking the course, there's no advantage to learning the very basics in person. I'm talking about getting comfortable with basic design patterns, JS prototypes, using higher-order functions. Callbacks and promises were only taught in the next part of the course, to give you an idea.

"They will have a nice job because they are very smart and motivated." No, they will get nice jobs because they're smart and motivated AND now know how to code, know how to work as part of a software team, know how to use coding best practices, and most importantly know how to learn new technical concepts and languages.

"That's $15,750 a pop." That's only slightly more than what Fullstack currently charges.

"A state university education in Ohio is $12,000 for 15 weeks by the way." Yes, things cost more in NYC. And Fullstack grads are WAY more competent than someone who's taken one semester of college CS courses. For four months I lived and breathed Javascript. Bootcamps focus on producing programmers who are ready to work in a production environment, something you absolutely cannot say for college grads.

"The Dean of Grace Hopper Academy has no academic credentials listed whatsoever..." For the last time, comparisons to academic college programs make no sense. The curriculum is already proven to produce good coders, and the staff constantly iterates to see how they can improve the program and the student experience.

"Do the [instructors] have industry experience and teaching experience?" Absolutely, every single one of them. They're likely not listed because it hasn't been decided which of the Fullstack instructors will transfer. From what I hear, it'll be a rotation, so you can look at fullstackacademy.com to see who'll be teaching there.

"Are any of them female?" WTF, the entire program is in place to ensure that more women will become coders because there currently aren't enough!

[nissimk]

These sorts of bootcamps are more along the lines of an employment agency. They make the recruits pay the recruiting fee rather than the hiring company. They also maintain strong relationships with the hiring companies because they've trained the recruits well. I'm not sure how that alters your calculus for the value based on the recruit / student's benenefit, but it is definitely a good value for prospective employers. Also, I imagine these job placement agencies in disguise are much better at helping their students find work than a university even if they are not as good at traditional style education.

[giaour]

If they made the hiring company pay the fee, then you would be correct. That's how hacker school in NYC makes money while offering a tuition-free school.

This bootcamp instead makes its graduates pay. That's very, very different from an employment agency and more like the University of Phoenix.

[gohrt]

> because they've trained the recruits well.

filtered, not trained.