"Their web immersive is a joke, but you'll never hear anyone admit that because they make you sign a waver/NDA that you promise not to tell anyone anything truthful/negative about your GA experience."
"Most of the money goes towards the advertising and marketing team, they have more marketers running around doing nothing all day than actual instructional staff."
"Sup-par teaching conditions: we were in a kitchen with a loud fridge in the back"
"Our teacher for our immersive was so underprepared and unenthusiastic and unqualified that the students tried to get him fired."
"The tables were jammed so tight in the room that we used to joke if there was a fire, no one would get out alive."
Sounds like a typical danger for an organisation like this. I'm in NYC and the GA here (the original one) has a fantastic reputation. Maybe they need to tighten up on quality control in their new locations.
And to be fair, the Yelp link you've posted also has a number of very positive reviews, you just didn't post quotes from them.
I liked them better when they were a gorgeous co-working and hackathon space. They really had a "future of NYC tech" vibe.
Their pivot/focus on education seems to be unfortunate, not sure how they can get money back for their investors when education's future is more likely things like coursera (especially with their specialization tracks) udacity and edx.
That said, I do hope they succeed, I never had a bad time sitting on their couches.
I don't want to malign GA because I know nothing about them. But the future of online education is IMO more along the lines of extensively marketed low quality private colleges. That's where the money us: attracting high volumes of low information young people.
I think the in-person element is crucial to the future of education. While there are many people who live in rural areas or internationally who benefit immensely from online platforms like Coursera, there are also a ton of people who live close enough to a city that it's worth it to pay more for the opportunity to learn in a physical environment. That's why GA is great - it takes the best of both, and can provide online education that is greatly bolstered by an in-person experience. Excited for them.
Their pivot to education was precisely about money, I think. It certainly sounded like being a co-working and hackathon space wasn't very profitable.
I know a few people that put on hackathon events and apparently GA jacked up their prices far enough to become totally unaffordable, hence why everyone ended up going to Pivotal Labs instead.
They're pretty good at marketing... that's about it. The lowest quality start-ups in this training/education space (at least from my experience) are not coincidentally some of the most funded.
Once the focus becomes the return for investors instead of the quality of instruction/training, it's a bad alignment of incentives. It seems in these cases there was a rush to expand before they'd really figured out the long lasting recipe of what actually works beyond marketing gimmicks. They're the "cool" version of DeVry and University of Phoenix, dumping more $$ into marketing than into their product.
Contrast this with codeschool.com that has raised $0 to date and is a much better way to learn. Or with some of the better in-person learn to code, design, etc programs, none of the good ones have raised any money. From my experience with all of these, and there seems to be a significantly negative correlation between taking large amounts of VC money and quality. FWIW.
Obviously GA would have the advantage of a theoretical community, but at least in SF... that doesn't exist for them anyway.
In NYC, GA conducts nighttime Meet & Greets with their "graduating" classes. As an employer, this is an efficient way to recruit. I attended one a couple weeks ago and thought it was fairly well organized. If GA can help people get placed into companies, then that's a huge advantage / differentiator for them versus online-only course providers.
So without speaking the quality of the classes themselves - GA specifically, or the concept of online v. in-person - this is a perspective worth considering before slamming the in-person education model altogether. Execution of the actually classes is obviously a separate discussion, but as I said one I'm not prepared to address.
The one here in DC is already doing an excellent job of matching people up with start-ups and non-profits. We've also got NGO's like the World Bank showing up.
My view is this: if a class has good teachers, a difficult, portfolio driven curriculum, and a decently high-bar of entry (my DBA coworker struggled to be admitted to the course because he was rusty in his programming skills. He ended up having to put in a lot of time just to be able to pass their test to gain admission into the course), then it will probably be a good course to take.
I took an html/css workshop with Dustin Coates in Boston and it was excellent. I learned many things which I implemented very next week at work. Indeed, the boss referred to my work as the best front end piece yet created.
I subsequently signed up for a longer front end course after that. True, a bit pricey, but I like a classroom setting and committing myself to a regular learning block each week.
We want to build General Assembly to still be thriving 75 years from now
There's a lot of negativity here on their pivot and marketing. I just like that they're talking about building a company to last. (Of course the VCs will want their money back well before 75 years)
I took several of their classes about a year and a half ago, one of which was a long-form evening class. I never had a good experience... I get more out of watching a good meetup presentation on youtube. GA is defined by over promising and under delivering. At least all of their operations out in San Francisco have been terrible, i hear they are better in NYC where they started.
I took the web development immersive. I will say, the experience you have depends mostly on two factors: 1) your instructor, and 2) your own ability to want to learn and the amount of effort you put in.
That said, they did try to fit a lot in the 12 weeks, but there are so many facets of the tech stack they didn't cover (they rushed through html/css quite a bit, so those that don't know it will still feel lost after the course unless they dedicate some time to get it down. They also don't cover things like how to host your app on AWS, only Heroku).
The redeeming quality they have is that they do seem to care a lot about students' outcomes. After the course ends, they try their hardest to get everybody a junior dev position or apprenticeship. There's a great support network for this and people on staff dedicated to students' outcomes.
For me, the course was worth it because:
* I had some background in web design before
* It was hard for me to teach myself, not knowing what to google or what path to take
* I got an apprenticeship afterwards which turned into a full time position
But about half my classmates did not get a job or full-time position. Your mileage may vary.
I took their Product Management class. It was good, albeit a little more basic than I was looking for and it tended towards too much group work driving the class. I do also really like all the alumni events though.
[+] [-] lquist|12 years ago|reply
Some highlights from Yelp:
"Their web immersive is a joke, but you'll never hear anyone admit that because they make you sign a waver/NDA that you promise not to tell anyone anything truthful/negative about your GA experience."
"Most of the money goes towards the advertising and marketing team, they have more marketers running around doing nothing all day than actual instructional staff."
"Sup-par teaching conditions: we were in a kitchen with a loud fridge in the back"
"Our teacher for our immersive was so underprepared and unenthusiastic and unqualified that the students tried to get him fired."
"The tables were jammed so tight in the room that we used to joke if there was a fire, no one would get out alive."
[+] [-] nickkthequick|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] untog|12 years ago|reply
And to be fair, the Yelp link you've posted also has a number of very positive reviews, you just didn't post quotes from them.
[+] [-] colmvp|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ludicast|12 years ago|reply
Their pivot/focus on education seems to be unfortunate, not sure how they can get money back for their investors when education's future is more likely things like coursera (especially with their specialization tracks) udacity and edx.
That said, I do hope they succeed, I never had a bad time sitting on their couches.
[+] [-] rayiner|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] inmygarage|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] untog|12 years ago|reply
I know a few people that put on hackathon events and apparently GA jacked up their prices far enough to become totally unaffordable, hence why everyone ended up going to Pivotal Labs instead.
[+] [-] mgadams3|12 years ago|reply
http://www.crunchbase.com/company/general-assembly http://www.crunchbase.com/company/skillshare
Once the focus becomes the return for investors instead of the quality of instruction/training, it's a bad alignment of incentives. It seems in these cases there was a rush to expand before they'd really figured out the long lasting recipe of what actually works beyond marketing gimmicks. They're the "cool" version of DeVry and University of Phoenix, dumping more $$ into marketing than into their product.
Contrast this with codeschool.com that has raised $0 to date and is a much better way to learn. Or with some of the better in-person learn to code, design, etc programs, none of the good ones have raised any money. From my experience with all of these, and there seems to be a significantly negative correlation between taking large amounts of VC money and quality. FWIW.
Obviously GA would have the advantage of a theoretical community, but at least in SF... that doesn't exist for them anyway.
[+] [-] jsherry|12 years ago|reply
So without speaking the quality of the classes themselves - GA specifically, or the concept of online v. in-person - this is a perspective worth considering before slamming the in-person education model altogether. Execution of the actually classes is obviously a separate discussion, but as I said one I'm not prepared to address.
[+] [-] JPKab|12 years ago|reply
My view is this: if a class has good teachers, a difficult, portfolio driven curriculum, and a decently high-bar of entry (my DBA coworker struggled to be admitted to the course because he was rusty in his programming skills. He ended up having to put in a lot of time just to be able to pass their test to gain admission into the course), then it will probably be a good course to take.
[+] [-] MtAuburn|12 years ago|reply
I subsequently signed up for a longer front end course after that. True, a bit pricey, but I like a classroom setting and committing myself to a regular learning block each week.
[+] [-] mathattack|12 years ago|reply
There's a lot of negativity here on their pivot and marketing. I just like that they're talking about building a company to last. (Of course the VCs will want their money back well before 75 years)
[+] [-] jmathai|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] untog|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jknightco|12 years ago|reply
If so, would you recommend them?
[+] [-] mgadams3|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jenno|12 years ago|reply
That said, they did try to fit a lot in the 12 weeks, but there are so many facets of the tech stack they didn't cover (they rushed through html/css quite a bit, so those that don't know it will still feel lost after the course unless they dedicate some time to get it down. They also don't cover things like how to host your app on AWS, only Heroku).
The redeeming quality they have is that they do seem to care a lot about students' outcomes. After the course ends, they try their hardest to get everybody a junior dev position or apprenticeship. There's a great support network for this and people on staff dedicated to students' outcomes.
For me, the course was worth it because:
* I had some background in web design before
* It was hard for me to teach myself, not knowing what to google or what path to take
* I got an apprenticeship afterwards which turned into a full time position
But about half my classmates did not get a job or full-time position. Your mileage may vary.
[+] [-] character0|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] crsmithdev|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] aaronchriscohen|12 years ago|reply