5 Reasons why you should NOT go to a coding bootcamp

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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Comments

[Nicole Wilbur]

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]

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]

LOL. Tks. I'll go fix.