LEARN Academy

I was part of the very first cohort at LEARN. Let me just say that while the curriculum and teaching staff was top of the line that was not what made the difference for me. It was the sense of camaraderie that came from the way the courses team you up... Read More and the continued support from the LEARN team and fellow students long after the coursework ended. Rob and Chelsea have put together something special and it shows in the caliber of the developers that come out of the program.

It is true that you can learn coding or web development online, however why would you want to do it alone? Some people do well learning on their own, but I am a true believer that learning in a team environment is the way to go. PLUS you then have a network... Read More of peers to work with ten fold! The hardest part is the decision to change your life and do something different. Don't delay it, just do it. It was the best decision I have ever made, and I'm so glad I did it! I've learned so much, grew my network of talented individuals, and learned the best way to LEARN.

Really got me focused in pursuing a career in programming. Usually would get distracted with work and other things. Set a great foundation and a great environment to learn. Also a great way to get into the tech community. Everyone was so helpful and welcoming... Read More which made this career change less scary.

Pros:
- Excellent career services
- Internship included, and some were paid
- Curriculum reflected current trends/job opportunities
- Flexible with daily lessons based on student needs
- LEARN is very involved in the local tech community, so there are a lot... Read More of connections to be made
- Good work/life balance
- School is understanding and respectful of students' external commitments
- The people who work at LEARN are wonderful
Cons:
- Learning material on website sometimes unclear or had mistakes, and continued uncorrected despite student feedback
- Few opportunities taken to assess students' knowledge, no code reviews
- Morning lessons frequently ended with "So does that make sense to everybody? *silence* Great!"
- Instructors always willing to help, but not always experienced enough to be able to help
- Pair programming required, but can be more inhibiting than helpful depending on individual learning style
Bottomline:
- Glad I did LEARN, certainly a good way to change careers and get your foot in the door with the internship. At the end of the day I'm confident I'll get a job and I'm excited to start a new career, but it was a windy road at times
Advice to LEARN:
- designating a scrum master would help with continuous improvement
- if resources allow, code reviews would be very beneficial to students

After trying to teach myself to code for over a year, I knew I needed an extra boost to turn my hobby into a career. LEARN Academy was the boost I needed.

Disclaimer, this program is very difficult, you cannot expect to just go through the motions and... Read More magically get a job as a developer at the end, you will just waste your time and money. You have to really put in the work. be motivated, and want to learn. If you do this, LEARN will open up many doors to you.

At the bootcamp, I gained a lot of technical skills, especially when it comes to Rails. However, I honestly don't think technical skills are the most valuable thing you get from a bootcamp. The most valuable things I gained from the bootcamp were: a better overall perspective of what it meant to be a programmer/how to think like a programmer, problem solving skills, working in a team environment (paired programming and group project), being in an environment with other motivated, aspiring developers, and the connections you make through the internship/being part of the community.

At LEARN they really focus on making it a family environment. The entire staff is incredibly supportive of you and your career and makes the effort to stay in touch, even long after your cohort has graduated.

Overall, I highly recommend LEARN to those who are motivated, self-starters.

Going to LEARN was one of the best decisions I have made in life. I was finally introduced to the world of computer science and I am so happy with the result. Rob and the rest of the team were so helpful and patient. The best part of LEARN was knowing... Read More that there was a guaranteed internship after the 3 months of in-class learning. I felt prepared (but also a little scared) for my internship. When I completed the internship I was offered an extension to the internship with potential to hire, which was wonderful. I recommend anyone who is slightly interested in going to a bootcamp to choose LEARN, hands down I loved the experience and have finally found the career I've been looking for.

A year ago, I was a wedding planner. Today, I am a software engineer at a Fortune 50 company.

People laugh when I tell them that…like they think it must be a joke. Let’s be real: it does sound like a joke. But it’s 100% true, and that is in large part... Read More due to my experience at LEARN.

I had a background in math and computer science, but life took me in a different direction, and a few years after college I found myself running my own wedding planning business. Fast forward almost a decade, and I had come to a crossroads. It was time to switch things up, and that meant either pursuing event planning in a different avenue, or returning to my roots. I chose the latter.

Obviously, my college education was outdated and, in the world of tech, pretty much obsolete. I needed some help to get back in the game. So I started to look into boot camps. I researched my options, and was pretty set on the fact that I was going to have to leave San Diego for several months in order to pursue this dream. Then I found LEARN.

From the moment I met Rob, Chelsea, Lisa, and the other staff, I knew these were my kind of people. When your interview feels more like catching up with an old friend you just never happened to have met yet, you know you’re in the right spot. Which is not to say that they don’t take this seriously. It’s called a boot camp for a reason; you will be challenged, at times your brain will be fried, and you will wonder, “what on earth have I gotten myself into?” But you will also find yourself surrounded by a community of people who are interested in not only seeing you succeed in the course, but who are committed to your overall well-being long after you’ve graduated.

Full disclosure: Everything about my experience wasn’t just peaches and cream. There were difficult personalities to work with. My internship experience was not the perfect fit, and I didn’t get a job from it like I had hoped. It took me 15 minutes to figure out how to turn on the computer on my first day, and I was sure that I’d just made a huge mistake by signing up for this thing…

But it turned out to be the best decision I’ve ever made. LEARN gave me a foundation in web development, and more importantly, taught me how to learn web development. After all, that is what a career in development is all about: constant learning.

Three months after graduating, I interviewed for a software engineering position at a Fortune 50 company. It was a full-day interview with multiple coding challenges and technical interviews with various senior engineers. Because of LEARN, I was confident in my technical skills, and made it through each challenge happy with my performance. I got the job offer that night. Scratch that. I got a job offer that night which was far beyond what I had let myself hope for.

I’m now six months in to my job, and loving every second of it. I can’t believe I get to do something so fun as a job, and that I get so well paid for it. Going to LEARN catapulted me into this new career, and I will be forever grateful. Not to mention, I made some incredible friendships with the other students and staff which go far deeper than just working together in tech.

Go to LEARN. Gain an education. Leave with a family.

I deliberated over which bootcamp to take for over 6 months. After having scoured the internet, researching bootcamps from all over the country I finally decided to checkout LEARN! in person. They were the only school that outright invited me to come... Read More in and check the place out. When I arrived at the school Rob, one of the founders was there to meet me, after talking to him and his wife Chelsea I knew this was the institution and community I was looking for to jumpstart my career as a Software Developer. After the bootcamp I decided to stay and work in San Diego. I wouldn't trade the experience I had at LEARN! for anything, the material was presented in a way for me to understand clearly and quickly, and the staff was and continues to be incredibly supportive to me in my career.

In my quest for a new career, what mattered to me the most in my journey consisted of two things: the resources and the people.

Resources: The one month internship provided after three months of instruction served me greatly. It gave me the confidence... Read More I needed to know I could do this (programming) as a profession. I also found that this internship put me ahead of many other bootcamp graduates from other programs because it allowed me to demonstrate to employers that I wasn’t starting from scratch in terms of industry experience. Many of my peers have gone on to work for the very companies they interned at. The instructors were free with sharing their knowledge, not only of the curriculum, but of the industry and profession. This is invaluable in countless ways that are still benefitting me months after I have finished the program. The outreach coordinator does an amazing job at helping you get exposed to the tech community and building your network. In fact, the internship process is a well-orchestrated series of events where local employers/organizations come to LEARN and present about their organization. Everyone picks which companies they want to interview with and what follows after interviews is a matching process that results in you getting the internship you want.

People: LEARN genuinely cares about you. I felt like I always had an entourage of people I could ask for assistance in anything: programming questions, networking, job-hunting, general well-being, etc. What I find amazing is, I know for a fact I’m not the only one who feels/felt this way. Changing careers is not easy. The LEARN staff knows it’s not easy, and boy are they good at helping you have all the tools you need to make that change happen. Along the way, I’ve made great friends, found mentors, had a wonderful experience I can always draw from, and became apart of a community that is downright cool. The collective mind here is vast, insightful, and generous—I wouldn’t trade the opportunity I had at LEARN for anything.

Did that new career happen for me? It most certainly did. Thanks to LEARN, a month after finishing my internship, I found myself at LoanHero, a fin-tech startup making the waves, as a software developer!