New York Code and Design Academy

NYCDA is an incredible program for first-timers. You start with the very basics and by the end you'll have developed a full-stack application (a few actually). The instructors/TAs that I had were very knowledgable and also very kind/patient. Emily and... Read More Clayton were very supportive in regards to job support; they did everything from reviewing linkedin profiles and resumes to bringing in many Philly-based tech people to speak to us once a week. Similar to all bootcamps, you have to show up on day 1 ready to do all the work (and do everything they ask of you! it's for your own good!) but in the end it's worth it. My only cons were we didn't really get into any sort of unit-testing/testing in general, but at the same time 12 weeks is a very short period to squeeze all of this information in!

NYCDA completely changed my life. I've spent over a decade working in bars and catering, barely scraping by, struggling to make rent. Now I'm working in my new career as a developer!

The course was one of the hardest things I've ever done in my life but... Read More also the most rewarding. I had Cam Crews as an instructor and he was amazing. He didn't just have us memorize code and spit it back out. He taught us how to learn. Going forward I know I'll never run into a challenge I can't solve because of the way Cam taught us how to attack problems and learn new skills.

I graduated in August and just got my offer in January. The five-month job hunt was longer than I had hoped, but the whole way through it I had my career advisor Nicole Arndt supporting me and helping me find new opportunities. She introduced me to my new employer! I can't imagine having to go through this process without having Nicole on my team. She is tireless and dedicated in a way that can't be over-expressed. I really owe this new life of mine to her.

Taking this course is a commitment to changing your future. It is grueling and exhausting and sometimes painful. I probably spent about 50-60 hours a week in the building for the three months I was in class. But if you commit and do the work, the staff at NYCDA will show up and work just as hard, if not harder, for you. If you are ready to work and dedicate yourself to your future, then I can't recommend this course enough.

I took this course in the beginning of the year, Dec. 2017 and I wish I hadn't. I'm not kidding, my experience was horrible.

Start off, the teacher Shannon was on vacation the first week so we got Brian Fountain to sub that week, cool, but then when he... Read More left and Shannon appeared, it all went down hill.

She was bad, knowledgeable, but a horrible teacher. Not very mature and was over-heard her FIRST day telling the school's admin, "I've never worked with a class so unprepared before." I guess she was expecting a seasoned class.

When confronted she simply blamed the school and left me feeling like a mistake had been made. Still, I carried on, simply because I had too. I already quit my job and made plans to stick it out.

I would like to say things got better, but they didn't. She literally flew off the handle if you asked a question she thought you should know. I'm serious, she slammed on a student's laptop like a kid who couldn’t get the circle to go into the triangle and said things like “ Sucks to be you” when you couldn’t get your machine to do something. She was there after all to teach you code, not help you learn to use your machine.

She absolutely hated repeating herself. Asking a question was a shot in the dark, you didn’t know if she was going to help you or hate you suddenly. Which left the class quiet and searching Google for help most of the time, or me anyway.

Some of the guys stormed out of class cursing and telling her to do her job.

So, what did NYCDA do about it. Nothing.

Now the good news, right into the second month we were told the school was shutting it’s doors. Awesome!

Shannon complained more about the school, let us all know that we weren’t getting a good deal, and looked for a new a job and ride while we taught ourselves code. Don’t get me wrong she did help, but asking for help was kind of like sticking your hand into an alligators mouth and hoping it didn’t bite your arm off because of it.

I’m actually surprised that NYCDA didn’t take action to help the class out, we complained and warned our head guy that Shannon was a mess, but what was NYCDA going to do, help us? We were only paying 10k for a three month course.

Actually, I take that back, she told us that Brian rudely Skyped her once. Cool.

Another thing about the place was the school, it was under construction in a rented out college where they were renovating our side of the building. Loud construction and smelly paint gave us all headaches, that lasted a little over a month.

What the hell right? I should have left that second week, asked for my money back, and watched 'how to' videos on Youtube for three months. It sure would have been a lot cheaper, plus, the screen won't huff and puff if you ask questions.

Graduating felt more like being kicked out, doors closed and that was it. I did get a call a few months later asking if I had a job yet, I honestly laughed. Our advice to getting a job was " All you need is that one job and you're good." Great job advice.

Talk about bad experience.

I can't speak for all the NYCDA coding schools, but they sure the hell dropped that proverbial ball here in Austin.

Hi everyone! I am a front end developer from Russia. Last summer I decided to combine business with pleasure, broaden my knowledge in UI/UX Design while improving my English. I read a lot of reviews about various bootcamps and chose the User Experience/User... Read More Interface Intensive at The New York Code + Design Academy. The New York City campus is located in the center of the Financial District, what I regarded as an advantage because it took me only about half an hour to reach the place by metro. Since the very first day, I was pleasantly surprised by the family atmosphere at the school, the friendly attitude of the staff, the comfort and coziness of the area and well-equipped classrooms. Our course instructor, Jimmy Chandler, is a great specialist in Interface design and a wonderful teacher whose lectures were cleverly structured and supplemented by activity tasks. It was really cool to chat with him about some new tech issues at the lunch breaks. Each week, NYCDA invited specialists in design to share their experience, ideas and new technologies with us. Meetings were held in a format of business lunch. Throughout the course, the school also organized extracurricular lectures in New York City museums.

To supplement our work in the course, the Outcomes Producer, Krystal Kaplan, provided the most informative lectures on self-presentation, going through the interview process and creating the perfect CV. She met one-on-one with each student to give them tailored recommendations. With Krystal’s help I managed to make important improvements into my personal website.

This bootcamp helped me discover this new field and made me a full stack developer. Now I know the all methods of researching in design and how I can use them. I learned how to conduct interviews and how to test prototypes. I completely mastered the Sketch and several other apps for creating interactive prototypes. By the end of course I added three completed projects to my portfolio. Coming back to Russia I found a job at a global company. Apart from the professional benefits, I made many new friends. I want to sincerely thank all the people who were with me at that time - it was one the greatest experiences in my life!

The time that I spent at NYCDA was one of the most rewarding experiences of my life. I came to NYCDA in the hopes of switching fields from elementary education to the tech industry, and that change would not have been an option for me without NYCDA. The... Read More course was both rigorous and engaging, and the program’s learn-by-doing approach taught both necessary technical content and practical skills such as resourcefulness, logic, and analysis. The instructor was knowledgeable and helpful, and the staff cares about their students. After graduating, the staff has followed up with me regularly, offering job placement assistance. I have already worked a contract position in Quality Assurance, and, because of NYCDA, I can now look forward to a career in an industry that I find interesting, challenging, and rewarding. Thank you, NYCDA!

Before I was web developer I was a vagabond hipster living in Brooklyn, pursuing art and making coffee for a living. It was not as glamorous as it sounds. After being fed up with my constant financial burdens, I pursued coding. I looked at many different... Read More bootcamps where I could learn this craft. I chose NYCDA first and foremost for the price. It was several thousand dollars less than other schools which was a huge advantage given my financial situation. Beyond price I found the staff to be personal and caring. They took time to meet with me. They didn't push me into anything I didn't want to do. They were honest with me. I liked that. When I enrolled in the full-time program I learned just how supportive the staff was. They learned each of our names, our qualities, our struggles; they stayed overtime to help us succeed. Through NYCDA I created a strong, solid foundation in web development.

NYCDA's Web Development Intensive is sometimes stressful, often frustrating, and 100% worth it. If your goal is to learn how to code, and to pursue a career in web development/software engineering, I couldn’t recommend NYCDA more highly. The instructors... Read More (I had Orlando), and Outcomes Coordinator (Krystal) work hard to put you in position to succeed, and to help you get the most out of yourself and the experience as a whole. Come ready to work, and this program is every bit as good as advertised.

I have taken classes a few other places and NYCDA is the best! I started out with Web 100 and then moved on to the Frontend class as well as Angular. I loved it! Not only did I learn a ton, but they helped me land a job post taking the classes and I'm... Read More still working there today. Every class is what you put into it, but not only are the teachers great here, but the staff is attentive, checks in with everyone and makes a point of ensuring that you are getting what you need to be set up for success.

Hi, I'd like to share my experience with NYCDA. I took the Web Intensive program there. It's much more involved than the 96 hours program you refer to. In my opinion, if you're considering a career change, the Intensive is the way to go; however if you... Read More only want to be familiar with the "tech side" of things, the Night/Weekend program is quite sufficient.
Regardless of which program you take, NYCDA is just a comfortable place to learn to code. The class size is intimate and the instructors are humorous and friendly, even when I was the 10th people to ask him the same question. Plus the partners there generously share their network that will help you tremendously in the NYC tech scene.
After the program I went on to become a developer and lead developer at different startups in NYC. Yes along the way I always bumped into things I didn't learn at NYCDA, but the intensive learning experience there taught me to tackle the source of the problems and solve it quickly, which is what really matters to my employers than the things I do know.

Good luck and more importantly have fun!

I'm an alum from both the evening courses and intensive. I was in finance before and now I have a full-time developer job with a startup.

The evening WebDev100 course is a great primer for anyone truly new to web development. It's honestly enough education... Read More to start building static pages on your own and even a delve into application/software development. If you're a good student and code outside of class (homework and extra credit), then you can actually convert the knowledge into paying skills.

If you want to accelerate your learning then take the WDI as it compresses a year's worth of education into just 3 months. To get the most out of the course you must study hard before/during and take every assignment seriously. I've spoken with other bootcamp alums (GA/FA/FS) and that seems to hold true everywhere.

As far as the school itself goes the main instructors in Javascript, Ruby, Rails, etc. are experienced, intelligent, and great teachers overall. I did however, wish that we spent more time on Ruby OOP/JS OOP and far less on HTML/CSS . That said, the staff are a great resource and they constantly encourage you to use them for help. To reiterate, you'll get out what you put in.

I ultimately chose NYCDA because:
It was within my budget.
It seemed to be most friendly to those with minimal tech experience.
I appreciated how dedicated the co-founders are. They are truly trying to build something meaningful and are doing so with less financial resources than the other schools.