Thinkful

I enjoyed the Digital Marketing flex program. I was able to finish early and complete this while attending college courses full time, so if you're looking to take this on while transitioning from one thing to another it's totally possible. My mentor was... Read More fantastic and very experienced in the industry. She was really encouraging but also helped keep me accountable. I have always worked for myself, so career counseling and resume building and Linkedin guidance has been a game-changer. I feel like I actually know how to present my value to potential employers. I found the content of the modules to be a little easy, however, I went into this with some experience. The projects were great for getting real experience and culminated in an attractive portfolio. If you don't know which aspect of digital marketing you want to go into, this is a great way to explore it. I'd say for just the career counseling alone this is a great value.

Curriculum Thinkful advertises their courses as the equivalent of a Master's program. Data science is a broad and deep multidisciplinary topic, and no program could hope to cover everything, but I do feel that Thinkful's program gave me a solid base in... Read More data science concepts and practices. No prior knowledge of programming or statistics are assumed, and those basics are covered. Python and its packages for math, statistics, machine learning, and visualization became familiar and comfortable tools (including NumPy, Pandas, Scikit-learn, Matplotlib, Seaborn). There are opportunities to explore further topics via an elective specialization topic later in the course. Course material is also updated to keep up with topics and trends. Be warned--Thinkful will tell you this program can be completed in six months, and it's definitely possible, but you need to be ready to commit to it as if it is a full-time job, seven days a week, if you want to finish in that time. I worked a part-time job as I worked through the program, and ended up needing to extend my enrollment to complete the full course. Your program manager and mentor will work with you if/when extending your enrollment seems necessary. Instructors Thinkful pairs you with one of their mentors for the duration of the course. Mentors have both education and business experience in your chosen field. Students meet with mentors regularly for review and questions about course material. Thinkful offers students the opportunity to change mentors as necessary. If I have a complaint, it is only that when I reached my specialization topic near the end of the course, and the topic I chose was not familiar to my mentor, I had to play "mentor roulette" to attempt to find a mentor with experience in my chosen area. As I understand it, Thinkful has already addressed the issues I had, and a better system is in place to better match students with mentors for this part of the curriculum. Job Assistance Job searches are brutal, and probably the most difficult to handle when attempting a career change. Thinkful's job coaches are your best cheerleaders and a needed source of accountability on this part of the journey. I had been working with a career coach even before I committed to Thinkful's program, and it was encouraging to hear my Thinkful career coach offering advice that lined up neatly with a professional who has decades of experience across a broader range of careers. They most likely will not find a job for you, but they will help you develop the skills you'll need to successfully navigate a job search, and find a job in your new chosen field.

I thoroughly enjoyed my time with Thinkful. They offer good information where you are working on starting your career immediately. It is CLEARLY their focus to get you going. You will learn the different aspects of digital marketing and apply what you... Read More learn to your own portfolio by completing projects. Instructors will give you valuable insight to your projects. I find that the best part about the Thinkful program is the mentorship and the career coaching you get with the program. They will give you amazing resources to use to advance your career. Their goal is to get you going. It has worked for me as I am now working for an agency. Thank you Thinkful!

Thinkful's Software Engineering Immersion course was a rigorous, insightful, valuable and worthwhile experience. I was taught the in's and out's of modern day web application development, using HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and PostgreSQL databases, with a focus... Read More on React client-side and Node.js server-side programming. 5 days a week (sometimes 6, if I felt I needed to study more!), for 5 months, I received tutoring from seasoned developers and a dedicated personal mentor. I learned so much during my time there and definitely recommend it to anyone that is looking into a computer programming career, but cannot use conventional routes, such as a computer science degree. The support students get, from the prep work before admittance, to career services leading up to your first breakthrough in the web development industry, Thinkful shines in a sea of coding bootcamps that are becoming so prevalent now. The $1500 per month living stipend was a huge help and the staff really cares about what they do. The only gripe I had was how I went about my first capstone project towards the conclusion of the course: I used a newer development feature for my React application, and was forced to refactor it to use the way we were taught to in the course. Other than that, top-notch experience and would recommend it to anyone that is interested in getting into coding.

Overall this was a solid educational experience for the price. The curriculum laid a strong foundation for using excel, python, SQL and Tableau. However in my experience I felt that some of the programming units could be more developed to be used in a... Read More professional environment. I enrolled in the course to upskill and pivot my career. After the course I was ultimately able to find a new job but it required work outside just the given course work. The one on one mentoring was strong and the mock interviews and presentations were helpful and informative. The career support was outstanding, and probably the single most important part of the program. I would recommend this course to someone looking to break into the data space but be aware that it will require a fair amount of work.

I attended Thinkful with very little prior experience, and without a college degree. About a year after beginning my education there, I landed a well-paying job as a data scientist at a reputable company. The great things about Thinkful are the money-back... Read More guarantee (which took some pressure off of me, although getting a job was always my focus), the very strong support network (a data science mentor, academic advisor, and job coach), and the coursework itself. I thought that the pace of the course was reasonable, and I never fell behind while simultaneously being challenged on a daily basis. The balance was right. Whenever I had questions about what I was doing (which was a lot), I either contacted their technical support network or my mentor, who helped me with small questions to big projects. If I needed general help, my academic advisor was there for me, also. Finally, my career coach was a real gem. She helped me with writing resumes, fielding technical questions, outreach strategies, and so much more. I applied to over 800 places before I got my job, and she was integral in getting through the process and inevitable flurry of rejection emails. The only criticism I can provide is that I was not prepared wholly for the difficulty of the job search. I understand that some of this falls at my own feet, and also because of the times (COVID), but I spent as much energy finding work as I did with the actual course. I would like to see Thinkful adjust in some way to help prepare graduates in general for the longevity of the search process. A minor criticism, but that's all I have.

I spent a lot of time reviewing programs before choosing Thinkful's Product Design Flex program. This was the first time I had done any sort of online learning and I was hesitant to spend any money on something non-traditional. However, the coursework... Read More there are a few things that made it worth the cost. First, the program was packed full of information-and we still have access to it after we graduated. Second, we get to meet a lot of people in the design community who mentor us and give us resources based on situations they've experienced. Third, we get post-graduation career services. We work with a specialist to help us get hired, and if we don't, we're eligible for a refund of our tuition costs. Overall, it was a great experience and I've been able switch careers from mental health to tech which is a pretty big deal to me.

Thinkful's Fully Immersive Engineering Bootcamp was an investment worth the 6 months of deep learning! Prior to Thinkful, I had absolutely no experience in coding. With Thinkful's Bootcamp, I was able to learn best industrial practices in the field of... Read More software engineering. Thinkful provided live lectures, paired programming, mentorship, and a career advisor all aimed to help students become engineers that are geared for the professional world. Having a one-on-one paired mentor was the best part of the bootcamp because I was able to come with any questions or concerns I had throughout my time at Thinkful. The resources were amazing and I am continue to express great elation for this bootcamp. 6 months did not even pass after I graduated that I received an offer at a company working as a web developer!

Before starting Thinkful’s program, I did extensive research in UX training programs. Based on what turned out to be misrepresentation in advertising, promotional materials of the school, and misrepresentations by representatives of Thinkful, I enrolled... Read More in the UX design immersion bootcamp at Thinkful. After three weeks of attendance, the product I received was inadequate and I withdrew for these reasons, in summary: 1. Expectation: a reliable curriculum with dependable syllabus. What I received: an incomplete curriculum and unreliable syllabus. Evidence: multiple schedule inaccuracies affecting assignment efficiency, comprehension, and deadlines. Daily, there were conflicting discrepancies between: the reading, assignments, schedule, instruction, and lecture slides. In a survey I conducted, the vast majority of students agreed that the syllabus and dashboard did not align. 2. Expectation: a comprehensive education. What I received: misappropriation of class hours. Evidence: a. School days: homework assignments were completed during 5 of 7 school hours which directly contradicts Thinkful curriculum that states, “Homework, mentor sessions, and independent study are completed outside the scheduled course time.” Performing homework was scheduled during class in lieu of a meaningful curriculum. A mere 1-2 hours were spent in “lecture”- 30% of which was spent watching youtube videos. b. With assignments: homework expectations were regularly mislabeled, misleading, and unexplained which led to great confusion. In a survey I conducted, the vast majority of students agree that the assignments did not have clear instructions nor expectations. In three weeks, only one assignment (out of thirty) received feedback so there was no gauge for comprehending material. 3. Expectation: support staff available for students. What I received: our cohort was understaffed and undersupported. Evidence: I was informed our cohort’s student teacher ratio would be 45:2 and it was 60:1. Due to an obvious lack of cohesion between all departments and program content, when questions were asked the answers often created more confusion because each department, person, or document would have differing and conflicting answers. As a direct result of Thinkful’s disorganization, my education was regularly obstructed because I was not provided the proper tools nor staff support as promised. Multiple Thinkful staff admitted, they were dissatisfied with the program themselves. Never was Thinkful’s lack of staff, leadership, and knowledge more apparent than when the program director reached out to me, after I withdrew, asking for my insight and feedback. I created a survey to collect data reinforcing the extent of program deficiencies affecting the whole cohort. Interestingly, the day after my survey was released, Thinkful sent out a similar one. Before withdrawing, I made friends with most of my cohort. Unfortunately, weeks later, their journey in UX education has continued to be impeded by these same issues. Too frequently I receive sad updates from current students overwhelmed by a system that is not set up to promote their success. For the money involved, that is unacceptable to me. If Thinkful had provided an adequate education, or had been willing to listen to feedback, I would still be a student. But they did not.

I've been in the UX/UI Intensive program and will soon complete it, and it has been hands down one of the worst experiences of my life. The instructors you meet with face to face are amazing, but literally every other aspect of the program is extremely... Read More toxic. The grading is inconsistent, the grading team will fail assignments for things that were not required in the assignment listing, and the actual content is stuff you could definitely find on youtube or somewhere else on the internet for free. It seems like Thinkful actively pushes students to drop out. They also straight up lied about class sizes. When I was in the middle of enrolling, the recruiter I spoke with assured me that the instructor to student ratio was about 1:20, only to sign up for the first day and find 60+ students in the cohort. Further, they assert that you'll easily find a job afterwards but their rates of successful employment are conveniently skewed from reality. For reference, the first class worth of students from this particular program still has a high unemployment rate amongst them.