In May the coding bootcamp industry got a lot of coverage in mainstream news including the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. In our latest podcast we discuss the new ways military veterans can learn to code, we look at three New York Times articles about coding bootcamps, and hear about a coding bootcamp facing closure. Income share agreements remained a hot topic, plus find out about diversity scholarships, university and coding bootcamp partnerships and more!
Veterans Transitioning into Tech
Diversity-Fueled Scholarships
Income Share Agreements: Pros & Cons
- Two US News articles, one which looked at the pros and cons of ISAs, and another which looked at how ISAs could help students choose what subject to study because those that are eligible for an ISA may have better outcomes.
- In a MarketWatch article, the Chicago Fed President warned colleges about moving too quickly towards ISAs, with a concern that grads might prioritize their payments over other expenses, and have to rely on credit for other aspects of their lives
- A report by the Aspen institute suggests that schools and training programs need to provide simple and accessible information about how the ISAs are repaid.
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Lambda School + income share agreements
- An Opinion piece in the New York Times by author Malcolm Harris, likens students using ISAs to “subprime students” and worries that, “If I.S.A.s take off as a desirable funding source, it’s inevitable that they will begin to reshape childhood… Every child becomes his or her own start-up.”
- According to Yahoo, a new income sharing provider called Align has closed its Series B fundraising round.
- And then Student Loan Hero lists schools or colleges which offer ISAs, including Make School, an intensive coding school which works with the Dominican University of California.
- North Carolina coding bootcamp Coder Foundry has launched a tuition deferred program called Launchpad where students don’t pay tuition until they land a job earning $40,000 or more.
- In Milwaukee, Wisconsin, DevCodeCamp has announced they are now offering income share agreements where students don’t pay until they are earning at least $40,000.
Should you Go to a Tech Bootcamp?
Tech Education in Africa and the Middle East
- Lambda School, an online bootcamp which offers Income Share Agreements is launching in Africa alongside Microsoft’s Africa Development Centre in Lagos and Nairobi.
- Region Week also looked at the eligibility requirements for Lambda School in Africa – it’s open to citizens of Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, and South Africa who are 18 years old or above. Lambda School is partnering with PayStack to provide co-working space for students.
- Tech Jaja looks at a number of different options for learning to code in Uganda, including Andela, an Africa-based developer bootcamp and apprenticeship program
- Africa News reports that the first free coding school in Senegal, Sonatel Academy, is taking part in the Digital Women’s Day event in Dakar, Senegal on June 13 and 14, and will involve talks by prominent women in tech, as well as an awards ceremony.
- KT Press profiled a Rwandan woman who went to Moringa School, while balancing her family commitments and built an app to help patients with or without medical insurance figure out which pharmacies to shop at. CNBC Africa profiled the first Rwanda coding school at Rwanda Polytechnic.
- The Arab Daily News reports that Middle East-based nonprofit Anera (American Near East Refugee Aid) is partnering with coding bootcamp ReBootKamp to provide tech and professional job skills training to unemployed Palestinian youth in Gaza, East Jerusalem, the West Bank, and Jordan.
- Vogue Australia profiles the co-founder of Re:Coded Alexandra Clare about how she and her husband decided to start the coding bootcamp after witnessing the plight of displaced youths in Iraq fleeing ISIS.
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A 25-year-old Palestinian woman, Shahenaz Monia, wrote a guest post for ReliefWeb about how learning to code at Gaza Sky Geeks changed her life. She became a freelance web developer, then a full-time mentor at Gaza Sky Geeks’ new campus in Hebron.
Coding Bootcamps at Universities
Advice for Employers
Coding Bootcamp Controversies
- The Arizona Central, Education Dive, and other publications report that Woz U, Steve Wozniak’s coding school, has had its license revoked in Arizona and may be forced to close, after the discovery of connections with a suite of career college collapses.
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The New York Times and Post Industrial dive into a lawsuit against coding bootcamp Mined Minds, a bootcamp set up with the goal of helping people in West Virginia affected by the decline in coal mining retrain to work in tech. Now more than 20 former students are pursuing a lawsuit claiming that Mined Minds was a fraud.
- US News looks at how people should research coding bootcamps before signing up, citing Course Report stats, and noting that a number of bootcamps have closed over the years, and some get mixed reviews, or have faced scrutiny from local governments.
- An opinion piece on Huff Post looks at whether tech companies inflate the costs of online education. They’re talking about 2U here, which just acquired Trilogy Education.
Alumni Success Stories
Updates: New Campuses + Courses
New Coding Bootcamps on Course Report
Favorite Pieces on the Blog
Imogen enjoyed interviewing Alex Mannix, a woman who graduated from Codesmith coding bootcamp in New York. Alex had always been interested in coding, but initially dismissed it in college because of imposter syndrome, and feeling like she should have been doing it since she was 10. Then she won the Edie Windsor Lesbians Who Tech Scholarship to fund 50% of her Codesmith tuition! She explained how supportive both the Lesibans Who Tech and the Codesmith communities are, and how she hopes to inspire more women to think about getting into tech!
Liz got to chat with two employers who hire from bootcamps in May! First, she talked with the VP of People at CD Baby, Gretchen Boster, about how their new hires from Epicodus coding bootcamp in Portland, Oregon are performing on the job. CD Baby actually participates in Epicodus’ internship program which facilitates internships for all Epicodus students. Liz also talked with Avery Johnson, a Technical Solutions Recruiter for Datadog, to understand the value bootcamp grads bring to the Solutions Engineer role. They hire mainly from Flatiron School.
FURTHER LISTENING
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