Le Wagon

Prior to starting my MBA at INSEAD i wanted to learn computer programming in order to start a business. I tried for 6-8 weeks to learn ruby and JavaScript with a book and various online programmes without much success. Fed up with my lack of progress, I applied to LeWagon and started two weeks later in Rio de Janeiro. The course exceeded my expectations by far. This is for the following reasons: 1.) incredibly well though out curriculum that is constantly updated and that has a very good logical progression, 2.) daily classes consisting of 90 min lectures, hours and hours of exercises with the help of the teacher and mentors and 90 minutes of live coding at the end of the day, 3.) incredibly attentive teachers with an unlimited level of patience, 4.) a final project that allows you to apply your coding skills in real life. My team built a web app for a social enterprise called troveko, which we pitched at the demo day. The course thus combines both coding and business skills.      I would wholeheartedly recommend the course. 

Le Wagon Tokyo in one word: great. I learned a tremendous amount and it was made fully evident on demo day with so much positive feedback. People were genuinely impressed with what we could do. It’s the type of program where you really get what you put in: if you are serious about becoming a developer, you can definitely become one. I am now working as a Rails developer and continuing my projects from Le Wagon, so evidently I am very pleased with everything that came from the experience. 
Our drivers Sylvain and Paul were also consistently great. They provided lots of great resources, events and networking opportunities which really made a big difference. They are clearly well immersed in the tech community in Tokyo.
I feel a strong sense of community, and I look forward to contribute to it in every way I can.

Before I joined the Le Wagon Tokyo I worked for eight years for a number of Fortune 500 companies in a Corporate Finance environment. I never coded or had any programming experience before, and to come away at the end of camp with the ability to understand how to build an application from product design and conception to full-working production online was unbelievable and invigorating!

All of the Tokyo staff were so impressive and accomplished, it inspires you to want to do more for yourself.

Having continued access to Le Wagon resources as an alumni afterwards is so beneficial. Through the Le Wagon Tokyo experience, I was able to land a new job as Chief Operating Officer of an established startup overseeing development. I am now on a course to a new life and career path in Japan and this was much more than I ever imagined to happen!

Entrepreneur for almost a decade prior to attending Le Wagon, I' had been wanting to code for years, until I sold and closed both projects I was busy with, clearing up the precious 9 weeks I needed for the bootcamp.

It was a blast.

I loved the experience, the people, the new opportunities.

I now freelance as a full stack web developer and I teach coding at Le Wagon and other communities in Copenhagen where I'm located, but also in Paris, Berlin etc.

Le Wagon truly changed my life.

 

My name is Cassiano Mangini da Costa, I'm 31 years old, from Santos, São Paulo, Brazil, graduated in Information Systems from the Catholic University of Santos (2008 - 2012).  I have experience in IT as a Cobol programmer, systems analyst and IT architecture analyst at Bank Bradesco and Bank Itau. At the end of 2014, I decided to leave aside my career as a systems analyst to realize the dream of going abroad to learn English and to be in contact with a different culture.The destination chosen was the city of Cork in Ireland. In the beginning of 2016 after completed my English course and my IELTS certification, I got a job in Apple's as a third party, responsible for supporting Apple Maps users, as well as data analysis and other activities. In 2017 I decided it was time to go back to something more related to my degree and experience, but 3 years had passed since my last experience as a systems analyst.  I was not feeling prepared to apply to any IT job position, I felt that I needed to recycle my CV and update my knowledge. I started researching about boot camps, as well as chatting with many friends about possibilities.  One of my friends was attending the Le Wagon course in Barcelona and he was really enjoying what he was learning. I have decided to read a little more about the boot camp, the content taught and the roles of a full stack developer. I was considering attending the course in Europe, but to my surprise one of the cities from the next batch would be São Paulo. That was all I wanted! To be studying and being close to my family and friends again. I have made my registration and the interview with Mathieu motivated me even more to attend the course. Time to pack all my stuff, go back to Brazil and face this challenge! Le Wagon's teaching approach really surprised me, I was motivated and challenged from the first to the last day of the course. The first few weeks were very difficult for everyone, but with the support of teachers and classmates, I knew the end result would be worthwhile.  And in the blink of an eye, it was time to develop our final project. Despite having some personal ideas of final projects, I decided to accept the invitation from a colleague to develop an intelligent platform (Advalori) to bring together clients (startups and small/medium companies) who needed to improve and control their cash flow with investors (factorings). It was incredible what we were able to develop in just 10 days! After having finalized the course in December, I took a break, so that in 2018 I could start the hunt for my first work as a Full Stack Developer.  And the reward and dedication came in less than a month of searching. After some tests and interviews, I got my first job as Full Stack Developer in GigaServices. GigaServices is an IT consulting firm, founded in 2009, based in Sao Paulo and in Curitiba, SP, Brazil.  They have clients as GO Eyewear, Mundial S.A, Softfilm, Dermiwil, Trident and Livraria Saraiva. I am part of the team responsible for developing all the demand (bugs fix and systems innovation) and data integration. The mainly product of GigaServices is MOBBIZ (www.mobbiz.com.br), a web platform that can do many activities such as: sales force automation, digital catalog, accountability, agenda of appointments, news and notifications, trainings via tablets, check list, action plan and summary of performance. The excitement and search for more knowledge are just beginning! Thank you Le Wagon for everything!  

Hi, i'm Corentin i was student at Le Wagon Bordeaux batch 127 in January 2018. I used to be an optician. I wanted to change my life because it was bored and had a passion for computer science. So I decided to learn to code to become Web Developer. I choose Le Wagon and i'm not disappointed because in two month i have learnt a lot of technical skills, languages and tips with qualify teachers. Our final project was amazing for very young developers like us. It's one of the best experience of my life, it's the best bootcamp and it's accessible to all.

IN A NUTSHELL:
The 8 weeks of the bootcamp will be tough and fast-paced, but when you look back at the end of the course, you truly feel empowered with the skills and knowledge to build a fully functional web-based app/ website. The course is originally designed for entrepreneurs who would like to learn how to build a website/ app for their business, yet it is very relevant for people who want to work as freelance developers, or who want to quickly learn what programming is about (like myself, I’m an independent management and strategy consultant with a now good knowledge in data analysis/ visualisation to offer to my clients). The course in Bali is very well staffed, students come from various walks of life and create a truly immersive community during the whole course. This was clearly one of the best learning experience in my life so far!
 

FULL STORY:
I decided to learn coding for two main reasons. Firstly, I had a few times some ideas for apps or websites, but never knew where and how to start to build a proof of concept; I was using this lack of skill as an excuse not to go any step further. Secondly, I believe that coding (any language or any context) will become a crucial skill in most of jobs - as important as knowing how to use a computer, excel… - especially when dealing with an ever-growing amount of data on a daily basis.

I tried without success to learn coding by myself, but I lacked the structure to help me getting started on what was important and to deliver step by step an extensive and demanding knowledge. So I decided to look into coding bootcamps available, and the one that caught my attention was Le Wagon. I had a couple of ex-colleagues who did the bootcamp recently and contacted them to hear more about their experience. They easily convinced me.
Just like me, they were working in Management and Strategy consulting for ~5 years, helping venerable industries to improve their businesses, but always far from the new Tech scene. Yet, they all learned invaluable skills that they are now using on a daily basis (they now fully switched to the tech industry).

Before I dive into the content of the bootcamp, I must say that the 8 weeks the course last are extremely fast paced and demanding. The hours can be long, but mostly our brains were mobilised and learning new skills almost 24/7! This is not for the faint-hearted! But all the pain endured is quickly forgotten when we saw the first results.
The first three weeks are dedicated to the core of programming. Basically, you will learn how Ruby (and most computer language) is built and how to quickly build back-end software. This part can be frustrating as you basically learn the first year of computer sciences in 3 weeks. But this is invaluable as you learn how to progressively think like a programmer and understand the logic of any computer language. Then you have about 2 weeks of front end (HTML, CSS, JS) and database management where you learn all the best practice, and because it’s front-end, you quickly feel empowered as you can see you are actually building beautiful webpages. The last 3 weeks are the most interesting: they are the projects weeks. On the first of these weeks, each team rebuilds a copycat of Airbnb from scratch (that’s really amazing – everyone after only 6 weeks is able to build such a site, with fully functional back and front ends!), then the last two weeks are for the projects pitched by students. On top of connecting all the dots (back and front ends), this is an excellent exercise to learn extra features (depending on the project needs) and to learn how to collaborate within a team of developers.

What does Le Wagon give you in the end? The results are pretty self-explanatory: every student is capable of building a fully functional website/ app that they present at the end of the bootcamp. On top of this, Le Wagon gives you access to a huge library of resources, classes, videos… that you can access for life. Very useful when you want to review a specific point of the course, or when a new module is added to the course. Last, but not least, it gives you access to an extensive network of teachers and alumni to help and support you.

Following Le Wagon in Bali is a unique experience: yes it can be frustrating to spend whole sunny days in front of your laptop, but the experiences are awesome. Students come from across the globe and all have different walks of life, creating an immense sense of cohesion within all classmates. No need to sell the charms of Bali, but did you know that it is also the number one destination for digital nomads (source nomadslist.com)? This means lots of freelancers who can give you advice if the digital nomad’s lifestyle appeals to you.

As for myself, I am back home where although I am back to working as a freelance Management and Strategy consultant, I feel sharper than ever as I know I could effectively build a proof of concept for any app that would come to my mind (and I’m still working in my free time on my Le Wagon’s project), but also as a consultant, I can bring to the table real skills in data analysis, visualisation etc… that only few other professionals have. So that’s what I’m building now, the bridge between business people and data geeks!

You will learn a lot of thing in so little time it’s just amazing but it’s difficult so be prepare because you can be overwhelmed easily with the amount of information you’ll receive.
I had a high school diploma in IT networking but that was not exactly what I wanted to do in my life so I decided to join Le Wagon to learn how to become a web developer.
I was in Le Wagon Bordeaux #127 the teachers and everyone else are nice and more than helpful they will push you to be better.
To be honest, before to participate to Le Wagon Program, I wasn’t convince that it was that good… but since I’ve finished the program I can say it’s worth it ! I am 100% satisfied with my experience.
Don’t be scared, if you take it seriously, you will not waste your time !

My review is kind of long so I’ll start of with a summary- if you are thinking about a career in web development or just want to learn a new set of marketable skills, do the Le Wagon bootcamp. I couldn’t believe that it could live up to all the positive reviews I found before starting the course, but it did and then some.

 

Right from the get go Le Wagon does two things amazingly well- teaching you how to code and making you feel part of a community. They send you an extensive list of prepwork to do so that you have a bit of foundation and can hit the ground running on Day 1. Frequent drinks are organized to encourage everyone to hang out. This is really effective- by the end you will have made some really good friends and an extensive contact list of established and budding developers.

If you like a challenge you will love the daily routine at Le Wagon. Attend a 60-90 minute lecture in the morning covering a particular topic, after which you spend the next 6-7 hours tackling tasks based around this material. It is not all smooth sailing- there are tonnes of moments where you feel like tearing your hair out in frustration. But there are an equal amount of “eureka!” moments when you finally lock down a concept. And there are always a group of extremely capable TA’s to help out- if you put in a ticket they will generally be with you in a couple of minutes. It is crazy how good some of these guys are at reading your mess of code and figuring out what you’re actually trying to do. They are all genuine guys who are really easy to get along with and who you will also count as friends by the end of the course.

 

By week 4 or 5 you really start to see how all the skills you are learning are coming together and then this is all consolidated by the two projects you do in the last 3 weeks of the course. THese projects give you invaluable experience in creating a project from scratch and learning how to code a product with your partners.

 

The office itself is amazing. Such a great workspace to learn in. It really starts to feel like home by the end of it and we were genuinely sad to leave. Ed, who manages Le Wagon London, is an amazing guy who is always willing to have a chat and give you encouragement.

They set up some really good talks to help guide you through the post-bootcamp-find-a-job phase. I left knowing what needed to be done in order to both continue developing my skills and to conduct a successful job search.

Other great perks:

Coffee anytime you want it

Yogas Tuesdays and Thursdays

 

Final Summary:

Teaching- great

TA’s- super-skilled and friendly

Workspace- top-notch

Tasks- challenging and fun to work on

Fellow students- varied bunch in terms of origin, age and experience which makes it a delight to get to know everyone.

Top tips:

Prepwork- do it! And maybe re-do the ruby section just before the bootcamp starts to really hit the ground running. If you have time, revisit a bit of the Javascript prep before you start the JS section.

Flashcards- find time to do these. It will really help with consolidating material. Also make use of the bookmark function for important or tricky cards. This is both useful during the course and afterwards.

Be on time for lecture and pay attention- showing up even a bit late will make it tricky to get the material

Do not get disheartened if you don’t completely get a concept. You will often find that after a bit of time it will become second nature to you. I’m looking at you iterators.

Don’t get a chromebook! I tried and struggled throughout the course

Try and do yoga, if you’re so inclined. The instructor is excellent and it really helps to clear your mind.

Go to drinks on Fridays- it really helps you to unwind and build friendships

Relax on the weekends- your brain needs time to process material. Speaking of which, have fun with dreaming about coding.

My goals in pursuing a code bootcamp were to relearn to code, to build a recruitment app to boost my business, and hopefully attract others to the project.


After a thorough research, I decided to enroll in Le Wagon Bali. The course itself has already been described in many of the other reviews so I won’t go into detail here. But I really want to highlight four differentiators:


First, how organized, structured and thoughtfully-composed the program is. The amount of information to take in can be overwhelming but the platform Le Wagon has built is unique and greatly facilitates learning.

Second, how hands-on the program is. You actually spend the majority of the day solving exercises and applying your new knowledge.


Third, the last two weeks of the bootcamp you get to build a live, functional app with a team of others. In my case, we built the very project I was dreaming of for Find My Flock. I thought I would only be starting it after the bootcamp! The tireless camp instructors not only helped solve our daily coding problems, they coached our team on the presentation for Demo Day so we’d have a boost later when seeking investment.

And lastly, the staff’s commitment to reducing stress before and throughout the learning process. Examples include pre-course prep work, yoga breaks, accommodation tips and more. One time I needed an electronics charger and they ordered it online for me in Indonesian and gave it to me in class.


So, what are the results? I left with a fully functioning recruitment web app. We’re already sending it to users to join. In addition, I hired two classmates to continue to develop. We code with the aid of a highly-active 2,500-members-strong Le Wagon alumni network. Multiple times already, I’ve posted a technical question on their Slack and gotten quick tips/help/feedback. I have never heard of these kinds of outcomes from another bootcamp.

Thank you so much Le Wagon Bali— I fully intend to sing your praises to everyone who asks!

After dropping out of college I stumbled across programming online and immediately fell in love with it. I got my feet wet with Codecademy and tried to teach myself how to code via tutorials and online mini-courses. Even though I made good progress and was able to make very simple mobile apps I always felt like I lacked the fundamentals and the structure to really be a competent developer and that’s when I realised I needed more than a simple online course, at the same time I found out about the concept of coding bootcamps, which promised very good results over a short period of time and Le Wagon ranked number one in every review site I visited, so after reading countless 5 star reviews I enrolled in Lisbon.
Everyone warned me about the pace of the bootcamp and how intense it was, but I remember being in shock with the rest of my classmates in the first week. We all felt like this was just too much to grasp in 9 weeks, but we were so wrong ! Don’t get me wrong, this is indeed A LOT to grasp in 9 weeks, but what makes Le Wagon different from every other learning experience I’ve had is the people that are apart of it - from the lead teachers, teacher assistants, the driver and even the intern! Everyone made sure we had the best guidance and support over the course, and displayed a level a of patience that I was not used to. In college, if you keep asking the teacher question after question, after a while they will just find a nice way to tell you to fuck off, whereas in Le Wagon they welcomed your questions and were always there to help you solve your challenges.
Besides the intense and rewarding learning part, which is obviously the reason why everyone decides to enroll on a bootcamp, the experience itself was great. In what other school/bootcamp are you drinking, having fun, meeting interesting people, all while learning such a overwhelming skill like web development! So much so that I looked forward to going to Le Wagon everyday, even when I knew I was going to work my ass off and be really tired by 7PM, I still wanted to go, and that can only happen if you are enjoying the journey.
The climax of this journey are the last 10 days where you and your group get to build a project from scratch to present it on Demo Day. This is the defining moment where you put to work all the skills you've been acquiring the previous 7 weeks, and by skills I’m not only talking about the hard skills ( HTML, CSS, Javascript, Ruby on rails) but also the collaboration, agile development methodology and design tips you've been taught in the bootcamp. I really enjoyed this last part of the course because it was so rewarding to create something out of nothing with skills you didn't have just a couple of months before!
At the end of the day, this was by far the best learning experience I've ever had and I would recommended to anyone, now I see why they have all of those 5 star reviews