4 Best Coding Bootcamps in Kansas City
Centriq Training is an IT technology training firm in Kansas City, Missouri that hosts two, 14-week training programs: a Full Stack Coding program and the Cloud and Security Specialist program. There are virtual and in-person training options in Kansas City and St. Louis, and night classes are available. During the 4-month programs, classes are held in a live, instructor-led format with hands-on activities. Each cohort is limited to 15 students. At the end of the course, students prepare a final project to present to their peers, instructors, and prospective employers. The Full Stack Developer training program covers subjects in .NET, HTML, CSS, JavaScript, MVC, SQL and more. The goal of the Full Stack Web Developer program is to prepare students for a Junior Developer position. The Clo...
Chad Bresette Verified via LinkedIn4Graduate • Kansas CityMy time at Centriq
It all started because of the pandemic. I was a truck driver looking to change careers in my late 40s. When I made this changes I was a nervous mess about do this. From the time with my first phone to graduated they all made feel welcome. I wouldn’t be able to do what I like to do without them. To this day I look back think of the great move I took
It all started because of the pandemic. I was a truck driver looking to change careers in my late 40s. When I made this changes I was a nervous mess about do this. From the time with my first phone to graduated they all made feel welcome. I wouldn’t be able to do what I like to do without them. To this day I look back think of the great move I tookFuel Sales Academy offers an “Earn While You Learn” Sales Development Accelerator bootcamp in Kansas City, MO. This bootcamp is offered live online and takes approximately 8 weeks to complete. Students graduate when they consistently hit sales metrics over a 4-week period. Students will learn technologies such as Outreach.io, SalesLoft, Salesforce, Hubspot, Pipedrive, and Zoho. The first step in applying for the Fuel Sales Academy bootcamp is to enroll in the free, 2-hour Sales Development Foundations training course. Students who complete the Foundations course will receive information regarding how to apply for the Sales Development Accelerator bootcamp. Fuel Sales Academy will receive career assistance including resume development, interviewing skills, and access to job placement opp...
Leah Tapley Verified via LinkedIn5Graduate • Kansas CityChanged My Life!
I could write a book but I'll keep it short (if you want to know the whole story, contact me on LinkedIn). From day one, the team at Fuel Sales proved just how different they are in contrast to those typical sales-y people (you know what I'm talking about - the sharks, the pushy, the cocky). They pay those who give them a chance to show them how to make a difference (free classes where they pay YOU to learn!) They vet other tech companies and help you find your niche They support you every step of the way (before, during, and after placement!) They genuinely care about you as a person - your life, your development, your future Dan, Lonnie, Zach and Alex bust their butts to provide you with curated sequences, daily meetings to keep everyone connected, quality content, continuous learning, etc. In a nutshell, they truly go above and beyond for their people! The team here is more like family to me. They believed in me and pushed me out of my comfort zone. They took a girl who never would have considered a career in sales and helped her soar. Now, I've been in sales for about 2 years and am currently at an amazing company Fuel partners with, and still get to work closely with the SDRs in training at Fuel Sales Academy. I graduated and moved on in my career, but gained so much more than sales knowledge. I gained comrades, family, and the best references I could ask for ;) Take a leap of faith and attend their class! What have you got to lose?
I could write a book but I'll keep it short (if you want to know the whole story, contact me on LinkedIn). From day one, the team at Fuel Sales proved just how different they are in contrast to those typical sales-y people (you know what I'm talking about - the sharks, the pushy, the cocky).
- They pay those who give them a chance to show them how to make a difference (free classes where they pay YOU to learn!)
- They vet other tech companies and help you find your niche
- They support you every step of the way (before, during, and after placement!)
- They genuinely care about you as a person - your life, your development, your future
- Dan, Lonnie, Zach and Alex bust their butts to provide you with curated sequences, daily meetings to keep everyone connected, quality content, continuous learning, etc.
In a nutshell, they truly go above and beyond for their people!
The team here is more like family to me. They believed in me and pushed me out of my comfort zone. They took a girl who never would have considered a career in sales and helped her soar. Now, I've been in sales for about 2 years and am currently at an amazing company Fuel partners with, and still get to work closely with the SDRs in training at Fuel Sales Academy. I graduated and moved on in my career, but gained so much more than sales knowledge. I gained comrades, family, and the best references I could ask for ;)
Take a leap of faith and attend their class! What have you got to lose?Power Learn Academy is a tech training provider based in Missouri offering 12-week, full-time, hybrid bootcamps geared towards helping students successfully earn a Business Central Certified Functional Consultant Certificate or Power Platform Certified Functional Consultant Certificate. Power Learn Academy maintains strict expectations to ensure success from students and the school boasts a 95% placement rate after graduation. Beginners and students are welcome to apply to Power Learn Academy certificate programs. The enrollment process is rigorous to ensure students will successfully complete the program and find placement after graduation. After attending an information session and expressing interest, students will attend an interview and complete an assessment. After comparing appli...
LaunchCode is a nonprofit which offers free full-time, 14-week, and part-time, 20-week immersive coding bootcamps and apprenticeships in multiple locations in the US. The programs cover programming languages and concepts like Python, Java, and web developer tools. In addition, LaunchCode provides various online and in-person resources to prepare students for a job in tech. LaunchCode's programs are free and accessible to motivated individuals who are assessed for passion, drive and aptitude rather than credentials. LaunchCode offers a variety of courses, which blend in-person classroom instruction with online learning. Students will receive mentored support from instructors, teaching fellows, and professional programmers. Applicants must submit an online application with online coding p...
Brian Verified via LinkedIn4Graduate • Kansas CityIt worked for me, but it could use some improvement
First off, I will say I graduated and was placed into a job by LaunchCode. I am very grateful for the opportunity, and it's worked out very well for me in the 2 years since I was hired. The good: If a classroom environment is right for you, then you will likely do well here. I learn better in a classroom, surrounded by like minded individuals. I have too many distractions at home to really focus and teach myself, though I had gotten fairly far with some Python a year or two before applying, and have been using HTML and CSS for over 20 years now. It's completely and totally free. My only expenses were a new laptop (only because I spilled water on my perfectly working one about halfway through the course) and transportation/commuting costs. They achieve this by partnering with the companies in the area they're located, and promising them developers who have gone through their program for temporary apprenticeships. This reduces the risk for their local partnered companies, as these are $15 an hour positions for 3 months. If a few people come in and prove themselves, then they're likely to take more LaunchCode graduates. Compared to comparable programs, which can cost $10k or more, this is probably the most important positive of LaunchCode. Several of the teachers were really great teachers, senior level software engineers with experience in the language that they were teaching. My teacher for Java could easily have been a Computer Science professor at a large university, and often would point out and correct some inaccuracies or suggest better practices than the examples in the course material. The bad: The course materials are confusing, lacking, or at times incorrect. I'll preface this by saying the material is constantly changing and evolving from "semester" to "semester". However, where it usually is pretty good at telling you how something works, there was almost no coverage of WHEN to use something. Real world examples would be super beneficial, but are usually absent. You can really only get so far with a basic understanding of each of the puzzle pieces and how they work by themselves, but no real knowledge of how to fit them together to build an application that is efficient, maintainable, and scalable. Again, my course was 2 years ago, and was only the second (I believe) time it had been run in my city, so this could have changed by now. However, I have a friend who is in the current class and has shared the current material with me. While the material has been updated, some of it is still worded in a fairly confusing manner. You will be teaching yourself a fair amount. The course only meets in person twice a week for at most 3 hours. Often, less than half of it is actual lecture time, with the remaining time used for "studio" aka the lab portion. I'd say over 75% the time, I was out the door in 2 to 2.25 hours. There is only so much lecture that can really be absorbed in a single day for most people, so I understood this, but when you're only really being "taught" for 2 to 3 hours a week, they can't cover everything that is important. But, I do feel like that is partly by design. Again, this is a completely free program. They're looking for not only the best and the brightest, but the hardest workers and the ones willing to teach themselves, as this absolutely IS a skill you need to succeed in any development position. There will always be new libraries, new languages, new tools, etc that you will be expected to teach yourself. We started with 250 people, but dropped down to about 110 after unit 1 of 3 finished. More trickled out over the next two units, so I'd say only 60-80 people actually finished the LaunchCode 101 portion. However, the people who do finish have shown that likely fit into a few categories that are marketable to companies looking for developers: smart enough to pick things up very quickly with minimal teaching, and can learn by reading, modifying, and just testing things out. can pick things up pretty easily with minimal teaching, but still have to supplement their knowledge with extra reading, especially for upper-intermediate and advanced topics not naturally inclined to programming, and likely lagged behind others in their course, but determined enough to teach themselves, take a concurrent online course, and spend several hours studying or practicing their skills daily until they find a job All three of these "types" of people are valuable to a dev team, especially if you think differently to other people that stereotypically fit into a developer role. Someone who isn't naturally inclined to programming will bring insights that those who are naturally gifted won't think about. However, that leads me to my final, most frustrating negative. LaunchCode's apprenticeship program/job placement unit, called LiftOff, is not technically part of the base LaunchCode course. It was a 4th, optional unit, for people who wanted an apprenticeship. And apprenticeship is a pretty good word for it. It's really just continuing on the job training for at least 3 months. Many times this turns into an offer for a full position at more than $15 an hour, but other times it doesn't, and you go back into the program until another company picks you up. I'm honestly okay with all of this, as I feel it is fair and gives the people who work well on teams a shot to impress the company they are at for 3 months, guaranteed, for livable compensation. The main issue is that their list of apprenticeships is not fair, is not revolving, and if you don't land a job in the first 6 months afterwards, you likely won't through LaunchCode. Search for LaunchCode on any job listing website, and you'll find dozens of postings advertising not LaunchCode, but their apprenticeship program. If you have all the skills necessary, you can apply and get accepted, while doing no ACTUAL work in any of the units. So, they're filling the list with people who have Computer Science degrees but haven't gotten into the industry yet, and as someone who took a free boot camp, it's very hard to compete. Additionally, I learned that a local company has a deal where they are guaranteed the top 15 from each semester for first interviews, and they hire 5 of those each year. If you're in the group of 10 that interview but aren't hired, you're nearly guaranteed to be placed within the first few months of finishing LiftOff. These are the "best and brightest" to them. I put enough work in to interview, but not be hired, and was placed at a job less than 2 months later. It seems that most of the rest of the positions are filled by the non-LaunchCode apprentices. My TA for the third unit had taken LaunchCode the year before me, but still hadn't been placed anywhere, and hadn't had any interviews set up by LaunchCode in 9 or 10 months, all the while job postings are going up on every imaginable site advertising the apprenticeship program. I just feel that it's a bit dishonest to pass yourself off as training these great graduates who go on to do great things when in reality, it seems like a small percentage of those they actually teach are showing what LaunchCode can do. They need to work on standing on their own merit, and maybe that's the slow play, get integrated with partner companies, and show the types of people that can come in (even if a bit dishonestly), they give themselves more staying power in that city, but it just doesn't seem right to me. However, I do know of many people who did not get placed by LaunchCode that did end up in development positions or in positions with a fast track to a development position, so if you're in the final graduate list, you do have what it takes to come in at a junior or associate level. Just be expected to prove yourself and strive to be in the top 15. Overall, I have to say it worked for me. My pay has increased by well over 50% in the 2 years since I completed the course, and I am much happier than i ever was in any other job. I finally feel like I have a career, and part of that is thanks to LaunchCode. If you can look past the negatives, and realize that getting what they offer for absolutely zero risk to you except your time, you will see that this is easily one of the most accessible programs out there. If you are a self-starter, good at learning on your own, and determined to change your life, you'll do fine.
First off, I will say I graduated and was placed into a job by LaunchCode. I am very grateful for the opportunity, and it's worked out very well for me in the 2 years since I was hired.
The good:
If a classroom environment is right for you, then you will likely do well here. I learn better in a classroom, surrounded by like minded individuals. I have too many distractions at home to really focus and teach myself, though I had gotten fairly far with some Python a year or two before applying, and have been using HTML and CSS for over 20 years now.
It's completely and totally free. My only expenses were a new laptop (only because I spilled water on my perfectly working one about halfway through the course) and transportation/commuting costs. They achieve this by partnering with the companies in the area they're located, and promising them developers who have gone through their program for temporary apprenticeships. This reduces the risk for their local partnered companies, as these are $15 an hour positions for 3 months. If a few people come in and prove themselves, then they're likely to take more LaunchCode graduates. Compared to comparable programs, which can cost $10k or more, this is probably the most important positive of LaunchCode.
Several of the teachers were really great teachers, senior level software engineers with experience in the language that they were teaching. My teacher for Java could easily have been a Computer Science professor at a large university, and often would point out and correct some inaccuracies or suggest better practices than the examples in the course material.
The bad:
The course materials are confusing, lacking, or at times incorrect. I'll preface this by saying the material is constantly changing and evolving from "semester" to "semester". However, where it usually is pretty good at telling you how something works, there was almost no coverage of WHEN to use something. Real world examples would be super beneficial, but are usually absent. You can really only get so far with a basic understanding of each of the puzzle pieces and how they work by themselves, but no real knowledge of how to fit them together to build an application that is efficient, maintainable, and scalable. Again, my course was 2 years ago, and was only the second (I believe) time it had been run in my city, so this could have changed by now. However, I have a friend who is in the current class and has shared the current material with me. While the material has been updated, some of it is still worded in a fairly confusing manner.
You will be teaching yourself a fair amount. The course only meets in person twice a week for at most 3 hours. Often, less than half of it is actual lecture time, with the remaining time used for "studio" aka the lab portion. I'd say over 75% the time, I was out the door in 2 to 2.25 hours. There is only so much lecture that can really be absorbed in a single day for most people, so I understood this, but when you're only really being "taught" for 2 to 3 hours a week, they can't cover everything that is important. But, I do feel like that is partly by design. Again, this is a completely free program. They're looking for not only the best and the brightest, but the hardest workers and the ones willing to teach themselves, as this absolutely IS a skill you need to succeed in any development position. There will always be new libraries, new languages, new tools, etc that you will be expected to teach yourself. We started with 250 people, but dropped down to about 110 after unit 1 of 3 finished. More trickled out over the next two units, so I'd say only 60-80 people actually finished the LaunchCode 101 portion. However, the people who do finish have shown that likely fit into a few categories that are marketable to companies looking for developers:
- smart enough to pick things up very quickly with minimal teaching, and can learn by reading, modifying, and just testing things out.
- can pick things up pretty easily with minimal teaching, but still have to supplement their knowledge with extra reading, especially for upper-intermediate and advanced topics
- not naturally inclined to programming, and likely lagged behind others in their course, but determined enough to teach themselves, take a concurrent online course, and spend several hours studying or practicing their skills daily until they find a job
All three of these "types" of people are valuable to a dev team, especially if you think differently to other people that stereotypically fit into a developer role. Someone who isn't naturally inclined to programming will bring insights that those who are naturally gifted won't think about.
However, that leads me to my final, most frustrating negative. LaunchCode's apprenticeship program/job placement unit, called LiftOff, is not technically part of the base LaunchCode course. It was a 4th, optional unit, for people who wanted an apprenticeship. And apprenticeship is a pretty good word for it. It's really just continuing on the job training for at least 3 months. Many times this turns into an offer for a full position at more than $15 an hour, but other times it doesn't, and you go back into the program until another company picks you up. I'm honestly okay with all of this, as I feel it is fair and gives the people who work well on teams a shot to impress the company they are at for 3 months, guaranteed, for livable compensation.
The main issue is that their list of apprenticeships is not fair, is not revolving, and if you don't land a job in the first 6 months afterwards, you likely won't through LaunchCode. Search for LaunchCode on any job listing website, and you'll find dozens of postings advertising not LaunchCode, but their apprenticeship program. If you have all the skills necessary, you can apply and get accepted, while doing no ACTUAL work in any of the units. So, they're filling the list with people who have Computer Science degrees but haven't gotten into the industry yet, and as someone who took a free boot camp, it's very hard to compete. Additionally, I learned that a local company has a deal where they are guaranteed the top 15 from each semester for first interviews, and they hire 5 of those each year. If you're in the group of 10 that interview but aren't hired, you're nearly guaranteed to be placed within the first few months of finishing LiftOff. These are the "best and brightest" to them. I put enough work in to interview, but not be hired, and was placed at a job less than 2 months later. It seems that most of the rest of the positions are filled by the non-LaunchCode apprentices. My TA for the third unit had taken LaunchCode the year before me, but still hadn't been placed anywhere, and hadn't had any interviews set up by LaunchCode in 9 or 10 months, all the while job postings are going up on every imaginable site advertising the apprenticeship program.
I just feel that it's a bit dishonest to pass yourself off as training these great graduates who go on to do great things when in reality, it seems like a small percentage of those they actually teach are showing what LaunchCode can do. They need to work on standing on their own merit, and maybe that's the slow play, get integrated with partner companies, and show the types of people that can come in (even if a bit dishonestly), they give themselves more staying power in that city, but it just doesn't seem right to me.
However, I do know of many people who did not get placed by LaunchCode that did end up in development positions or in positions with a fast track to a development position, so if you're in the final graduate list, you do have what it takes to come in at a junior or associate level. Just be expected to prove yourself and strive to be in the top 15.
Overall, I have to say it worked for me. My pay has increased by well over 50% in the 2 years since I completed the course, and I am much happier than i ever was in any other job. I finally feel like I have a career, and part of that is thanks to LaunchCode.
If you can look past the negatives, and realize that getting what they offer for absolutely zero risk to you except your time, you will see that this is easily one of the most accessible programs out there. If you are a self-starter, good at learning on your own, and determined to change your life, you'll do fine.