arol.dev

It's been 3 weeks since my graduation. After a little rest I realized how much my life has changed in these 5 months. I can say with confidence that I made the best decision for myself. 

It was an exciting, challenging, inspiring adventure that finally made me fall in love with programming and, I'm sure, captured me for a very long time. 

I’m so happy that I’ve chosen arol.dev. It’s not just a mentorship program (which itself is worth a lot). This place is literally your home for a few months where you are treated as a member of the family. It’s not only about learning programming (and believe me you will learn a lot), it’s also the experience that Arol, Olga and other teachers have in all the different areas of professional life. You will be taught not only how to code, but also a lot of soft skills that will help you in the programming world. 

After finishing the program I’ve been attending a lot of events for students and graduates of different bootcamps and put together a small review for myself with differences between this program and others. In arol.dev you will get: 

• 24/7 support from Arol and team. And I really mean it.
• No homework! You only work in the office (office hours) and all the other time from 8pm to 9am next day you dedicate to rest. The office hours are quite tense but at the same time it’s right enough for you to cover all the material and finish all the projects with teacher’s support. From my side I can say that this point is crucial as you will need to have enough good rest to recharge for the next day.
• A wide range of tech stack from the very basics of programming to deployment. I’ve talked to people asking what they’ve learned in their bootcamps and telling them what I’ve learned. Most people haven’t even heard about Postgres and MongoDB, Docker, Koa, AWS and many other things which we covered with Arol during the course.
• Office and out of office activities with the team. There are always fruit, snacks and good coffee in the office. 3 times a week we went outside for sport sessions, played funny board games together after big assessments or just to relax. The atmosphere is very important and in here as I already said - you are a part of family and you feel it.
• It’s perfect experience to be here in the Barcelona office of arol.dev, but at the same time Arol has his own studio for recording lectures/having zooms for live coding sessions with all the best equipment like mic, camera, lights etc so with all these he makes online students feel like they are right here in the office with us. So it’s perfectly fine to be online part time or even all the time because Arol is very professional in what he does and you will get the same experience as if you were in the office.

To sum it up, the course worth it all (both your money and your time) as you will get much more than you invested.

My objective with this review is to provide you with an accurate description of my experience at Arol.dev, as well as the advice that I would give to myself if I were to do this bootcamp again. 

Before you read any further, allow me to confirm that what you will learn in this course will prepare you not only to find a job as a Software engineer but also to excel into your role as you more to a more senior position. However, I also want to warn you about its intensity and commitment, because, unlike other bootcamps, Arol is unwilling to sugarcoat the benchmarks that you will have to meet in order to guarantee your success. There are several things worth sharing about my experience:

• The curriculum was rigorous and comprehensive, covering all the essential programming concepts and industry tools that one needs to succeed in the tech industry. Arol is an extremely knowledgeable instructor and starting from the pre-assignment, he sets the expected pace of depth of each assignment. The projects were challenging and the fact that they were based on the latest technologies helps you apply the theory in a practical setting that is close to real-life development.

• The quality of the instructors is world-class. Something that is evident from the start is how Arol is an exceptional programmer. Given that not all programmers are great mentors, one of my initial fears for me was to see how that teaching approach would be. Arol is humble, patient and provides honest advice. He understands the starting position of each student and works with you on a 1-on-1 basis to help you succeed. What sets this bootcamp apart is that Arol is clearly committed to making each of its students succeed -provided that you are matching his effort-.
  
  
• It is intense and extremely rewarding. Every day starts with a warmup coding exercise before the lecture. After the lecture, there is an explanation of the delivery that you have to meet before the end of the day. I was surprised by how much we could get done before each day’s 7pm cutoff to deliver our work. Then, there’s a final review of the exercise where people also showcase their work. I found this to be incredibly useful to understand the different approaches from other students as well as the expectations from the industry. Oh, and there are also classes on Saturdays. However, despite the grueling pace, I never felt overwhelmed or unsupported.

• It has a collaborative environment where your peers become your friends. They say that you are the average of your closest 5 friends. In my opinion, Arol leverages this approach by only accepting people that have the potential to become exceptional programmers, which pushes you to excel as well. There are also meditation sessions and group activities such as paddle surfing, which allow you to get a taste of what Barcelona has to offer. Through pair programming and group projects, we learned to communicate effectively and solve problems together.

Overall, I would highly recommend this bootcamp to anyone who is serious about pursuing a career in programming. It's not for the faint of heart, but if you're willing to put in the work, you'll come out on the other side with the skills, confidence, and network you need to succeed in this exciting field.
If you are serious about this -given that you are still reading this-, I want to share the following recommendations for you to prepare for this experience:

• Think of problems as an opportunity to find a solution. Coming into the course, I had always been scared of React. I was able to break down this scary problem into smaller subsets and now, having completed it, I can say that this was a challenge worth facing for my professional career.
  
  
• To be a developer, you have to become self-sufficient. Many people come into a bootcamp expecting help every time they get stuck. The worst moments were when I was fighting all alone with a given problem. But later on, I understood that it was thanks to overcoming this struggle(s) that I was more capable of appreciating the correct solution and evaluating the tradeoffs of my own approach.
  
  
• Take care of your wellbeing. Sleep, workout and communicate if you are tired. We each come to the bootcamp with our own personal battery and challenges. I was training for a half-ironman during the start of the course and I recall that after finishing the race I was sick and in bed for a couple of days. The thing that helped me get back on track was to meditate, take care of myself and accept the tradeoff that I had made for that given week.

I hope that you have acquired a better sense of why Arol.dev was a useful experience for me and how it could be beneficial for you in the future. There are many more things that could have been said about the bootcamp, but the only true way for you to experience them is to decide whether (1) you want to become a software developer and (2) if this is the right place for you to start this journey. For any questions other, feel free to reach out to me via email at -jc2897@cornell.edu-. 

As 42 years old father of three, coming from the Real Estate industry with a background in accounting and report controlling, I was excited to make a career change and pursue something related to tech. The importance of tech in the future cannot be overstated. The dynamic environment surrounding it means there is always something new to learn and exciting developments to be a part of.
I highly recommend the Arol.dev software engineering program, which helped me obtain solid knowledge in JavaScript and other relevant technologies despite having no prior coding experience.
The Arol.dev team is amazing, always encouraging and attentive to individual needs and progress. Founder Arol is very present on a daily basis and easily reachable, as are the rest of the instructors and staff who are highly competent and always looking to help boost your performance.
The program strikes a good balance between theory and practice, with a specific part dedicated to working on a group project where you can obtain valuable learnings to apply later in your real work life. 
I found the people I met in the course to be very interesting and highly motivated to learn, and I learned a lot from them. 
I completed the course in person, and the office is well-equipped and located in a fantastic spot in Barcelona near the sea and only 20 minutes from the city center.
Overall, I highly recommend the Arol.dev software engineering program to anyone looking to pursue a career in tech.

Although not officially a student, I got to work closely with Arol, Olga, and the students during a semester. I found myself learning from Arol and naturally during my duties every day. My experience with computer science comes from a university background, which is very theory-laden, and does not touch upon practical exercises or web development until later years if at all. Thus, Arol was very flexible and helpful in teaching me the fundamentals of web development, supporting my self-directed learning, and allowing me to work and contribute in my areas of interest. By the end, I had spent several months in a practical software engineering environment, and attained proficiency in web development such that I have made several of my own personal projects.
The last point I want to make is on the interpersonal dynamic at arol.dev. I am from the U.S., so settling in Spain for a few months was somewhat of a challenge, but Arol and Olga were very helpful in that aspect. Additionally, everyone gets to know each other very well through group learning exercises, and more casual activities like meals together. This made the experience so much more fun for me, and the connections I developed are lasting well beyond my time there. Ultimately, I would highly recommend arol.dev to anyone looking to break into software engineering from anywhere for its interpersonal environment, focus on practicality, and its highly-talented instructors.

Overall, I highly recommend this program to anyone interested in pursuing a career in software engineering. It's an intensive program, but it's well worth the effort. The knowledge and skills that I gained through the program have already helped me land my first job as a software engineer, and I'm confident that it will continue to benefit me throughout my career.

The curriculum covered a wide range of topics, including programming languages, data structures, algorithms, and software development methodologies. The hands-on projects and coding exercises were challenging but also incredibly rewarding, as they gave me the opportunity to apply what I had learned in a real-world setting.

Summary: Remarkable the staff, they make it a unique experience personalized for each individual. The syllabus outstanding compared with the rest of the industry, I promise that you will be ready even for mid positions.

This program is special for several reasons but mainly 2: 

The teachers and stuff, not only will receive detailed support but they will enhance your soft skills, this will be really important after the graduation. I know for friends that other bootcamps treat you like money, this is not the case, totally worth. 

The syllabus is focused not on web dev but software engineer, really important. You study important concepts that will make you shine from other bootcamps students. Algorithms and data structures, testing (real important), system design, automation, typescript + the BE-FE skills.