Bloc

Prior too my bootcamp experience with Bloc, I had no idea how to code or build web applications. Just a dream pursuing a career as a web developer and working with some great people.

Overall the curriculum is very thorough and well written. In addition to having a great curriculum, they are really good about making sure their content is up to date. As a Blocster you'll always have access to your materials and the updates they provide. 

One of the best parts about my experience with Bloc was working with my mentor on the Frontend portion of the track. My only wish is that our sessions were a bit longer.

If you are interested in learning web development Bloc is a a great online bootcamp and very resonably priced.

I'm currently in the process of refining my portfolio and hoping to land my first job as a developer very soon. It's been a tough journey so far!

I enrolled in Bloc's UX/UI Design course a little less than 2 years ago. I was formerly a teacher with no technical or design skills whatsoever. The curriculum was thoroughly written and as a former teacher, this was greatly appreciated. I love even more that it has been updated and I now have access to the new curriculum. The relationship I gained with my mentor is priceless. He walked me through each checkpoint with such grace and encouragement. My mentor also provided honest feedback in order for me to grow as a designer. He asked open-ended questions that would cause critical thinking. I believe this course prepared me for what is expected in the "real" design world. Upon completion, I have been able to freelance consistently from home, which is exactly what I wanted to do. I have recently obtained a full-time contract position with a well-known software company. I am still able to work from home, but I get to interact with an incredible design team and get experience with working within a corporate setting. I owe all my skills and knowledge to Bloc. 

Let me start by saying that I am fortunate in that my job was willing to pay for me to take the Bloc Front-End Course part-time (36 weeks). Had I not gotten this class for free, I might be writing a very different, much more negative review.

It's cool that they dive deep-ish into JavaScript and Angular, but the curriculum is ridiculously basic. Every lesson is broken down into checkpoints and assignments. Checkpoints are lots of hand-holding, telling you exactly what code to write while doing an OK job at explaining concepts. Assignments are abusrdly simple, sometimes as ridiculous as asking you to write less than 3 lines of code. I had assignments take me less than a minute to complete. Timewise, I'm 50% done but curriculum-wise I'm basically finished and working on my capstone/ portfolio site. I wished the program was more challenging.

The major plus of Bloc, as many mention, is the mentor relationship. My mentor was very talented and knowledgeable, but he wasn't very engaging. Also, there has been no pair programming as advertised, he'll type up something and not really explain his thinking despite my asking him. He has also been late to meetings, rescheduling at the last minute, and doesn't have the kind of energy I need to propel me through this kind of self-paced learning. Others seem to have lucked out more than me.

I will give Bloc some credit. This experience was a pressure test to see if I like programming enough, and the good news is I do! I'm basically considering this Bloc experience as my "Bachelors" before I apply to Flatiron School's Learn Verified program.

Having a mentor and the external expextations to pracice design everyday is amazing. However, for $5000 I'd expected the ciriculum to be waaaaay better. Each checkpoint is broken into 2 sections, the lesson + the assignment. The lesson leaves you wanting since it's just a really boring video of someone doing the assignment without explaining what the code or design tools means–he just says, outloud, the exact thing he is typing. How would the possible think that is useful?? 

In the same respect, the curriculum workflow is very off-puting at times. 

I also strongly belive that UX/UI course is title is misleading. There is only a short section on user research and testing, and very little information on what UX even is. While there are a lot of wireframes, it feels much more like a primer to front-end design than UX, and an incomplete one at that. 

I'm located in the South Bay, CA, and being so close to SF meant I had a lot of different options to choose from for a UX bootcamp. I did a lot of research, and eventually landed on Bloc because my manager at the time allowed me to work part time while doing this on the side. And I'm so, so glad I did.

In the time that I started and ended Bloc, General Assembly raised their bootcamp prices by $2k+. I had a friend that was doing their UX program at the exact same time as I was doing Bloc, and it was great to compare and contrast what and how we were learning.

GA is great if you like learning in others and in group settings, but frankly, I didn't want group projects and stressing about who does what, like in high school, spending money and figuring out commute. I think the guest speakers are the coolest part about GA, but... you can find so many great talks online now. 

I liked that Bloc allowed me to pursue my career part time, my small business, and this all at once- I was busy, but I could pace myself and work and learn from home. I learned all the basics, all the tools, and my mentor was amazing, so fast at answering any questions I had, and I was still in touch with him through my job seeking process and after. The facebook group was also super helpful and everyone was very kind and helpful on that- virtual student feedback was very valuable.

Bloc is sitill developing its cirriculum, so it's defiitely not perfect- but the student advisors are all really kind and open to suggestions. I'm not sure why people expect these programs to be magical and give you a job right out of it- that's quite impossible- but if you work hard, ask lots of questions, Bloc is the perfect partner. Highly reccommend. 

I was attending when the full-stack program was less than $5k.  While I was in the program, they changed the curriuculm twice and then began advertising that the true full-stack course would begin soon.  I would be allowed to switch by paying the additional money, of course.  To me, this felt like a classic "bait and switch," which I know was not the intention of these changes; however, it did show to me that the product they have is not tested or complete.  My mentor spent a lot of time explaining to me when I was frustrated, that the curriculum team had made changes.  Some parts ended up being harder or missing instructions.  I also spent time talking to other students that said they had subscribed to all these extenal services and were studying an additional 10-20 hours on top of the program, because the program itself wasn't sufficicient for their learning needs.  Sorry... I want something that is actually a complete, strong product.  Bloc was not for me.

    Even though I have completed 150% of the curriculum materials, I had to spend much of my time locating and learning additional supplemental materials in order to be able to understand the program's course materials.  I found the course materials to contain many undisclosed errors, and the directions often were vague, resulting in time wasted and frustration. 

I also had a hard time finding a mentor who was able to simply explain some of the questions I had with the curriculum, but after some trial and error I did connect with the right person and was lucky to be able to keep in touch with him.  Had I not made the effort to find the right mentor, I would have been stuck with a mentor who was unfamiliar with areas of the curriculum concepts with which I had the most questions.  My coordinator was not as helpful in facilitating this as I had hoped and it was hard to get an immediate or timely response from her via email.  This resulted in having to call her then wait and hope she would take some action quickly before next meeting started.
  All the mentors don't really have materials prepared for your meetings, they just react to whatever questions you might have....so the overwhelming portion of most meetings were spent with the mentor "thinking about" your question, rather than efficiently providing answers.  So even if you have a good mentor who might extend your time for a free half hour, you should only expect two or three issues that you might be having with the curriculum to be resolved in any half hour or full hour session. 

After I completed all the material in over a month's less time than expected, my mentor and I didn't know what to talk about or where to take the discussion to make best use of our remaining meeting time.  He said he might come up with more material for me to learn, but ended up pointing me to other online coding schools with tutorials and exercises.  I basically went back to doing my own research for materials to learn and asked him questions if I got stumped along the way, but his ability to answer really depended on his familiarity with these outside materials.

In my opinion, their job support program as advertised is purely propaganda and should be called into question.  As I was told by the career person, the best resources available for students to find a job is the Slack Student Group, as well as their 'psychology' webinar for career support. 
I attended once, and the topic instantly put me off.  Unless you're too afraid to apply for jobs, that webinar might be for you.
  Also, advertised as part of your deal is that you are supposed to be able to benefit from their free curriculum updates, but shortly after I graduated, somehow I wasn't able to see my curriculum page even when I've logged into my account.  I can see anything in my account except my Roadmap.  I sent them a message to request to fix my issues, but they still have not responded at all.

It's been an agitating and frustrating journey for me.  Worse comes to worst, the result is I will have to apply to another similar program, and do it all over again.  Hopefully at the end of this journey I can get a job as a reward.  It's the wasting of money and more importantly, my time that really bugs me.  If you don't expect to get a job in the end, just want to pay for materials to learn and don't mind the price, you might try it yourself.  I still would not recommend it though.

 

 

 

 

Like many others, I came to Bloc after having tried the many free/low-cost online coding programs (e.g. Treehouse, Code School, etc). In college I had thought about computer programming, but ended up deciding a pre-dental path. After college I found that my interests lied more heavily with programming and I started to research coding bootcamps. I ended up choosing Bloc in large part due to the flexible pacing. I knew that I would want to start on a part-time track and possibly finish at the full-time pace. I did exactly that and the transition was seamless.

 

I had a truly amazing mentor. She had previous teaching experience and it really showed. Rather than simply giving me the answers to problems that I struggled with, she gave me the tools to identify the issue, find/understand possible solutions, and implement the appropriate solution. These are skills that I use daily as a software engineer. That's right, my time with Bloc did lead me to full time employment as a software engineer. And to top it off, it was my mentor's husband (also a programmer) who referred me for this position.

 

I was very happy with my Bloc experience. The staff that I had the pleasure of working with were incredibly helpful, gave great advice and were very supportive. I had the opportunity to meet several of them at their HQ meetups last year. Prior to joining Bloc, I had several calls with one of their student outreach advisors. He helped me understand what I could expect from Bloc, what Bloc would expect from me and also gave me insights about what I could expect from other bootcamps. When I spoke with support staff from other programs, I did not feel the love like I did when working with Bloc.

 

I did feel that the entry-level curriculum was lacking a bit. By the time I hit the Angular portion of the course, I did not feel like I had a good grasp on Javascript. Some of this may have been my bad. I was so excited to start building things that I wanted to get the foundation phase done quick. From what I've heard though, Bloc has totally updated their curriculum since I completed the course. That's what is so great about this program. They take feedback from prior students and make adjustments/improvements. 

 

In the end, with Bloc I learned a ton and was able to transition to a completely different career path. I do think it is important to keep in mind that you, as the student, are responsible for keeping up with course material and putting in the time to make sure that you understand what you're doing. You will only get as much as you put in to this experience. The mentor is not there to hold your hand every second of every day. They are there to help guide you, motivate you and occasionally help you get unstuck. Do your research to determine if this style of program is right for you. It was for me and I hope many others find that to be true. 

 

 

In my experience, Bloc, the program and the employees, has been as good as I could have expected.  The course work is specifically designed to insure that students learn the skills necessary to find employment and succeed as a developer.  They are also willing to grow, and therefore, expand existing course material.  This, to me, imphasizes their willingness to improve and make sure they are providing the most up to date learning environment for their students.  My mentor guided me through the course material rather than just giving me the information.  This allowed me to retain information and allowed the experience of solving difficult issues to be more rewarding.  Perhaps most importantly for people interested in learing code, Bloc has an well organized system to help you find a job as a developer. They honestly care about your success.  I am glad I joined Bloc, and I would recommend Bloc to anyone who is willing to put in the effort to learn web development. 

I have used many online courses and tutorials including: Treehouse (paid), Codecademy, Code School, and Udacity.  Bloc has some unique features that stand out.

1. Mentors.  My mentor pushed me toward self-reliance.  I want to make web and software development my career.  I need to be able to communicate to employers that I can do the job.  Ben pushed me to look up answers and think critically through my challenges.  He was not there to spoon-feed me information.  When I was a police officer, I had the same kind of mentoring.  It is the kind of mentoring that actually produces competence.

2. The organization of the curriculum.  While working through the foundational material and my projects, I have never wondered, "What am I supposed to be doing next?"  Bloc's apprentice dashboard is incedibly helpful for keeping track of accomplishments and staying on pace to complete the apprenticeship.

3. Focus on building applications.  I want to build applications...I should probably build some applications.  This has been my life with Bloc: read, think, build, evaluate.  Repeat.  I don't watch someone build something and dream about building something.  I get to build things and see them work in real life on my machine and out on the web.

I am just a few checkpoints away from my Rails program graduation.  I know how to build applications, I know how to find answers to my questions, and I am not afraid to work hard to build working applications.  Bloc has made an incredible impact on me.

 

About me:

I have a bachelor's and master's degree.  I am making a career change.  I am in my late 30s.

Thought was a comlete waste of money. The instructions on how to do anything were very obscure and if you wanted to know more there were links to Wikipedia (?)

One had to download software but there were links to other sites for instructions on how to install it and then your instructor tells you it wasn't the right way, then he also had a different teamwork viewer than Bloc says is recommended and you waste your whole one-on-one session reinstalling everything. 

My first instructor was knowledgable but there were so many inconsistencies with so many things, that it super confusing. There was also a baby crying in the background the WHOLE session, to add to the frustration. My second instructor was nice but it was too late.

Bloc is so disorganised i cannot even start explaining. Don't waste your money! 

Half hour sessions with under equipped teachers were a waste of time. My teacher had a blog post from about a year before about how they're learning rails and now they're in charge of teaching me? It shows, they're not hiring good developers to teach students. No group project which seems like a no brainer since people want to work as a team.

If you're looking to build half featured applications completely alone with the assistance of someone with 6 months of experience who has to google documentation, then you're going to love Bloc!

I graduated the Bloc Full Stack Web Development apprenticeship and it was one of the most fulfilling things I decided to do.

I wanted to level up in life and gain some useful skills.  Stuck in an unsatisfactory dead-end career, I decided to formally get some training on development.  My knowledge of programming had been limited to self-taught books and online tutorials.  I "shopped around" and considered brick and mortar schools as well as other online/remote schools.  What led me to Bloc was their value.  How I considered the value was by tallying the languages and technologies the apprenticeship taught along with the total amount of hours dedicated to learning divided by the dollar amount.  That, and being coupled with an experienced mentor got me to sign up with them.

I'll admit, I was VERY hesitant learning from a remote school.  I wanted the satisfaction of someone being able to look over my shoulder and review what I was learning.  Bloc's remote mentorship proved to be an excellent substitute.  Depending on the pace, you meet one to three times a week for roughly 30 minutes each time and you share screens so your mentor can see how you're doing and answer questions.  This one-on-one meeting turned out to be very useful, as I was able to focus on my work and not be slowed down, or left behind by a class of students of varying skill levels.  I felt my mentor was able to fine-tune the curriculum to my speed and skills.

Bloc was great when I started and got better as I advanced in my program.  Throughout the course, I was able to give feedback on my mentor and the program itself.  You could see that Bloc was slowly evolving and considering the feedback to make things better.

I would recommend Bloc to anyone who thinking about a career in programming and has no clue where to start.  I think those with no or little knowledge will benefit the most this program, however, even those who just want to polish their skills or learn something new will be able to take away a lot.

Sign up here for $100 off Bloc! https://www.bloc.io/?ref_token=MjMwMzM1MQ

From a proud alumni of the Bloc Full-Stack Apprenticeship:

TL:DR Do it! :D

I started in Oct, 2014 with the slowest course (36 weeks) because I was working a full-time job and am married. I finished July, 2015, averaging about 9 hours per week, although 10-15 was recommended. I wish I'd had more time to study, but 9 hours worked pretty well.

Almost halfway through, I wrote this post on my blog sharing my experience so far and also how preparing before Bloc was a great help.

Overall, the program definitely met my expectations. I was an embedded software engineer for 5 years before Bloc but had almost no web development skills. Bloc took me from basically zero to pretty much being able to do (or at least learn!) anything I please.

The course structure of 1/3 foundation and 2/3 projects was perfect for me. You can really learn a lot in the project section, especially if you get creative and make your projects unique.

My biggest regret is not making sure I had a good mentor. I had my first mentor for the first 1/3 of the course before dumping him and getting another one. However, the second one was hardly better, so I ended up finally switching to a good one about a month before the end. They were nice people, but they didn't take a proactive role in helping me. They basically only answered questions I asked, yet I didn't have many questions because I picked up everything easily. At the time, I didn't realize the value I was missing.

So my main recommendation is to insist on getting a good mentor and ruthlessly switch until you find one that really helps. Hopefully Bloc has improved their monitoring of this, but regardless, you are the one paying and the one that knows how much a specific mentor is helping. You want a mentor that will proactively review your code/project and give helpful feedback (not just "looks good"). Someone that truly wants to spend the whole session helping you instead of getting done as fast as possible (Levi Kennedy was the excellent mentor I ended with!).

I also didn't have the greatest experience with their job prep (basically no help at all), but I think they've improved this at least some. I tried to find a junior job but never did (search is currently on hold due do other life factors :)

If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to me @flybayer

P.S. Sign up through my referral link for a $100 discount!

I enrolled in bloc last year for their 36 week course and it's completely revamped my skills as a designer. I graduated from college with experience in print design but web design was always the scary subject I dared not cross. Mentor Chris Courtney was a massive help and really helped me re tool my entire design process for more digital outcomes. We really stressed the "why" of what we designed, rather than just making something pretty.  Bloc really works collaboratively, and it was not just a one on one mentorship, but online groups all over the internet to interact with team members and other students. The main benefit of a one on one mentorship is that your mentor really and truly cares about weather or not you succeed, and really push you to do your best so you come out of bloc an even better designer and ready for the working world.

I really wanted to pursue an education in programming and web design.  I discovered coding bootcamps all over the country and started my journey to find the one that was the best fit for me.  Originally I was going to enroll in one of those immersive bootcamp programs that you would sprint through in less than 12 weeks.  But upon further review I found that I wanted to take the time to digest each new lesson at my own pace.  I also found the immersive bootcamp pricing to be a bit much.

I then found Bloc and started my dialog with the company.  I loved the flexibility of the program and learned how to spend my nights and weekends developing my coding skills.  Ricky Panzer was my mentor that I talked to every week and helped push me in the right direction every time I got stuck.  It was an amazing experience and I am successfully taking on my very own freelance jobs today.

I am nearing my halfway point with Bloc and so far my experience has been great. My mentor has been excellent (Timothy Barnes) and I look forward to diving into my Frontend material after the holidays.

Bloc is setup so you work through checkpoints with your mentor while building out projects. I love this approach compared to a few other in person classroom style camps I checked out. All in all, Bloc has been an awesome place for me to learn thus far.

I do find myself having to be my own boss and that was a bit of a transition. I consider myself to be a independent learner, however this part of the learning took some time as I adjusted to not having a teacher glaring over my every move.

Thus far, I have completed my Reddit project, Wikipedia project and a personal project called ReferMe. 

I would absolutely recommend Bloc to my friends and family!

 

 

Pros I liked my 2nd mentor since my 1st was so horrible I had to switch. 

Cons the program is way over priced for what  they offer and give you. Mentor meeting aren't enough and the teaching method used are very confusing. Majority of the work is done by yourself and nothing is really tought by the mentors, they are just there for questions. There multiple options when it comes other schools that offer same material for less then half of what BLOC charges. If I could go back I would NEVER go with Bloc. I wish someone told me what I know now. I just hope somone else dosnt make the same mistake of choosing bloc. 

I never knew that Bloc existed, as I have been trying for about 6 months to find an online bootcamp, I have not been so successful. Reviewing several bootcamps over the last few months, I refused to become discouraged as I continued to see what local Bootcamps and software schools were available. After finding a couple from the course report  list and through word of mouth, still to no avail an online bootcamp. After receiving the Course Report Bootcamp newsletter, I was astounded that they had several bootcamps listed, hopeful to see more bootcamps become available, AN ONLINE BOOTCAMP! Bloc it is. Reviewed the site, sent my email for further communication, and requested a call from the advisor for a call to setup my online learning for the Designer Track program. Am I excited? Yes. Will I be jumping right in to learn all the things I could have been learning over the last 6 months while looking for this opportunity? Yes. Will I not only get to advance and develop my career, but build on to my many talents as a IT developer. Yes, yes, YES. Thank you Course Report for the newsletter but most importantly this opportunity to review something as spectacular as my personal growth. :)

I'll be graduating from Bloc very soon and I must say I've had a wonderful experience with them.  Looking back at what I have accomplished makes me proud -- I doubt I would have been able to learn as much as I did with just a book and browsing tutorials.  They really offer you the one on one assistence that can push you through the tough times we all have learning to code.  I'm excited for whatever the future may bring me in my search for my next career.

Overall experience: I graduated from the Frontend program with Bloc in February 2015 on the 36 week pace. Initially I started on the 18 week structure as I wanted to get as much information as possible, however work caught up with me and I moved it to the longer structure. I must say, having that flexibility was crucial towards my ability to succeed. My mentor worked with me when I intitally struggled on some early JavaScript concepts and was able to give me multiple resources that helped me navigate signifcant trying moments. At the end of the day, the experience was fantastic despite the big learning curve. Expect to learn a lot of information and definitely expect to fail, and that was what really set me up for success when I reached the project portion of the program. 

Current position: Sales Operations

Prior experience: I had completed the Javascript tutorials on Codecademy, done a lot of Treehouse and also a bit of Code School prior to Bloc. 

Goals: I came into Bloc looking to build applications as well as a portfolio that I could eventually put in front of a company. I am not currently looking to transition right now, but easily could in the next year or two as I start to put the skills I learned to use. 

Mentor: My mentor Andrew was absolutely fantastic. He works at a top tech startup in Silicon Valley and I felt I was learning the most valuable and relevant information from him. He made it very clear to me that relevancy is increasingly important in education and I never felt I was learning something outdated working with him. At the end of the program he mentioned his company was hiring, but I was not ready to leave my current role to take him up on the offer.

Favorite Project: This is a tough call. Building Blocjams or your own version of Spotify appealed to me for my love of music and I really enjoyed making it responsive. Nothing cooler than visitng your own app on your iphone in front of the family! However the capstone was what stood out to me. I had an app idea I always wanted to bring to life and my mentor gave me strong advice on what was capable of building early on. I was able to launch a strong V1 of the app by the end of the course and am focusing the rest of my evenings on it from here on out.

Final thoughts: I found Bloc to be exactly what I was hoping for. The curriculum had a lot of depth and my mentor gave the resources so I could be successful at developing on my own. I might come back for the Rails course in a few months!

Hi my name is Brian. I'll be graduating from Bloc next week. Like the previous reviewer said, my mentor experience was AMAZING - I think that's Bloc's key difference - the confidence-boost you get from working with a real developer who knows what you've built, knows what you're struggling with, and can offer perspective on what you'll need to be able to accomplish to get a job in the real world.  

I enrolled late January for the 12-week course in Rails Development (back then known as Full Stack Development, not to be confused with the similarly-named "Track" offered now). Over 24 weeks later, twice as long as I planned, I still hadn't finished my enrollment and would have required months more to finish.

I signed up right as the curriculum was changing from version 3.0 Rails to 4.0, and it felt like I was right in the middle of a construction site. Checkpoints were extremely wordy and hard to understand for someone like me who learns visually, the very antithesis of my learning style. Assignments at the end of checkpoints were either broken, incomplete, or so poorly worded that my mentor eventually told me to skip them and just submit the checkpoints. This backfired however as checkpoints began integrating these assignments further on, to the point where my foundation app had too many "workarounds" that the instructions basically no longer matched what I was doing anymore. I was told to abandon the foundation app in favor of pursuing projects, but by then the damage had been done. What should have taken one month by their estimates and my initial enrollment dictated, took me four, and it was never completed. It honestly felt like I was paying to beta test their new curriculum to ultimately fail.

Out of six projects to do, I finished one and nearly a second before withdrawing. My struggle with the foundation made it too apparent that I couldn't yet write code sufficient enough to do anything on my own, and the mentor(s) were just dragging me through it all. Nobody would hire me for what I barely know and any work I have to show after six months is either incomplete or basically not my own work.

Program coordinator was hard to get a hold of. Many times they said they'd call next week, and wouldn't. My concerns of falling behind were just dismissed. What should take one or two days to settle something took up to two weeks. Their own website says they hold students accountable, but what about vice versa? Poor communication and curriculum, guess who ultimately suffers? The student.

Thankfully the head coordinator talked to me (they had no plans to extend my mentorship when I was told otherwise) and my complaints were finally listened to. My refund would have been nullified if I hadn't withdrawn. It's left me pretty bitter that I went this long and put so much time and effort into it and things never seemed to get better with Bloc. Just excuses and apologies. They did admit that they didn't live up to their own standards or mine (to graduate and find employment), which effectively meant they knew they were wasting my time.

I can assume by now that the curriculum is in better shape and fully Rails 4.0+ now, but there's no way in hell I'd go through it again nor could I recommend it to anyone. My mentor tried their best but with Bloc's online "book" having so many problems and sometimes being just wrong, the outcome was pretty clear. I was later told that I shouldn't have skipped the assignments - Duh, but I couldn't do them, either.

I sent my foundation app to the curriculum's designer to see if there was any hope of fixing it, but never got a reply. A second mentor was added at one point, but he dropped me from his schedule.

In summary: I learned a lot, but not enough to be hired by anyone or much of anything to show for it. I don't have a good understanding of the core concepts because of the poor foundation. I have to spend more months and more money elsewhere to continue my education.

I took the Rails Web Development course, and found it to be an excellent online bootcamp experience. I have a baby at home, so taking an in-person one wasn't an option. The coursework is extremely thorough, and provided the guided instruction I needed to get started. And my mentor rocked! He was super helpful, and helped answer questions around why I got stuck. Overall, I'm pleased with the projects I've built, and quite satisfied with my experience considering how I got a job 4 weeks after my course as a web developer.

My experience with Bloc was an amazing one.  Entering into the program with very little knowledge of programming, I now feel competent enough to take on a job as a junior developer.

The greatest part of Bloc was the mentor, who went above and beyond to help me out and make sure that I not only could use what was being taught, but also that I understood the reasoning behind it.  

I absolutely would recommend Bloc for those who are dedicated enough to put in the time to get the work done, their curriculum is well thought out and designed, and the mentors will make sure you get where you need to be.

My experience with Bloc was overhwhelmingly poor. While good intentioned my advisor could never remember simple things like whether I was using Ruby or Angular. He frequently tried to push his own software solutions on me and several times had me scrap projects to try our new frameworks or generators that he considered the flavor of the week.

 

Their team is difficult to work with, impossible to escalate complaints with and has poor administrative oversite. For the amount of money they're charging you're much better off attending a different bootcamp.

I enrolled in the front end apprenticeship in September. It was a fantastic experience. Although I did have some difficulty at first with some of the JavaScript content, my mentor got me to where I needed to be. I think that the highlight of Bloc's program is its curriculum (which is constantly changing) and the mentors they hire to get apprentices through. The significant plus of the program is the mentorship, and they constantly challenge you with the material and extra material that's relevant to today's developers. I hesitated about joining Bloc because of the cost, but it was well worth it. I am actually going through their Ruby apprenticeship now, which I am finding difficult, but challenging and rewarding. They have added new material to their Ruby program, so I am having fun and learning a lot of new concepts and ways of thinking about programming that differ from my knowledge of JavaScript.

Bloc was helpful and I do recommend it to people, however it has some drawbacks.  

The positives:

- Great for students who are self driven
- Straight-forward curriculum
- Forces students to learn/research on their own
- Flexibility

The negatives:

- Limited time with a mentor
- Mentors were widely inconsistent in their knowledge and experience (I spoke with 6 along the way, mine was great luckily)
- Cannot cover topics with the same depth as other bootcamps
- Almost zero help with job placement (but you should be networking anyways...so not an issue if you actually plan)
 

My experience doing Full Stack Web Development Course at Bloc.io was an amazing journey from beginning to end!  I came into it without any background in computer programming and now I can build my own web applications.  My mentor was incredible.  He really understood where I was in my learning process at each point in the curriculum, and was therefore able to scaffold my learning so I didn't feel frustrated.  The office hours mentors are really great as well!  I don't know of any other bootcamp that has such extensive office hours.  Being able to get help when you need it makes all the difference. I would highly recommend Bloc's bootcamp!

I just finished Bloc about two weeks ago and am going through their job prep program right now, working 1-on-1 with their CTO doing practice technical interviews.

I’d say that the best part of my Bloc experience was the feeling of finishing a web app or site and moving on to the next one. The feeling of “I did this!” And then the being able to create a solid portfolio that shows the work that you’ve done, its just really gratifying and useful. In fact, that’s actually why I chose Bloc. I wanted to be able to come out with all the knowledge I’d need for a RoR job, but also be able to show what I could do becuase that’s a big part of getting a good job.

I also really liked Bloc’s mentorship aspect because I know that going in I had a ton of questions. Before I enrolled in Bloc’s Full Stack course I was teaching myself Ruby on Rails for about 4 months. But as I messed around with the XAMP stack I was also trying to improve my CSS/HTML skills. So having someone help me break down each of the languages and frameworks I realized where my gaps in knowledge were and what I really needed help with. My mentor, John, was just really helpful, and had a lot of information. If there were things I didn’t know the answers to, we would look it up and solve it together.

I recently graduated from Bloc, and in the time I signed up to leaving I have:

Learned the fundamentals of the Ruby language

Built three functioning web applications

Found not only a mentor, but a friend

Have lifetime access to Bloc's curriculum

Lifetime access to their open office hours.

If you can afford it, it's definitely worth the investment. You'll pick up an incredible new skill and become more creative in the process. They've also got a diversity scholarship in partnership with New Relic that could possibly save you some money. Also, they have a pretty good referral program, $100 off your tuition if you sign up through someone's referral link. It doesn't put much of a dent in the tuition, but an easy $100 back is always worth it.

I completed the 12-week Full Stack Course with Bloc just two months ago. 

Pros:

I could work/learn from anywhere with an internet connection, so I went home to the Philippines, lived rent-free for 3 months, got to spend time with family, while learning Rails development.

My mentor was engaged and cared about how I was learning - the one-on-one connection is rare opportunity. So much was accomplished in the 30 minute meetings. We are still in touch now, taking Coursera classes together.

I loved the pace, and that I was able to go my own pace. For me, this meant 9 hour days learning new concepts, or 4 hours debugging with Stack Overflow, or spending a day playing with Bootstrap. I was able to choose what I wanted to focus on.

Bloc is an amazing community. From the very beginning I had a real person call to onboard and ask me about my goals. Upon enrollment I got a welcome package. I get check ups from program coordinators. Little things like this let me know that they are accessible and are invested in my learning.

Cons:

The course gave me enough to be able to lay out the solid foundations of a Rails application. But it doesn't look pretty. I would have liked to have more exposure to front-end technologies (Ajax, jquery). 

After Bloc, I would've loved to even just a small document giving me options on the next step. Maybe that's delving deeper into CS with algorithm design, or learning Javascript for front-end, or going with the MEAN stack. When I submitted the capstone, I was left thinking, okay now what ? 

Job prep is exactly that, a prep for interviews, giving you technical topics to review and hints on how to present yourself honestly. I wish there was more of a network or platform for Bloc alumni and employers to meet. This is hard for Bloc as each student has her own completion date, but one can dream.

 

I recommend Bloc to someone new to development and is committed to delving deeper. 

Bloc is an amazing program and I highly recommend it for anyone looking to delve deeper into the world of coding.  

I became interested in development because I have an entreprenuerial streak and wanted to learn how to build out some of my own ideas. Bloc has provided me with the skills to do just that.

Furthermore - I am going through the job-prep phase now and I am confident that this will further prepare me for finding work as a developer.

The recommend Bloc for the following reasons - 

1. Mentors - Bloc has amazing mentors - and I absolutely loved working with mine. The fact that you are assigned a single mentor - and they work with you one-on-one really allows them to cater to your learning style and customize the material so that it is presented in a way that is clear for you. Their mentors are very high quality, and my Mentor, Chris, was beyond helpful.

Furthermore - for anyone who has learned on their own and spent copious amounts of time banging their head against the wall - the mentor is there to make sure you do not get stuck and can progress forward. Having this help and not having to waste time was invaluable to me.

2. Curriculum - The curriculum itself is great and I liked the way it was strucutred. It allowed for more hand holding at the beginning and then worked its way to more freedom towards the end. The fact that you are able to build several applications by yourself throughout the course - allows you to see the progression of your own skills as you move thorugh the curriculum.

3. Cost and accountabtiliy - I wanted a program that would hold me accountable and push me - but also one I could afford. Bloc is much less expensive than the other bootcamps so I could actually afford it. Furthermore - it created a framework where between the curriculum and the Mentor - I was able to hold myself accountable and push myself. 

Again, I would highly recommend Bloc - it is a great investment in ones' skillset -but like anything else - you get out of it what you put into it. So if you are willing to work hard, Bloc will help you leverage that effort to get you to where you want to go.

I'm a graduate of the UX design course and I'm starting the Job Prep. I think BLOC is a great solution if you want to enhance your skill, without having to commit with an 'on campus' course. I had to take the course while I was working and I was looking for an online course that also had a bit of human touch and interaction. BLOC was perfect in that sense: the plus value of having one-to-ones with a mentor during the week is invaluable and something that is hard to find in on line courses.

I'm a designer and I'm already working as academic lecturer, but I wanted to move towards the UX design area and BLOC met my expectations. I wanted to create a good collection of work to build my portfolio and eventually enter the UX design world and the meetings with my mentor really helped me with that.

Additionally, I've been contacted at the end of the course for starting the Job Prep and so far I'm excited about what they cover and I'm sure that's exaclty what I need.

As student you will receive tons of suggestions and references by tutors, students and the BLOC team in general, so that you'll definetly know how to spend your free time!

Of course this course requires your effort and you'll need to work in your free time to get the work done (late evenings and week ends mainly, in my case), but you'll be willing to do that in order to achieve the goal you set to yourself, I suppose!

Great experience overall, highly recommended if you want to make a twist in your career and you want to be in touch with great people.

I honestly feel like Bloc has the potential to change your life.  In many ways it has changed mine and the best part is that it will continue to.  

If I wanted to find a job as a developer I'm confident I could find one - especially if I'm willing to relocate.  I am an entrepreneur and wanted to learn enough to be able to create my business ideas.  What I learned in Bloc has given me power to make my ideas become a reality.  

I chose Bloc for three reasons.  

1. The first was it was online.  I simply couldn't relocate and I needed something flexible.  
2. Even though it was online I wanted something intense, something that pushed me, something comparable to an at-location bootcamp. I was so impressed with Bloc in this aspect. The first few weeks are very guided and directed and not that difficult. Slowly it becomes more challenging until you get out of the guided work and you begin building apps on your own with the help of your mentor.  There is flexibility here so for the person who finds this in and of itself challenging gets the challenge but for others who want to do more I was able to work with my mentor and do more advanced work. I loved that customization for me.
3. The leads me to the third reason I chose Bloc. The mentors. This is the heart of Bloc and what makes it stand out. I met with my mentor three times a week!  When I originally signed up I didn't realize it would be so often. I got to work with him on my capstone project which is a business idea I wanted to create. It was amazing to work together with my mentor to create a business.  Just this was worth it for me.  

I now have skills and knowledge I didn't have before. I am better. I have more potential. I couldn't put a price tag on this. Invest in yourself. But, that's just my opinion.  

After taking off the training wheels after codecademy I was eager to jump into more challenging courses for web development. Most of the other on-prem bootcamps ask for upwards of 12k for 10-12 weeks of dev school. Bloc was a great alternative. It cost less than 5k (it cost me like 2.7k because of a scholarship they had available at the time). 

The weekly pairing sessions and office hours are invaluable when coding by faith. Starting off with a big project that runs the gamut off rails apps was another plus. 

One of my drawbacks was that there was not a lot of emphasis on JS. One lesson was devoted to it when truthfully JS is one of the most important aspects of modern day web dev. So maybe there should be an onus to have students learn more of it by the time the second project rolls around? 

All in all, there are only so many things you can fit into 12 weeks and they all rival each other in terms of importance. It was a great launhing pad but the most important thing is in the desire of the student. 

 I really did like my bloc experience. it was pretty intense. The best part about the experience was my mentor Aaron.

 I'm based in SF and looked pretty closely at Dev Bootcamp. I ended up choosing Bloc's 18 week track and I was able to keep working (as a marketing manager at a startup) full-time at the same time. I'm going thru the job prep phase right now, and just got an offer and will be starting as a rails developer in about 10 days.