Bloom Institute of Technology

I was a front-end developer when I joined Lambda school hoping to learn some back-end development technologies and to find a better and higher paying job. Now I am a frontend developer (with a possibility to move to full stack) at a big tech company with a salary of over $100,000.
I am for the most part happy and satisfied with the curriculum, the materials and the teachers. The school gives students free and easy access to lots of premium tools which I really liked. The teachers and TAs were helpful and available to help and to answer questions. There was some confusions and changes during my cohort, but it got settled after a while.
I found the backend and CS units the most useful of all units. The labs were probably my favorite part of the school as they imitated real job projects, yet it was the part that lots of students didn't pay enough attention to and didn't do enough work. If you decide to join the school, definitely opt in the longer program. You will learn so many useful stuff, and you will not regret the decision.

Now getting to the downsides of the schools: 
One main reason I joined lambda was their advertisements on how they help students find and land a job. Lambda helped me learn and understand data structure and algorithms that are important to pass interviews, however I was completely on my own during the job search. The help the school gives during the job search is mostly focused towards inexperienced developers, and not on someone who already has some experience. The opportunities that the school suggests to the students are mostly for junior developers with the average salary of $50,000. I was earning more than that before joining Lambda school, and of course I was aiming for even higher salary. Surprisingly, Lambda leaves experience developers on their own while it can make more money when they land in high paying jobs. I was lucky that I was getting reached out by recruiters themselves, as I did not get even one interview with help from Lambda. I am very disappointed with the amount of help I received during the job search from Lambda school. Read less

They're trying to automate the grading system after they ended the team leads program. Team Leads were other students above your unit that were forced to work for them for minimum wage that were supposedly going to help you move along, answer questions and review your submitted code. Now as long as you submit your work with the right file type before deadline you've passed. No one is looking at your code. The problem is really bad: I was told by one of my classmates she's sure she'll repeat the course because she hasn't been completing her work, the system passed her. They tell me I failed the final project because I didn't write a summary of what I did and complete some new quiz. No one is looking at how I completed the team project on my own, my code is completely ignored, they're just looking if you've jumped into these hoops with quantitative metrics. It's literally a "coding bootcamp" where no one is looking at your code!

The live lectures are awful. The instructors don't know what they're doing half the time. You waste half the lecture of them trying to debug something and don't even complete the lecture. They don't even understand the material and are constantly saying things like "I think that they meant by this is...but I'm not sure." You'll get better quality content in Udemy. I was literally watching udemy videos on the weekend on the subject they touched upon during the week based on how damn awful the lectures are.

Then there's no help with building a resume. I was told by students more advanced in the program that they lied about the support at finding a job, which is why they got into debt with them in the first place.

I got out in unit 3 owing them $10,000 rather than having to repeat it and get $30,000 into debt with their awful program.  Read less

Lambda has made massive changes to its curriculum halfway through my experience. 

While some of the changes might be for the better,  many of them change fundamental facts about Lambda that would have made me reconsider signing away part of my soul to the tune of 17% of my income for five years. 

Also, some of the changes have necessary bad side effects that Lambda is unwilling to acknowledge. They no longer have "team leads" individuals with coding experience who would look at your code after you completed it and help you with minor problems. Your, the student, are now the only person who looks at your code. If you have a pervasive problem, you might never know.

Team leads have been somewhat replaced by a peer mentorship program. A peer mentorship program, by itself, is not necessarily a bad thing. But replacing paid, trained help, with unpaid untrained unwilling help is not. 

Lambda also shortened the curriculum by six entire months for part-time students (3 for full time). They've pasted on some voluntary busy work at the end, so that we can't say this is a violation of contract.  

These changes might make for a better program, but its not the program I signed up for. Lambda does not seem to think this is in any way dishonest. They respond to legitimate concerns by telling the students they are wrong. Which is, by itself, a further concern. All large changes, good or bad, are going to have some difficulties and unforeseen side effects. By refusing to acknowledge any of these, Lambda makes it difficult for me to believe they will actually ensure these changes are for the better.

And even if these changes (shortening the program, removing 1:1 help from paid instructors, removing half of the computer science curriculum, adding mandatory group/leadership meetings that take up a large fraction of total time) do make Lambda better in some theoretical way, it does not change the fact that I did not sign up for this.

So, Lambda is not trustworthy. Even if you like whatever current version of Lambda you see, keep in mind that Lambda has no qualms about yanking the rug out from underneath your feet. 

You may be happy to commit 17% of your income to the program you see, but that might not be the program you end up getting. 

(I'm leaving this review anonymously, unfortunately, because Lambda has broken the trust I would need to post it publicly. I am at this point deep enough into the program that I need to finish.) Read less

I couldn't even get through the admissions process. I suppose no reply within 4 business days means I didn't make the cut. It's been 2 weeks and no word from Karen. I sent her a screenshot of my Web Dev application which lists my email address, but I guess she still couldn't find it. She didn't know the email address that I listed on my application was a short domain email address despite the fact that she was still able to email me and I was replying. I also hadn't entered my full name thinking I could just fill it in later, but to my surprise, there isn't an edit button for the application. I guess they want to re-submit your application should you need to edit something. You can only view your application. Easy fix for a bootcamp, no?

Anyway, that's really all I can say about it. It's fine though since I was getting cold feet from the bad reviews in the midst of all the good reviews. Many of the glowing reviews are from people who have experience in the field already. That isn't to say there aren't any newbie reviews, just not as many.

Lastly and more importantly are the numbers - 17% capped at $30k is steep. No thanks, but thanks for not getting back to me. Dodged a hole in my pocket.

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I would highly recommend Lambda School to anyone who is looking to further their education and personal skills while also getting a job in the field of software development. I graduated in mid-2018 and the curriculum was still in flux. Some bits were a little rough but overall it was a fantastic experience. They are very keen to adapt to student needs and trends in the industry. I even saw a few critical pivots happen within a week after my cohort voiced their concerns. Most of the instructors are very knowledgeable about their subject matter and are available if need be. If you ever have any questions, I would highly suggest reaching out to some of their students on Linkedin. Read less

I started Lambda School in April of 2018 after much deliberation about whether an online school provided the same quality education as one in person. On the surface, it seemed like Lambda School was too good to be true: free until you get a job, world class instructors, ability to get in touch with your instructors at any time. I just graduated a few days ago, and Lambda has delivered on every part of what I signed up with. The instructors were amazing; if I ever had a question about something they were very eager to help (I once had a problem and an instructor spent 2 hours with me to troubleshoot), everyone is extremely nice here and everything is very transparent. I’m so thankful that I chose Lambda when I started. One of the things that I didn’t think about was how important a career coach is after you’re done with instructions. My career coach was able to help me every step of the way and was easily one of the biggest highlights of my Lambda experience.

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I joined Lambda School with Project Manager Experience and a professional background of working with developers for a number of years. I am a millenial with a college degree who was looking to bridge over to programming and development.

 I find that lambda school's Full stack web program started off very cheery and promising but quickly fell short as soon as the first month was over. It immediately became apparent that they only cared about getting you job ready for maybe a very rigid corporate environment and focused much more on things like doing a code challenge everyday, reviewing your peers code even if everyone has identical code and asking your pm for help- even if they often dont provide any help. They focused less on making sure that you actually understood course material by providing adequate resources to help you understand whats wrong with your code and more on job prep fluff. TLDR: It became a teach yourself, while they put time constraints and focused on fluff to get their ROI.

In the end you are paying Lambda 20-30k for these 6 months. While I dont think they are total cons, im glad my github repo has expanded as much as it had. I do think there are some fundamental issues in their structure of hiring students as section leaders and PMs (glorified term for a T.A.) when they themselves barely know the content to teach students who will then be hired to do the same. a lack of knowledge or curriculum changes perpetuates this knowledge gap through generations of cohorts. like their React program for example. 

They also dont seem to take feedback very well and have shut me down many times just for the sake of winning an argument so it seems, perhaps because they cant withstand any negative press atm. I complained about having been switched around group to group 6 times in 4 months, they agreed it was a mistake they overlooked but it continued even when I approached the SL to rectify the issue. Despite being exposed to so many PMs i can say there have only been three or four at the most who i can say know what they are talking about. Basically any student who comes to lambda with previous programming knowledge is better off than those who have none. and those students who have programming knowledge from the start end up being better PMs. Lambda rides on the success and knowledge of the students prior to any value added by them. it is quite the circus.

So do be advised that in time there will be better options in ISA's and education than Lambda provides

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I went to Lambda School something like 7 months after they launched (They were only live for 7 months!!!).

Of course, I experienced a lot of the growing pains that come with being an early user of a brand new startup (hence the 4 stars I gave for the curriculum, I had to keep it honest). Some parts weren't very organized, some material wasn't well explained, etc... etc...

But the transformation from month 1 to month 7 was m-i-n-d-b-l-o-w-i-n-g. Night and day.

And here's the thing, they're not done evolving! 
I was on the 7th cohort. Right now they're working with the 15th cohort.

Each one gets better, and better, and better. I'm sure by now they have a 5-star curriculum. (If I were you, I'd jump in quickly before they become harder to get into than Harvard 😜)

And their job support is AMAZING. My friends and I each got EXACTLY what we wanted.

- One friend of mine wanted a job where he made exactly $80k a year, and he got it. 
- Another friend of mine wanted a remote job so he could keep traveling, and he got it. 
- I wanted to work for a real Silicon Valley startup, and I got it.

There are hundreds of stories like these at Lambda. They really are that amazing.

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