BrainStation

Taking the User Experience Design program is probably one of my highlights in 2019. I had the chance to develop the mindset of a UX designer, improve on my UI design skills and most importantly, I learned to expand my industrial connection, which includes all of the wonderful people at BrainStation. 12 weeks of intense workload along with many sleepless nights, I graduated BrainStation, more passionated and motivated than ever.

If you're reading this review and still wondering whether you should take the program or not, listen to me and go for it. Consider it as a wise investment for your future if you're interested in the creative industry.

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I’ve taken 3 courses at Brainstation (UX, Product Management and Digital Marketing) I loved them all. First of all, Slack is the main communication tool which you get to learn how to use and it is really beneficial for the professional work life. There’s usually 2 instructors, as one of them teaches the other one takes down notes and shares the highlighted info and important links on Slack. I was a beginner in the tech world when I took these courses and I noticed that instructors tried their best to arrange the phase of the classes quite well to be able to teach everyone at all levels. Hands on projects are really fun to work on. Most importantly, network! You do not only get to meet brilliant people from different industries in the class, but you also have a life time access to BrainStation’s network which supports its students as much as possible! I took Digital Marketing course as an online live course which saved me so much time on commuting and provided me with the comfort level of travelling and attending the classes across the world. Pls do not hesitate to reach out to me if you have any questions

 

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The BrainStation UX Diploma was an incredibly refreshing experience for me. The community is really welcoming and you are treated as a professional from the moment you walk in. The extremely supportive instructors and my peers were a definite highlight. They all put in the effort to make sure that you are challenging yourself to put out the best work even under pressure. Everyone encounters stress and frustration at some point but all the support gets you through it.

I entered with a bit of basic graphic design and marketing knowledge but rest assured that even if you come in knowing nothing, you will be able to pick it up as long as you're willing to put in the effort as I have seen in myself and my peers. Regardless of experience, it is important to come into this program hungry (figuratively only - please eat your breakfast). Be present and willing to learn every day. Accept that you're not going to get everything right away, but always keep trying. You will touch on a lot of topics relevant to the industry, but curiosity for additional exploration is how you'll get to master it. You will have to put in hours after classes, but it's well worth to craft something that you will walk away and be proud of.

My advice for applicants is to start gathering inspiration from the world around you: Take note of colours that speak to you and interesting interactions you encounter on existing products or even out in the actual world. Bringing that into class will give you a stronger sense of direction when you're starting to come up with ideas and help to relieve some of the stress.

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The UX diploma program was an amazing 12-week journey with lots of challenges, support, and fun along the way. I've learnt so much from our educators, peers, and mentors. The mentorship was definitely a highlight! It’s a very pleasant experience connecting with mentors who are alumni of BrainStation. They speak from their personal experience as UX designers as well as offer helpful industry insights.

Expect to put in extra hours outside of regular school hours to work on your projects and career development. I'd suggest looking into networking opportunities in addition to the career workshops to get to know more about the industry and build your network.

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The web development program at BrainStation is simply great! The 12-week program is very intense and fast paced and I think it is designed in a way that different people with different backgrounds can benefit from it. Of course what you get from the program depends on your previous knowledge and skills, but what is true for everyone is that they can learn at their full capacity of learning. Throughout the program I thought to myself several times “I couldn’t be learning more!”, and at the end of the program, when I was working on my final project, I was amazed myself by the skills that I’d acquired, especially since I had almost no background knowledge of programming when I entered the program.

 

These are the highlights of this program for me:

 

• The skills I’ve gained: I’ve learnt fundamentals of  HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Node, Git, and SQL. I’ve also learnt about some useful JS libraries such as React, express, sequelize.
• Career workshops, whiteboarding sessions and the mock interview: these helped me have a general picture of the process of looking for jobs and conducting interviews.
• Hackathons and group projects that gave me some experience of working in teams.
• Tech tours and power hour talks, which helped me learn about the real work environment.
• Helpful and super friendly staff, who supported me and others with their positive energy both during the program and afterwards.

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Taking the UX design course at BrainStation was one of the best decisions I've ever made. Changing careers is never easy, but the diploma program gives you the confidence in your craft that you feel like you can take on any challenge. The instructors were very helpful! Be sure to ask them for any questions, and suggestions, they'll always give you constructive feedback. The curriculum is very short and condensed, so expect lot of work. You will feel stressed, but don't feel discouraged, it's part of your growth. And don't forget to take breaks! Throughout the course of the program, there will be workshops that help you with job hunting. They make sure that your documents and interviewing skills are on point. Read less

I had a fantastic experience taking the online Data Science course at BrainStation. The classes were engaging, the instructors are friendly and knowledgeable, and the support network is fantastic (everyone, from our instructors, classmates, to our learning experience coordinator to the entire Campus Support team). There was a lot of content, and the pacing was good.

Data Science & Python required hands-on training, and I felt how the classes were structured provided me with precisely that. The project was also a great tool for me to apply what I've learned: from setting up a Jupyter notebook, to importing data, utilizing Pandas, cleaning data, creating a modelling hypothesis to testing the hypothesis, and plotting data graphs.

Prior to deciding to take the BrainStation course, I was considering doing either a Coursera or an edX course. I am pleased that I've decided to go with BrainStation, as the engaging, hands-on format is what I needed to learn such a complex subject. I am able to freely ask questions during class, on Slack, and my instructors are very responsive.

I'd definitely recommend anyone who are looking for great data science courses / certification classes to take the Data Science certificate course with BrainStation! I've also taken the Product Management certificate course with BrainStation in the past and that was also fantastic. i'd recommend anyone who are looking to break into tech, to consider taking classes at BrainStation (online or in-person).

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It took ma almost a year to make my decision to transition into the Data Science field. I visited many institutions but BrainStation appeared to have a well-structured program coupled with an excellent career support team.

The instructors are very intelligent and supportive. In the beginning, it was a little bit difficult to cope because of the fast pace of the program, but after the 2nd week, I found it very interesting and I became fully immersed in the journey. 

Here comes BrainStation 3D, a one-day practical experience where you collaborate with the UX and Web Development students to solve real business problems and build a project in 7 hours.  This is one of my best moments at BrainStation.

Demo day is a day we all love the most, all the students get the chance to showcase their individual project to the public. I was proud of what I was able to achieve after 12 weeks. 

I'd say you should be well prepared to lose some sleep and you might not have free weekends as well. The program is very intense and requires a lot of dedication from your side, expect some complicated assignment that will help you grow and learn fast.

 

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I completed the 10-week part-time digital marketing certificate course via online live. 

I absolutely enjoyed this course taught by Larissa Hildebrandt. 

Online: I definitely appreciated having this option available to learn from anywhere... esp at home. Even though it's online, the program requires your attendance and for your camera to be on at all times. This definitely kept me accountable and alert during the entire class duration (3 hours with a break). Having the camera on felt weird at first, but I think it adds to the class as it feels like you are sitting with other students even if you aren't. As an introvert, I still felt shy but that went away after the first couple classes. I loved the ability of still being able to work in groups. The platform used is Zoom and it worked flawlessly. The instructor was able to send us into breakout rooms and bring us back when needed. I would highly recommend having a second screen or using zoom on your ipad. I took me a class or so to figure out my set-up but all good. 

Platforms: The platform used to learn was Synapse. All the Google slides were provided a week prior. It was easy to follow along with the instructor as she was going through the slides. There isn't an option to be able to take notes and I found this a bit difficult to have everything on the screen at once. My solution was noted above-- having zoom on my ipad and using my computer to take notes. The web conferencing platform used was Zoom (described above). The slides are not downloadable and the sessions are not recorded (due to copyright). Slack was used for communication during and between classes. We had a channel just for our group and I found this helpful. 

Content: The course covered a lot and covered everything that was promised. I have read a lot of different things about digital marketing in the past couple years and I really liked that I can learn all the most current and correct info all-in-one. I feel like the content was very solid and thorough. It has propelled me in the right direction to continue. I usually have lots of questions but I barely had any cause everythng was answered. 

Instructor: Larissa is a really great instructor! She also works as a digital marketer and it was so helpful that she gave us real-life glimpses into different aspects of digital marketing. She is clearly an expert in her field and was able to give us industry-related expertise. She is very knowledgable and if she didn't have the answer to a question, she always followed up on Slack. There was great follow-up between classes and I felt well supported throughout. After our final project, I received really usefull feedback from Larissa about how to improve on my digital strategy for my business. 

Overall impression: I would highly recommend this course for anyone who works full-time and would like to propel their career. Being able to take a great course, at home, and being held accountable each week is definitely what I needed to keep me on track. 

 

 

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It was a 5-week program (1 full Sunday every week), and it was INTENSE from a content point of view.  As someone who already works in marketing, the first couple of weeks around knowing the customer, the brand and the landscape were pretty straightforward.  But then getting into some of the tools and mechanics behind SEO, SEM, digital ads, social media, and analytics - it was a LOT of content to try and grasp practically at any level of detail.  We could easily have had at least 2 more full days of instruction, as it was jam-packed! 

The instructors (Warren Thompson and Rafael Gi) were outstanding facilitators of discussion, and able to bring practical examples from their experiences on both the client and the agency side of the marketing equation.  

I will continue to absorb the material from this course over the months to come as my role is increasingly digital and the material covered here was exactly what I was looking for to elevate my knowledge and give me a decent baseline in the digital marketing arena.  

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I took the 10 week Product Management course via Online Live and it was awesome! The Brainstation team made it easy to learn online and provided the flexibility for me to take this course anywhere, the course material was super relevant to my role and I could implement my learnings at work every day as a product owner. My instructor was super knowledgeable and provided such relevant industry knowledge and expertise. I'd recommend Brainstation for anyone looking to upskill their tech skills or trying to kickstart their career in tech. 

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Like me, most of my classmates were looking for a big carrer change. In my case, I looked around at many institution and Brainstation caught my eye not only with they content, but also with their Carrer transformation Program.

After completing the course, I can resume it like in a few words:

1) It is a intense program. They overload you with content about everything regarding Data Science

2) You will loose a few weekend on their projects. You have to deliver assignments over the corse and they do take some effort

3) You will need to keep studing afer hours to keep up with everything

In my opinion, those feedbacks mean that the course is worth taking. I don't regret going throught it. Actually I highlly recomend it.

At the end of the program, there is a final project that we need to present to an audiance. By the time I was presenting it I realized how much I have learn in 3 months and it was mind-blowing.

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Raymond and Lauren (who are amazing instructors by the way - personable, patient, supportive, and they clearly care about their students) led us through a 10-week journey through advanced excel formulas and techniques, SQL, tableau, and data visualizations.  Classes and content were delivered via lectures but plenty of time was allocated during class to understand and practice the concepts using real-world examples.  If you are brand new to the content then it might feel a bit intense but the instructors were always willing to help and support you outside of classroom hours.  
If you are looking to develop your data analysis and visualization skills with a recognized institution then I highly recommend the Data Analytics course offered at Brain Station.  Hopefully, you end up with Raymond & Lauren as your instructors!

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I'm really glad I took Digital Marketing at Brainstation. I recently started a new job that demands experience in paid social and search, but this was a skillset I did not have prior to taking this bootcamp. I feel much more confident taking on this work now.

I took a growth marketing bootcamp called growclass at the same time at this Brainstation one and I found that I got fewer "tricks of the trade" with Brainstation. This would be because growclass had 5 instructors with different specializations vs. Brainstation having only 1. Naturally, the 1 instructor won't be an expert in every unit which is ok.

My instructor was great, although I can tell she was more knowledgeable on some units over others. Again, that's totally ok because I still learned quite a lot in each unit and I was never left hanging. 

DRAWBACK: You can't access the course slides after 6 months so you better take good notes.

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I am still processing and learning after having completed a 1-week accelerated in-person Product Management course at BrainStation. I am so glad I took it as it was enriching and worth it in ways I didn’t even expect! I mean, who knew I would become so interested in Marketing as a result of taking this course.

I had had some exposure to Product Management concepts and aspects of it in my work already, but it really made a difference to my confidence and knowledge depth to take the course with other professionals, and taught by an instructor with a long trajectory in both larger well-known tech companies as well as startups. While some of the course was lecture-style, much of it was interactive and hands-on with teamwork and roleplaying with classmates from a variety of roles in small and large organizations (including product managers). I appreciated and learned from these immersive parts the most, as I got to apply the concepts with other team members by building an MVP (minimum viable product) pitch deck for a real-life problem. We even had to present the pitch at two different stages – and got really useful feedback!

I had some surprise learnings – I gained a deeper understanding and newfound appreciation of marketing, which including an introduction to product marketing. I liked digging deeper into how market research is carried out, why it’s so vital, to understanding a problem space and people's needs, and how it can differ from or overlap with user research. 

As someone with a rich and diverse professional background, what I most appreciated was BOTH gaining new super-relevant skills AND seeing my existing critical thinking and design thinking abilities from a different perspective. I now better understand how I can leverage and build on these to ask the right kind of questions of users, colleagues and leaders, define problem spaces, make better and faster decisions, and work to build human-centered solutions that improve people’s lives. I loved having other classmates that work in different parts of tech, from a variety of different functions and disciplines. It made the discussions and teamwork even richer, and more applicable to different scenarios that come up in a product management role, or other role where this highly cross-functional skillset is essential! I would recommend this course to both seasoned professionals looking to pivot or enhance their careers or those in earlier stages of their careers.

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I completed the part-time online "Digital Marketing Certificate" course with BrainStation and thoroughly enjoyed it! It was a course that challenged me and my instructor Larissa Hildebrandt always made herself available to answer questions and offer suggestions. With so much information to take in I felt overwhelmed at times but the course is set up for people of all skill levels and Larissa's feedback was always helpful and constructive. I like how the content is broken down into specific parts so you know exactly what's going to be covered before each class. There's a perfect mix of instruction and group interaction. I've already signed up for another online class. Thank you BrainStation for a rewarding experience!

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It's intense, but it's worth it if you value growth.

I'll be honest, this course was fast-paced and intense. I moved to Vancouver from Edmonton to take this course, and keeping up with the course content after doing such a big move was incredibly difficult for me. There were so many late nights, and so many times I called my sister to ask for emotional support.

But, it was all worth it. Whereas I used to feel like an imposter, as an economist trying to shift into the creative industry, I now feel an incredible sense of competency after taking this course.

Plus, the professors really do care about us. They have good hearts, and they provide a lot of support.

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Brainstation was definitely the right choice for me! I was looking for a career switch, and didn’t want to go back to school for years. The 10 weeks User Interface online course was an amazing learning experience that I could do at my own convenience. I felt so knowledgeable after every class, and always felt like I got the support I needed from the teachers and colleagues. I really believe it was worth the money, and gave me enough of a platform to help me get started in the field. I would definitely recommend this school to anyone who wants to gain a new skill, change careers, or upgrade their career. You will learn from people who are currently successful in their field, you can share experiences, ask loads of questions, and leave feeling confident on what to do next. 

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I took the Search Engine Marketing course with Andrew Jackson and Alexander and learned a ton about how to take actionable steps to improve my clients' website rankings. Both instructors made the class a super welcoming place to be, took time to make sure everybody was up to speed, and worked hard to show current, real life examples of how we could apply SEM to our own projects. I learned a lot and got my monies worth. Plus brainstation is super organized which made the whole process enjoyable too! Read less

BrainStation was definitely the right choice for me. I felt as though they gave me excellent support throughout the program - from great instructors to helpful career support The whole staff at BrainStation does a great job of making you feel welcomed into their work environment. 

The curriculum is fast paced but well rounded. I felt that if I showed up, applied myself during classes and worked diligently on assignments the workload was very manageable. 

Considering it's only 12 weeks I don't think I could expect anything more from a bootcamp. I feel as though I my career success is in my own hands, as long as I continue working diligently. I definitely couldn't have said that before I went to BrainStation, so overall the course gave me every opportunity to succeed that I could have asked for.

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