Codesmith Reviews
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Anonymous
The best decision I've ever made!
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I attended Codesmith's software engineering immersive from July to October. I began to teach myself how to code over a year ago, and decided I needed to be surrounded by like-minded individuals who are eager to plan and build applications and tools.
I had been accepted to Flatiron, Fullstack Academy and Codesmith - it was an easy decision to go with Codesmith, as I got to meet so many prospective students and staff before the program even started, and felt like I could grow as an engineer. And there was a sense of community, whereas the other two lacked such structure.
This isn't for those looking to make a quick way into software engineering - the units are intense, you'll be learning a new technology every other day. Coming from a non-technical background, I had to work harder to make sure I wasn't falling behind on units. I would spend 9am till 9pm on campus and when I'd get home at around 10pm, I'd either review the units, read documentation, build test apps until 1am. This cycle continued on for three months, and yes it's definitely challenging!
More importantly, I got to meet so many wonderful people from diverse backgrounds, which contributed to forever-learning environment at Codesmith. The staff members are also super supportive, and when I was going through difficult periods while job searching, they were always there for me, pushing me to do better.
Codesmith's program definitely works, that it has shaped my mind in a way that I can read any docs, tackle problems on my own, and collaborate to provide optimal results.
The grind doesn't stop after graduating from the three-month program. With its excellent hiring support, I was constantly receiving feedback as well as mock interview rounds to prep me for real interviews. I came from no computer science degree, nor worked in tech (I did marketing prior) and still ended up with a six-figure salary offer within a month of graduating.
Each outcome varies, but it shows that if you put all your effort into the process and make the most of it, anything is possible.
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Anonymous
Codesmith changed my life!
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Joining Codesmith was without a doubt the best decision I've ever made. The amount of growth I had and encountered in such a welcoming environment was absolutely unheard of. The course is by far harder than most things I've ever done but equally more rewarding than anything I've ever done as well.
The greatest pros of Codesmith are:
1. Culture - the Codesmith culture is the most welcoming, supportive culture I've ever been a part of and I continue to keep up with current students, staff, and alum! Thursday nights alum gather to mingle and catch up at the facility and one night there was a representative from 10 of the 12 established cohorts - the community is incredibly close-knit.
2. No Hand-Holding => You will learn how to learn - you will without a doubt struggle at Codesmith, but in the best way possible. The difference between my previous self and me now is insane and I credit the encouragement of learning on your own/with your partner/with your team. Learning how to learn will be the most valuable asset moving forward because the tech world is constantly evolving and the learning never stops. Deciphering how to pick up new tech is paramount to being a software engineer and Codesmith trains you for your future.
3. Job Support - Between all the instructors and staff and Eric Kirsten there is no possible way not to succeed in finding a job. The process is incredibly thorough and the support lives on well beyond what anyone would expect. There is comprehensive support (resume, online profiles, mock interviews, morale boosts) was so much more than I ever could have hoped for and I'm happy to report receiving 4 different offers by trusting in the process and working hard.
*I've only listed 3 pros but I could go on for daysCons:
The space could be a few square feet larger.
(There aren't any cons) -
Anonymous
Exceptional curriculum and culture
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I came to Codesmith with many years in the tech industry in order to re-sharpen my coding skills and gain knowledge of a modern JavaScript based tech stack. From day one the experience exceeded my already high expectations. The lecture schedule/materials and delivery are a high quality product - but the people that surround you are the real differentiator - you are surrounded by amazing individuals with both a genuine ability and desire to help you succeed. Hiring support is exemplary and I feel I have been given valuable tools to help me get the kind of job I want. On the technical front - Codesmith understands that you need to take on a challenge and just build something rather than relying on a hand holding approach. Being at Codesmith mirrors what real work in the field feels like and as a result it develops real engineers as graduates. Amongst other things - I personally I built multiple React/Redux frontends, had the freedom to explore more exotic technologies such as graph databases, and built a tool to help examine the resiliency of GraphQL end points in distributed systems, while at the same time being able to be inspired by the creativity and work of other classmate's ideas and around me. Codesmith has huge personality and creates a collaborative environment for all. 100% recommend
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Anonymous
15$ an hour to over 100k a year!
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CodeSmith changed my life! I want to give a big shout out to Will, Schno, Shanda & Eric. I appreciate everything they have done to create such an amazing program. I wrote a review on SwitchUp, but wanted to add one here.
CodeSmith gives you everything you need -- starting with JS fundamentals & Algos, to a modern framework & tooling, and finally devOps and system design.
CodeSmith job support is amazing! They will work with you to detect where things are working well and where you need more support. They give you explicit guidelines on how to approach the process and Eric even helped me negotiate a 5k increase in my salary and a nice relocation bonus. I would have had no idea how to even begin approaching that kind of thing without him.
My suggestions: 1. Prepare to live and breath code so clear out your schedule. 2. Try to learn as much as you can before entering the program (its a multiplier). 3. The job search process can be a grind if you do not have a technical background like me, so follow the guidelines outlined by CodeSmith and work with the support team to practice interviewing or resume formatting.
I hope if a prospective student reads this review, they know that this program truly is a game changer, but also keep in mind that there are no guarantees, and you must do the hard work to succeed. They can help you as much as possible, but ultimately you must do the learning & and the hard part of applying.
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Anonymous
SWE
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I would highly recommend Codesmith to all aspiring SWEs. I started off teaching myself js, css, and html earlier this year and I decided to attend Codesmith soon after. The first 6 weeks consists of multiple day sprints using the newest technologies and lectures, and then the last 6 weeks consists of projects that will help you shine once you're on the job search.
Reasons why I would choose Codesmith:
1.Teaching style. I really enjoyed the teaching style of Codesmith, please attend their free workshops on Thursday if you're serious about it. The material you learn will definitely help during your job search in the future (I ended up rewatching some workshops via youtube before interviews to nail down js fundamentals) Hard parts with Schno was the tipping point for me to attend Codesmith over any other programs. At first it was very challenging for me to learn so much material at such a rapid pace. During the program they will not hold your hand and walk you through everything. They will teach you what you need to know and then from there it is on you to reinforce the learning through pair programming sprints and projects. This allows you to be an autonomous problem solving engineer, which is key to being a great engineer on the job.
2. The community/network. I had an amazing cohort and we were all driven to becoming impactful engineers. If you want to be surrounded by likeminded people striving to break into this amazing industry then I would highly recommend looking into Codesmith. The results speak for themselves (check their outcomes). One thing I learned throughout my time post CS is who you know in this industry will get you a long way. I believe being part of the Codesmith family will be an amazing asset moving forward whether it is receiving referrals or advice on engineering best practices.
If you are serious about making moves in this industry and you are just getting started I would highly recommend CS. It is definitely not for everyone. I had my doubts throughout the program, but through the help of my cohort members and CS fellows, instructors, and admin I was able to defeat that imposter syndrome and find a great job. You definitely need to be committed to spending 3 full months grinding away.
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Anonymous
Codesmith NY Immersive
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Hey All,
I wanted to give a review of Codesmith, because I've had such an amazing experience there - completing my immersive this Friday.
I'll go into details later, but I think there are two things about Codesmith that are inarguably better than other boot camps, instructors and job assistance.
Instructors
Your lead instructor in New York is Phil Troutman with ample lessons also provided by the founder, Will Sentance. They are two of the most charismatic speakers I've ever listened to, and they know what they're talking about. They're also the same two people giving hard parts talks, what I sampled for free and convinced me to join the camp is exactly what I got when I was in the immersive. I highly recommend attending hardparts to get a feel yourself.
Curriculum
Codesmith focused on Front-end(React, Redux), Back-end (Node, Express), Testing (Jest), Devops (Amazon). Their technologies are chosen based on the job market, which is exactly what I wanted. Their style of teaching is very much "hard learning", meaning they give you the 50,000ft overview of a technology and then ask you to start working in it. The goal is push students into those corners where you need to figure things out yourself and that is... hard. However, everytime you hit one of those blocks and push through your ability (to understand documents and programming concepts) as well as your technical skillset grows immensely. They will finally close out a particular technology with an in-depth lesson that clarifies any of the things you weren't able to solve on your own or had an incomplete understanding of.
Job Assistance
One of the two things, I think Codesmith does incredibly well is help you get a job. The assistance with structuring your resume, understanding how to properly interview and present yourself, those things aren't happening in the same way at other boot camps. It's integral that you actually learn how to code, but equally important that you're able to convince others of the same once your program is complete. The job assistance is the secret sauce that puts Codesmith over the edge, it's an entirely different skillset from coding an absolute must to be successful. Whether you're fresh out of high-school or have 15 years of experience, they take the time to provide actionable steps to getting phone interviews and ultimately, offers (9 years of non-technical experience myself).
Overall
I can't say enough how great the experience at Codesmith has been. I've exculsively focused on the actual work thus far, but the community is just as great. They preach "empathetic coding" and it shows. I've had many nights when people have stayed until midnight to help me understand concepts I've been stuck on (Redux!) and vice versa. The instructors, curriculum, the community all top notch, my strong recommendation is to check it out yourself and see if feels right.
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Anonymous
CODESMITH, THANK YOU!
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I was at Cohort 9 NY (January - April 2019). I've had an Associates Degree in CS before I started the program but wanted to accelerate myself into the field, so I decided to join Codesmith. It wasn't an easy decision - $18k is A LOT of money, but I couldn't be happier about it. Studying was very hard - first half of the program you jump into a new topic every day, spending about 80 hours on campus, many including myself spend a few nights here. Still, every step of the program you feel tremendous support from every single person surrounding you: form a cohort-mate to the CEO (thanks, Will!)
RESULT: I got my first offer precisely two weeks after graduation, two more the week after. I started my first software engineer job less than a month after finishing the program.
CONCLUSION: as for a person who only worked at the restaurants it was hard for me to imagine that in less than half a year I'd be able to turn my life upside-down: do things I enjoy every day and earn way above $100k.
CODESMITH, THANK YOU!
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Anonymous
Extraordinarily Ammusing
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As a veteran in the software industry, I'd highly recommend Codesmith's Software Engineering Immersive Program to anyone who wishes to learn more about coding. Looking back at my period there, I was able to learn more about what it means to be as a software engineer.
Before I joined the program, I had planned on enjoying while being in the program and simultaneously looking for jobs. However, throughout the program, although I had fun, it really took a lot out of me even if I were to disregard to my job as a software engineer that I attended to after everyday at Codesmith. Although the program is just 3 months, the program can be very intense if you are not fully ready to get indulged in the program. I thought it was intensive beecause of all the challenges I specifically looked for and the challenges that were unexpectedly thrown at me. BUT I enjoyed them still regardless. I enjoyed them because it was an experience that I did not encounter anywhere else and it allowed myself to grow as a more cultured software engineer. Even as a student whom with prior software engineering experience, multiple hackathon winner, and a bachelors in software engineering from a pretty prestigious university, I felt that Codesmith was a valuable experience for me. In terms of techncality and learning materials, they are pretty up to date with the technologies that are being sought to be used by a lot of companies, especially startups. You can still aim for bigger companies, but a lot of the bigger companies have slower adoptions with modern technologies (except for like the big 5 such as Google, Microsoft, and etc) that they teach. However, it really doesn't matter what technologies you use or they teach you because the main goal of this program is teach you how to think programmatically and from a software engineer's perspective. And really, this is a mandatory skill in software engineering and a lot of the big companies like Google mainly look at this and how strong you are at it during the hiring process. As well, in cultural perspective, I think Codesmith has an alright culture going on. They like to keep the atmosphere very positive and encouraging, but I think it is a good choice since they know that a lot of the students and applicants that come here are coming from a variety of background. They would like to encourage that anyone can do it, regardless of the background!
My overall suggestion is that you get what you put into this program. In my honest opinion, look for challenges that actually makes you go nuts. While being in the program, a lot of people will go crazy over a framework or library, but in my opinion that's normal. That is what the program is intended to do to their students. So that everyone can be challenged. However, if that is not enough challenge for you or you would like to add more complexity, go for it even if it is just for fun becasuse at the end, you will get more out of it in my honest opinion. Also, in the progarm, there is a portion called Production Project. I'd reccomend doing something really really crazy because this is where you will get most of it. Again just challenge youself above your limits. Overall, I think this was an interesting experience that I did go through and I wouldn't mind recommending to the readers who are reading this review right now!
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Anonymous
Well worth it!
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About me: Prior to attending CS Prep, I had been studying Javascript, HTML, and CSS for about a year on and off. I also developed an MVP web application while working for a previous employer. I joined Codesmith’s CS Prep online course because it was recommended for preparing for Codesmith’s technical interview for their Immersive program.
The CS Prep curriculum emphasizes technical communication. It’s led by Ryan Trontz, an enthusiastic and helpful instructor. Even if you’re not planning to apply to Codesmith’s Immersive program, the practice with learning to effectively communicate with someone else should prove very helpful in an interview or other development related situations.
Each day begins with a coding challenge and a thorough explanation of the solution to each challenge is given the following day. Following that, the instructor gives a lecture. You’ll need to stay on your toes as you might be called on during the lecture. This method really helps you stay on focused and on track, which is important in an online class. In case you don’t know the answer, Ryan will help you reason through how to find the answer.
After the lecture you’re randomly paired with another student to solve problems based on the lecture. While pair programming, you’ll encounter people at various technical levels. This was helpful for me as it gave me the opportunity to teach people at times which meant that I had to think about topics at a conceptual level. At other times, I programmed with people who were more skilled than me and it was a great challenge to keep up with them.
I can’t say enough about Ryan Trontz. He’s excellent! He created and fostered a supportive environment for learning. He’s clearly enthusiastic about teaching and about teaching people about programming.
More importantly, Ryan is available for students. Although there were quite a few of us, I always felt like he was available if we had any questions or if we required guidance. He asks great leading questions instead of giving you an answer. If you have deep questions about Javascript, he’ll give an awesome, well reasoned reply.
Don’t expect that you’re going to learn everything about Javascript in a short amount of time. However, the harder parts of Javascript such as closures and objects are addressed. It trains you to develop your abilities to tackle problems that you haven’t seen before.
Even though the class is online, the amount of time that you spend together pair programming and working on projects with different partners creates a great communal atmosphere.
I’m definitely glad that I took CS Prep.
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Anonymous
Worked out great for me - highly recommended (read on for caveats)
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my background:
I came in with some exposure to coding: I’d finished another bootcamp that you’ve probably heard of, and had zero luck getting a job, despite the sincere efforts of said bootcamp’s career support. To give you an idea: after several months of job searching, I was on the verge of accepting an internship for $15.00/hr, and had turned down an ‘offer’ for an unpaid internship (after seriously considering taking it). Non-technical background; I’m not some sort of ‘natural’ programmer (whatever that means), and need to put in a good amount of work to learn things. I’m also someone who enjoys programming, but isn't completely obsessed with it.
pros:
- I met some truly wonderful people who are now friends and professional contacts (the alumni network is also an amazing resource)
- a baseline level of confidence that I lacked (if you come in with a lowish level of confidence like I did, chances are good that you’ll basically prove yourself wrong just because you’re constantly coming up against blocks and then working through them - after a point, you’re like ‘Huh, I guess I can do this after all’)
- the hiring program was really useful to me and helped me get
- a job at a company I’m excited about! (the salary outcomes are real, fyi)
cons:
- physically exhausting schedule (which makes dealing with anything/everything else harder)
- there’s a certain amount of ambiguity built into the curriculum (which is different from the way my previous bootcamp and a lot of online resources are structured), which was challenging at times
- dealing with imposter syndrome (to some extent worsened by above points)
other thoughts/advice:
- The material isn’t spoon-fed (it’s nothing like a JSHP, for example) and it’s fast-paced, so just be prepared for that. There’s a lot of support available and plenty of folks come in with very little experience and do fine, but everyone learns differently and only you can know if it’s right for you.
- If you’re newer to coding, you may have a harder time with the structure/pace (and potentially related impostor syndrome). It can be very (psychologically) challenging, and having a good support network/coping mechanisms can help a lot. Being okay asking for help and maintaining a positive attitude will also go a long way.
- If you already have some experience coding: no, you don’t 100% have to do a bootcamp/program to get a job, but there are some valid reasons to do one, and if you decide to go that route, I'd recommend giving strong consideration to CS
- As someone who also came here and read all the reviews as part of my decision-making process before applying, I’ll just state the obvious - don’t apply based solely on the positive reviews, but don’t NOT apply based solely on the negative ones. The best way to make an informed decision is to get more information - so spend some time doing your due diligence. Get to know the community; go to JSHP/CS-hosted events in person if you can, online if you can't (there’s one that covers the curriculum and program in detail) and talk to actual people there, including residents. Ask the questions that matter to -you-, including ones that seem uncomfortable/trivial/whatever (I met 1:1 with a grad who had a similar background as me to ask specifics about their experience). Better to have all your concerns addressed up front so you can make the most informed decision you can. Again, this all sounds really obvious, but some people don’t do this, for various reasons.
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Anonymous
Great Community
The CS Prep is highly recommended for anyone who wants to enter Codesmith fulltime program. The instructor was amazing. He really made sure you feel a part of the community. For what it is, CS Prep content is very good. I highly recommend anyone wanting to enter Codesmith to actually do CSX on top of this program, among other things (such as doing Codecademy etc).
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Anonymous
The Best Program Ever
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Background: absolutely no software engineering or coding background
pros: My resume says it all. I did not have any experience in software engineering but now I have so many products on my resume. The products are not simple CRUD apps (not saying that they are bad, but it is nice to solve more developer problems), but developer tools that other developer uses. For example, our team created 1. a dedicated React IDE in VS Code, 2. Automated Containerization CLI Tool (Docker), 3. D3 Chart generator, and 4. CSS to Styled components converter. Due to the solid understanding of JavaScript that I gained through Codesmith, I easily picked up other languages along the way, such as TypeScript.
cons: The hours might be a bit tough if you are not prepared. Mandatory hours are from 9 am to 8 pm, but no one leaves at 8 pm, by choice. That being said, if I decided to invest my time and resources to learn software engineering, I would rather be surrounded by hardworking software engineers that are willing to learn.
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Anonymous
CS Prep
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I was initially hesitant on applying to the course due the online aspect of it - after all, why spend the money when there are so many free learning tools online? However, after hearing that the tuition fee can be applied towards the immersive program fee (thus, potentially being free), I decided to take the plunge. It's been about two weeks since the course ended, and I am extremely thankful that I had decided to take this course.
On the first day of instruction, what stood out to me was Ryan's approach to teaching. He started the class emphasizing the high expectations he will place on us, which I thought help set a positive growing mentality for our class. Whenever we would hit a road block, rather than immediately providing an answer, Ryan would focus on assisting us so that we could figure it out on our own.
Throughout the course, Ryan modeled good coding practices/approaches to students, and when we did pair programming, students were given opportunities to practice what Ryan had modeled. Everyone in my class came with different coding backgrounds and ability, but the diversity of skill levels made each pair programming a unique learning experience (whether learning how to better communicate ideas or learning something new from a fellow classmate).
When I applied to CS Prep, I went in with two goals in mind: 1) to further solidify my foundational knowledge of JS and 2) to improve on my technical communications skill. This course did above and beyond in helping me better work towards those goals and well enough for me to get into the immersive program. I would highly recommend this program to anyone who is seriously considering coding.
You don't have to take this approach, but for those that are decided on taking CS Prep, I would recommend exposing yourself to the topics covered on CSX/going to the Hard Parts workshops - that way, you'll be able to ask for help/clarity on areas that come only after longer exposures to concepts like object oriented programming, recursion, closure, and etc. Also, if Ryan suggests sharing a technical commutations video on a coding problem, just do it. Do it early on in the course so that when you get feedback from Ryan (and classmates - if you choose to share with them as well), you can see what you need to improve on from the start and work on it throughout the course.
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Anonymous
You Get What You Put In
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I just finished week 1 for the first 9-to-5 job I've ever had. It has been the scariest, most exhilarating week of my life ... besides my first week at Codesmith.
My target salary after graduating was around Codesmith's median at the time, $100k. I was unbelievably fortunate to be offered a senior frontend role for a $150k base salary within two weeks of graduation. Is it too good to be true? Well, I don't have time to verify this -- I'm too busy cramming my new company's codebase, so that I can hopefully avoid getting fired in week 2 ;)
One amazing thing about Codesmith is that even if I get let go from this, my first role, I now have enough confidence in myself as a programmer to get my second incredibly quickly. Codesmith trained me to be a blazingly-fast learner (since frameworks/libraries change at the drop of a hat), but also to be a surgically precise job interviewee (meaning I prep with a high level of efficiency and present myself in the best way possible to maximize my chance of landing roles). I'm not a 'ninja coder' by any means -- but what I gained from Codesmith is a much, much deeper fundamental understanding of javascript, and perhaps most importantly, extremely strong technical communication, perhaps the most important tool in my new developers toolbelt.
Codesmith is INCREDIBLY DIFFICULT, and I pulled all-nighters galore. Please DO NOT think just because you write a check for ~$18,000 you'll receive some magic elixir for getting a high-paying job.
Generally, programmers who attend are beyond motivated and if they aren't willing to give the program their body/mind/soul for three months, they won't find a job, codesmith or not. You truly get out what you put in. And while my salary is atypical, a ridiculously strong work ethic + positive attitude + codesmith = engineering success. No question.
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Anonymous
A+++ experience, excellent community
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I graduated from Codesmith and got a job as a senior software engineer 3 months later - my journey began when I attended a few "Javascript the Hard Parts" sessions and was introduced to the community. I did my research about the curriculum and personally agree with their philosophy that beyond technical skill, there are additional traits that make for a successful engineer - namely passion for and the ability to learn new concepts and technologies, empathy, grit, and communication. These are all traits that I rely on daily at my current job, and they've been well received and recognized by my colleagues. Some of my coworkers graduated from other coding bootcamps, and I'm leading them and coordinating the team to build features.
I left a full time job that was technical (though not as engineering-focused as I wanted it to be) to attend Codesmith and I can confidently say it was one of the best decisions of my life and one of the best investments I have ever made. Not in terms of just the financial payoff (I more than doubled my salary), but also the investment I made in myself and my potential. It's truly powerful to be put in an environment that not only forces you to step up and prove yourself (to yourself) but also gives you room to develop your leadership and collaboration skills via the pair programming exercises and group projects.
And, of course, I accelerated my growth as an engineer - in terms of the technologies that are taught, I was exposed to many that I had limited prior experience in - Node, React, Redux, Webpack, etc. I had experience with HTML, CSS, SQL, and database design, which was certainly advantageous, and in those cases I was able to hone my abilities by helping fellow residents and sharing my knowledge - all skills that come in handy in a real-world engineering environment. Plus, I now have a network of engineers that I am sure will remain lifelong friends and contacts - people I would be honored to work with in the future, and who feel the same about me. That level of trust and respect cannot be taken for granted.
All in all, I highly recommend Codesmith!
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Anonymous
I'll rather drink cyanide than repeat this bootcamp again
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This review has been preempted as apparently Codesmith (Eric) called ME thinking that one of the unsatisfactory reviews were written as it "sounded like you" and reassuring me that their job statistic placements will be verified soon which left me in a HUGE confusion until I realized they still have not verified that since I inquired about it since October 2017. If it takes more than a year to verify statistics where your early LA cohorts have already been published before, it just means that they areWAITING on people to get hired to boost their statistics up more. A third party verification is easy to do, you give them your data and it does not take that long as they do not have many students EMPLOYED. Apparently that is why some people cannot even leave honest feedback as Codesmith keeps calling them to change their minds.
Which leaves me to my next point that most of these 5 star reviews are done by Fellows who are "employed" by Codesmith as esentially teaching assistants, to help answer "help desk" requests when student submits a ticket. However, most of these tickets do get ignored as these TAs are not meant to help students but rebuild the website for Codesmith. All in all a huge marketing and low laboring scam setup here.
This is a going to be a LONG, well in depth REVIEW with some personal anecdotes and feedback I was given personally, and experienced through these 3 months at Codesmith. While I appreciate the staff for being nice, the overrall value into going Codesmith was absolutely wasted and there was not even WiFi working well during my April/May-July 2018 time and I have tracked it back to NY Cohort #2's time as well. There are a lot of excuses for things they need to address and NOTHING IS PERFECT, but they sure act as if they are and are not open to suggestions and shut down anyone who does not follow their "Codesmith ways" which just inherently means being a sheep in thoughts and actions.
Background
I am a NON-cs student who just started coding early of 2018 and was pushed too much to join Codesmith despite my lack of foundation of even Javascript. Which I was assured repeatedly they will help me in. I am also typing this as I am recovering from LASIK as I feel infuriated that they are hounding other people for their HONEST reviews and accusing people that are busy with their lives.
There were precoursework that were given and not really reviewed in depth. Pair programming was a huge pain in NYC's Cohort 4 as Codesmith has internal politics that HUGELY affects their students' even though that is what they should be focusing on and not other aspects to promote an invalid hostile environment. Their COO Victoria left which gave a huge amount of work to the staffs apparently, and no one boetherd to check up in our cohort if ANY of us were even pair programmed efficiently. My seniors did not face this problem as they had Victoria's presence and apparently she didn't "leave to attend Business School" as Will Sentenace's own explanation was for her departure, but she was FIRED for being young in a COO position for Codesmith due to "lack of experience" even though she did a lot of work behind the scenes apparently at Codesmith.(she was also the one passive aggresively ensuring everyone was coding well with one another). Her absence made the staff ignore a lot of risk factors in our cohort which made MOST OF US MISERABLE.I do not think any one of us actually enjoyed the time at Codesmith except knowing one another.
The funny part is for a bootcamp to advertise learning of "deep diving" by facing "engineering blocks" through "pair programming" of units, I TOLD them myself in a feedback at Week 2 that they conducted to their outreach coordinator Jenny, that pair programming is not being efficiently done. She told me herself, "Well! We cannot enforce pair programming." ??????? WHAT DID I HEAR. Yes, I relayed this to Will himself and his own magical PR words of his marketing schematic self was, "she is not a representative of Codesmith's staff so what she said did not represent Codesmith at all. We even had an extra 30 minute PP of effective pair programming for your cohort and I even pulled people aside personally to let them know about it."
Here is Lie #1 I caught Will in. I spoke to EVERYONE in my cohort if they have EVER been approached by Will about this and they have said no. Only one person in my cohort said Ryan (who was the LTM - Lead Technical Meentor? - at that time) has approached him, but not Will himself. Will could not even be bothered to attend his own Javascript workshop on a Saturday morning that was attended by 100+? or more people since he was late by an hour to his OWN MEETUP. Plus if this was true this would have been fixed from Week 2 onwards but I can see people still not pairing well even on the last month for projects at Codesmith lol.
Another Fellow mentioned that she has tried to get the women's nnegotiation/ hiring workshop in before but Will has not even responded to her about it. I pushed for it to happen for my cohort and my juniors as there were a lot of people who needed to know. I slacked him a lot, did not see a date as it was nearing the end of my curriculum. I had to ask a FEMALE staff of Codesmith just so I can relay how infuriating and frustrating it is to try to get something done when they claim to be "FORWARD THINKING AND RESPECTIVE TO EVERYONE".
Half of my cohort has failed their weekly "checkings" which are assessments of that week's topics/units. The funny part is that the React portion in Codesmith is similar to React's OWN documentation tutorial so while I am not saying that Codesmith got lazy in TEACHING React but they just had a similar guide to React's own starting process tutorial guide ....
1:1 tutoring was not available in our cohort and instead we had a group review done as it was more "time efficient" but still "time wasted" as it was not individualized, and not personalized. They just reviewed code semantics without really explaining what was going on between components, which I learned well AFTER the program ended.
I am the bottom knowledge % wise in my cohort and I did not mind since I just started out and it was fine. But the lack of support of materials and just being thrown in haphazardly because this is "how engineers learn" as Will personally told me himself, just means I never got proper foundations to even make projects work. My whole cohort still did not even know how to use React well despite having ALL of our projects in React which is funny. Our resumes are well spoken and FAKE which makes it seem legit, which they're not.
I was also one of the people who got tutoting by Stephen and even some of the tutorings from him and Fellows have mentioned that Codesmith has taught their units in such an unnecesary way of learning that no one grasps it until wayyyyy later or until they learn it a more effiecient way to understand it. I was told I was also not a hard working because my brain quits after a while since you are there Monday-Fri from 9:-8pm and Sat 9am-4pm. It's not a matter of how long it takes to learn but how efficiently can you get it, that's how you can work smarter not harder. Which is the oppoiste of Codesmith's values apparently.There are multiple ways of learning (and teaching it as I was told) it but if its more complicated than it should be, that in itself is against programming itself.
Lie #2 - Will told me himself he was paying tutors out of pocket at $200/hr and as a FAVOR for me and others to get extra tutoring at 10 hours a week for 4 weeks. He personally told me himself, "Anonymous, even YOU cannot contest these rates I am paying here." I was offered a refund of around $4k or tutoring which at the end of the day I am more interelsted in LEARNING, which I had to fight for a lot. I can contest these rates because Will wasn't even paying that much to begin with, he even said "THESE TUTORS ARE TOP OF THE INDUSTRY SO THEY ARE WORTH $200/HR I AM PAYING OUT OF MY OWN." He didn't yell this, but was very affirmative hence the CAPS. Turns out the tutor was just one of my Seniors in the previous cohort so thanks! Thank you Will for such TOP OF THE INDUSTRY TUTORS@!@! I do appreiate Stephen's tutoring -- just being lied continously again face to face by Will Sentance, Codesmith's own CEO is infuriating and frustrating.
I have also failed my finals assessment and I was told I had to retake it. I asked why since I did the backend pretty well and I was told I can do it in any format I want but the test itself restricted you not to use React since it had a longer setup and their testing for the assessments were not setup for React but specific file locations and such. I was told I could have asked to restructure the file formats myself even though the test ittself said not to and I even asked a Fellow for help and they told me to stick with the testing environment. If I had the flexibility to do so but have no actual instructions and flexibility given initially, why tell me after? Absolutely ridiculus. I also asked them why do they need me to retake it and they said, "oh well its for us to know where you are and how to benchmark you to get the help you need." I mean I already know what I am struggling with which was basically almost everything so I did not have the optio2n to repeat the course just "extra help". Basically their motto is letting YOU know where YOU are behind, so YOU can learn yourself and catch up yourself. Absolutely no support as promised.
Lies #3 - was given Will's and Eric's own number for after graduation but it seems that Will is ghosting a lot of my messages plust other people in my cohort. Yet when I was interested in joining, I had a 4am e-mail and constant text messages and phone calls about joining. He said emails were best to reach him but I wasn't even given his email.
I did manage to get a senior software position but I completely ignored all of Codesmith's guidelines. I applied to over 200 job applications and only got 2 onsites out of those. Apparently I am supposed to get 1-2 onsite interviews out of every 20 applications but that is another lie. Most are outright rejections and I only got placed luckily through a very kind and pushy recruiter (which I am always kind to even recruiters even though Codesmith says not to pay them much value). If anyone is jobless still after 6 months and applied to every position, be warned that you may be blacklisted as recruiters tend to notice why you are till job searching after some time "your startup which is a project has disintegrated over a few months ago."
I completely started over after the program ended since it was disappointing, frustrating and tiresome to have to "fight" for a way that I can learn best since I could not even take a single project to break it down much simpler for me to understand and piece together. Instead you are jumbled up all through each different projects to use the frameworks and knowledge you have supposedly obtained which is 10% for a semblance of something that works.
The completely ridiculous thing at the end I was asked on how I can improve learning/teaching for their future cohorts at the END of my cohort despite my numerous complaints of the lack of Fellows helping and (1) hour PP slides that are not even great starting course materials to learn off. If I repeatedly have told them during learning that we are not learning the right way we won't ever "cement" our knowledge during projects as that is the known "Codesmith's way" which is all convoluted shenanigans. I paid to learn, not to be your consultant on fixing your problems even though Codesmith at this time had 20+ classes already and 3 for NYC. So again that means their curriculum still needs to be changed and improved as most of Codesmith's graduates STILL have to learn the curriculum after their time spent of 3 months.
This review may make me sound like a bitter person but no I was more determined to get a job on my own despite knowing nothing at the end of the bootcamp. I have spoken to several friends who have done Fullstack academy and App Academy and they have not had buyer's remorse as I have had. I recommend Fullstack Academy more as App Academy is more stressful than needed. If you have any questions you can reach out to me at teamgingko@gmail.com.I would love to leave a verified review but like many others, have to mask our actual profiles to not damage our own reputation and jobs / potential jobs. I recommend Udemy for courses as low as $10 to each a particular language/ framework.
It's really hard to work with anyone especially a CEO (Will Sentance) who lies to students' faces and has the guts to tell me I cannot contest his claims. I sure am and can, and will because most of them are FALSE. A lot of other reviews have also labeled him as "markety" Will, which is true. A business who keeps contesting every "negative" review left so often and does not even address the main focal points but skirts around points made to again self promote their "program" that "dives deep under the hood" while trying to foster a "community" but lies to their students is truly atrocious. I wouldn't mind if their program did not work out for me, but to be belittled every step of the way to ensure I had proper guidance is definitely something one should not experience.
I would rather take out all 4 of mmy wisdom teeth again on the same day, without any painkillers if I can go back in time to prevent myself from even entering this bootcamp. Oh and Codesmith does take credit for students' long work after they completed the program. Most of them didn't even understand the subjects taught and instead learned them well afterwards. Ask to speak to their graduates if possible, the ones with NO technical experience at all. If you do the math if there are about 10-15 people and LA had about 20 cohorts and each cohort had 2-3 fellows... which ammounts to about the same 5 star reviews left behind, which reviews are actually real? Again, please feel free to email me at teamgingko@gmail.com for any questions.
Codesmith of Codesmith
Codesmith
Oct 22, 2018
Most of your concerns have been addressed in our response to your previous review. As you mentioned, you were able to secure a Senior Software Engineer position 9.5 weeks after the program at a major media company, without prior coding experience. We’re sorry to hear that you don’t attribute any of that to Codesmith’s software engineering education and hiring support - especially given that you made use of an additional 40hrs of one-on-one tutoring, mock interviews and code review with the engineers here. To your point, it certainly requires hard work after graduation day to get an engineering job at the senior level so we’re very proud of the time and effort that our grads put in to nail those down, and as you saw we will always happy to help to make that happen. -
Anonymous
100% worth it
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Coming from a Computer Science grad from Cal Poly, I would've never thought that I could learn so much about programming in a 3 month period. I can honestly say that I've learned so much more in this 3 month program than I did with taking Computer Science courses during college. Not only do you apply the fundamentals, but you learn all these programming languages, frameworks, and library in so much depth with how it works under the hood. I was also surprised about the fact that everyone in the program was able to pick up a lot of complex data structures, algorithms, and concecptual material in Computer Science, they manage to pick it up faster than the students in a Computer Science program in cellege. In addition, you get to innvoate an actual production level project for seasoned developers, this is something that you cannot get out of other schools, especially in a Computer Science program in college.
Just another heads up, although the program is only 3 months, it's VERY intensive. This opinion is coming from a person that has a Computer Science degree. The amount of work they give you is ludricous, the hours are suppose to be from 9am - 8pm, but expect to leave around 11PM or even 12PM. So be prepared to put in the work, it'll be worth it at the end, I can promise you that you'll learn so much.
Now, aside from the academic side, the community is just astounding, no words can describe it. You would be surrounded by so many amazing and intelligent people in this program. These people go from the staff, instructors, and of course your cohort. This experience that you get from being at CodeSmith, you definitely cannot experience else where. The bonds that you form with your cohort and staff, is just incredible, I wouldn't trade it for anything.
All in all, I highly recommend coming to CodeSmith, the experience and learning experience you get from here, you won't be able to find anywhere else
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Anonymous
Another one bites the dust...
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It’s been about 6 months since I graduated and I’m still unemployed. I’ve applied to over 100 companies so far including companies as small as 5+ employees. I consider myself to be smart and hardworking, so please don’t turn this into another convenient statement about “isolated cases” saying how you’re sorry it didn’t work out for me. There were numerous warnings from previous graduates, online board such as this, and family about signing up for Codesmith. People told me that the promise – “Become a software engineer in 12 weeks!” – sounded too good to be true and that the market is changing and getting saturated with people like us. I wish I’d listened to them because this sucks. I’m heavy in debt and no job prospect on the horizon. -
Anonymous
Don't trust all the 5-star reviews!
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When I was choosing which bootcamp to sign up for, the first thing I did was to come here and read people's reviews about Codesmith. Visiting this site again after having graduated, I feel like maybe I'd been seriously duped…
I just realized that most, if not all, of the reviews that are written by people from my cohort and the one before mine are posted by Fellows. For those of you who don't know, Fellows are paid student instructors who decided to stay and work for Codesmith after completing the program. Codesmith hires about 4~5 fellows from each cohort. It did with mine and the one prior. Considering that there are now over 20+ cohorts and if this pattern were practiced consistently, it means that there are at least 100 such reviews written by Fellows on behalf of their employer.
I am not suggesting that they couldn’t all have had positive experiences at Codesmith, but it’s one thing to do it voluntarily; it’s quite another when you’re asked by your employer during your employment to do so on their behalf, fully knowing that the business relies heavily on them and that any negative review might invite a rebuke. Just like how Codesmith would tell its students to star each other's senior project on gitHub to make them look more popular or legit, same thing is happening here. I won't name names but heck I am seeing A LOT of them here! -
Anonymous
Best Decision Ever
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After attending a few of the Javascript the Hard Parts lectures and leveling up my core, basic coding knowledge, I decided I was finally ready to apply to Codesmith. The interviews went great (although the tech interview was hardly a breeze), and I got in (!!!). I was so nervous on day one - my background was primarily outside of tech, and even though I prepped a lot before applying, I still felt like I was way out of my league once I got there. The other students were all unbelievably smart, but what really blew me away was how NICE everyone was. And supportive. And fun. And interesting. (I could go on and on...). Once this became apparent, my nervousness melted away, and I learned what it really meant to be a software engineer. I had incredible help available to me at any time I needed it - from the full-time instructors or the Codesmith fellows or the senior students. Yes, we learned React, Redux and everything else a full stack JS programmer needs to know, but most importantly, we learned how to solve problems and REALLY get how the software does what it does. We did hackathons, we did endless pair-programming (which I loved), there were lectures, family dinners, days on the beach, expert speakers, alumni panels, etc, etc. In short- it's an absolutely amazing program, and from what I can tell it's pretty much the best one out there. Codesmith changed my life, and now I'm doing my dream job near the beach at a salary that's just over their avg starting salary in LA (105,000). I'm beyond excited. (oh - did I mention that they even guide you on interviewing and networking? Well they do that too and it was so, so helpful).
The last thing I'll call out is the team that runs Codesmith - they're all so incredibly knowledgeable and kind and patient and somehow ALWAYS in a good mood. They're the absolute best, so all I can say is - if you can get into Codesmith, then you absolutely should attend Codesmith. You'll thank yourself every day. -
Anonymous
Surpassed my expectations
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My experience at codesmith was much better than I had expected it to be. The curriculum was thought out very well. The main technologies taught are Javascript, React/Redux, Node, SQL, NoSQL. There is also a hint of machine learning, but not too much. Although these are the main technologies, By the end of the program you will be able to pick up any technology you would like to learn. The fact that you are able to collaborate with others and create open source projects is also invaluable and has taught me a lot.
I ended up doing a lot of things that really challenged me and helped me improve as a software engineer. Their pedagogy is all about teaching you how to learn and you're not told to do things tutorial style. You're able to become immersed into an environment of software engineering. You will learn a lot when you start building a tool that other developers will use and it shows a sense of maturity that recruiters like to see.
Job Assistance is the greatest part of the program especially after the program, where you still have access to all their resources. The advice you get on job searching and interviewing is incredibly useful.
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Anonymous
In retrospect
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As a graduate of Codesmith, I can tell you with 100% confidence that if I were to do it all over again, I would not pick Codesmith. I think Codesmith makes money way too easily from the students for the level and quality of services that they provide (or rather, don’t). Codesmith and its CEO would love to tell you that their instructions are purposefully bad because they’re meant to be cursory in order to promote “autonomous learning” and “independence”. To me that just sounds like a poor excuse for not having quality lesson plans and not employing high-quality, well-compensated, non-student instructors like some competing bootcamps do.
I take bigger issue with how Codesmith promotes and markets itself. Codesmith wants you to think that it’s for their short 4 weeks of superficial instructions and 8 weeks of scattered group projects that the graduates are getting the jobs that they claim. Did you know that you can’t even tell your interviewers that you graduated from Codesmith because of the negative stereotypes associated with it? Codesmith and its CEO swear that their program works because of their often anecdotal and unsubstantiated claims about student outcomes that are sourced from some “internally gathered data”. The thing is they even take credit for students’ job placements that happen well after their graduation when, more so, it was actually the students’ own hard work, struggle, and months and sometimes years of self-studying that got them the jobs in the end. I ultimately landed a job that I’m fairy happy with for now, but I spent considerably more time outside of Codesmith before and after, studying and preparing myself in order to successfully transition into the industry. I find it less than genuine that Codesmith would unabashedly try to take all the credit for student outcomes and make it sound like their 3-month program is all that’s needed to achieve a successful outcome just so it can continue to promote itself and make more money from unsuspecting and often, desperate students.
$17K for 3 months.
I know some prospective students justify paying or taking out a loan for the high tuition by telling themselves that if the program can help you get the kind of jobs that Codesmith is claiming, then it’s worth it. I did too. But that’s assuming that it does and there’s no better use of your hard-earned money. What if it doesn’t? What if it’s not?
-A.H.
Will Sentance of Codesmith
CEO
Sep 12, 2018
This review is an interesting one because it rejects the very essence of the approach of Codesmith - despite it apparently having worked for you with the job you received after the program
Traditionally coding bootcamps teach you by walkthroughs of frameworks etc - they don’t go ‘under the hood’ of the language, they don’t make you struggle through blocks to build autonomy (actually Hack Reactor does) and they don’t have you refine your technical communication for months on end to make you an enhancing member of any team.
This means grads of those coding bootcamps take entry/junior jobs for $50-$80k in NY/LA/SF and that’s maybe great. It’s based on the fact that they have learned how to do specific tasks but not how to learn - because learning how to learn is not always pleasant and people don’t always recognize where they learned how to learn - so it’s understandable that bootcamps would rather just teach walkthroughs. It then typically takes a further 3 years to get to the mid level roles that 90%+ of codesmith grads receive.
It would be infinitely easier for us to offer a program that hand held people through in a classroom style tutorial ‘learning’ React, ‘learning’ Node. But this is the antithesis of the Codesmith model (And again shout out to Hack Reactor for following this approach too). It can cause frustration - “why can’t I just have the answer” - but it works.
The attention to detail in the program is so huge - from Eric personally working with every grad to help you negotiate up your salary, to the workshops with me iterating on your approach to interviews, to Schno, Samantha and Phil instructing with years of experience.
Normally reviews on coursereport have some thoughtful lessons about polish around the program or things that can be improved. This review I firmly stand against - including the explicit false claims it makes about interviews and data. I proudly stand by the approach of codesmith that has got 100s of graduates straight to mid level roles requiring 3+ years experience but with no prior coding background. How? Because these engineers have learned how to solve any new task as fast as someone who has been doing it for 3 years. Reading the 150 reviews here that celebrate that approach makes me proud and reinforces why we do this - to build a network of people who are truly autonomous learners for the rest of their careers - it’s worth it for that. -
Anonymous
What More Can I Add
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There are so many technologies propping up the web as we know it. It can be difficult to wrap your mind around all of them, much less be productive in a work environment with them. Having done CS in college, I can attest that academic topics rarely translate cleanly into the current state of web development. Codesmith takes these academic topics are really projects them onto the modern software development landscape, providing context as well as industry best practices. It's an iterative process, building from the core fundamentals to cutting edge technology.
Not only will you be fluent in modern tech but you will add your own library to the open source community; pushing yourself as a developer in ways that most devs never will. This enviornment of pushing the envelope and constant learning is fostered and facilitated by a phenomenal staff of amazing engineers. They are the secret sauce that allows for such a rigorouse program and I can't laud them enough.
Switching gears to the job finding process; Codesmith, in my opinion, really shines here. The industry can be very difficult to break into. Notriously so. The team makes sure to not only break the process down into manageable chunks but to hold you accountable to you employement goals.
All in all, Codesmith is really a once in a lifetime experience and an amazing way to become a top-tier software engineer.
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Anonymous
Codesmith student review
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As someone who attended a bootcamp prior to attending codesmith, I found the difference was tremendous. Easily one of the best programs out there, when they say "our graduates get mid-senior level positions" they really mean it. I know, its pretty crazy, I remember reading that and thinking: theres no way thats possible, yet here I am 2 months from graduating, accepting a senior level position. They will tell you to trust the process, and I know, we're not really programmed to just blindly trust something and expect it to work; but seriously, trust the process and put in your best effort and it will take you very far. My advice would be, if you're stuck, you have an entire network of people that are willing to help you get unstuck use them to your advantage.
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Anonymous
Life Changing Experience
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I had heard about coding camps prior to Codesmith but I never really had the intention of signing up for one. I figured I could learn web development on my own and apply to junior positions with that knowledge. I didn’t realize how difficult the industry was to break into though, even for a junior developer. It was near impossible to even get an interview.
Then I attended a Hard Parts class Will was teaching. I was impressed with his knowledge and how engaging the class was. Then I explored the Codesmith campus and saw the current students working and talked to a couple of them, and it seemed like such a great and inclusive atmosphere. My positive impression along with my disappointment in finding a job pushed me to apply for Codesmith where I ended up being accepted.
The experience of Codesmith itself was amazing. I met so many motivated people that motivated me more, and I met a lot of good friends from my cohort and other cohorts that I still hang out with. It really does feel like a family there. The course content was also great and they taught us a lot of difficult and advanced topics in detail. That’s one of the biggest differences with Codesmith compared to other schools: You will struggle. But you come out at the end of it very knowledgeable in a lot of areas and you have projects that are genuinely impressive, even to experienced developers. Many other schools will have you make generic, junior-level projects that you see a million times on inexperienced programmers’ resumes. That won’t make you stand out.
Keep in mind, even by the end of my time there, I was still skeptical about finding a job because I remembered how difficult it was before Codesmith. We went through a lot of job preparation like resume reviews and mock interviews, but I was still unsure. The key here is you have to follow what Codesmith tells you to do to a T. It’s very easy to get lazy when job searching after your graduation. But I followed exactly what they taught me and I ended up getting interviews left and right. Some of them didn’t go well, but most did.
I ended up getting two offers and went with a company that currently pays me a six figure salary doing something I love. Before Codesmith, I would have been surprised to get an offer of even half that. I’m still in disbelief that I was able to get to where I am now in such a short time.
Everything about Codesmith was life changing, from the friends I met to the experience of being there to my new career now. If you’re on the fence about this school just because you think it might be too good to be true, know that I felt the exact same way. I just pulled the trigger on it and it was the best decision I ever made.
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Anonymous
Software Engineer
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I’m very happy with joining the Codesmith community. The skills I have developed during my time as a resident are incredibly invaluable, not just in the sense that you learn the latest technology stacks, but also for the fact that the pedagogy this program incorporates instills a refreshing approach to solving challenging problems. Residents traditionally put in between 80 to 100 hours worth of studying to synchronize with the rapid pace of the curriculum. It is advisable to enter the program with a strong foundation in Javascript fundamentals to lessen the overwhelming time spent on learning popular technologies and familiarizing oneself with the newest libraries that complement these technologies. You spend a month and a half concentrating on the core curriculum that prepares you with the essential skills to build a full-stack application. The remaining time is used to build a solo project, two smaller scale projects with teams, and one big project (that is usually a tool that may be used by other developers) with a team you will be collaborating closely with for several weeks. Lastly, you spend one week reinforcing all that you’ve learned with one more team-developed project.
There are very supportive engineering fellows that assist you in times of frustration or in times where you might feel a lack of complete understanding due to the exponential growth in the field of software and information technology, but the environment is conducive to helping each other learn. It is apparent that with the abundance of projects you build throughout your time, the engineers graduating from Codesmith are of an exceptional quality as they learn mostly through doing and not only from the instructors, who have a very solid understanding of the material that is taught in the program.
People from very diverse backgrounds, both technical and non-technical, decide to transition to a career in software engineering and all walks of life have an equal opportunity to excel because of the cooperative atmosphere that Codesmith maintains. If you are considering a engineering residency program, strongly consider Codesmith.
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Anonymous
Transformative experience
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CodeSmith is remarkable. It transforms experienced (and less experienced) developers to senior engineers who are able to architect complex applications that scale. Perhaps its secret is teaching the ability to learn itself – engineers are taught how rapidly to pick-up new technologies and swiftly become experts.
After reading the positive reviews here before taking the course, I was skeptical since it sounded too good to be true, but it simply isn’t. I’m beyond glad that I took the dive.
In terms of my background, I attended Williams College, and recently graduated in 2016; I’m from New York. What I particularly appreciated about CodeSmith is the culture instilled from the top-down by its impressive CEO and founder, Will Sentance. Will is an Oxford and Harvard grad and has built a culture of critical thinking, hard work, and innovation, alongside fantastic collaboration and fun.
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Anonymous
Unhealthy culture and environment
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We were there 11hours a day and then once every two weeks they had "optional" hackathons after. I never stayed because I was tired and at the end they didn't let me graduate because as they told me I wasn't passionate enough. It was more like "we did a poor job teaching you by leaning on the Socratic method as an excuse to force you to figure out 95% yourself, and we aren't prepared to share the responsibility of failing you so well just blame you for not staying at our hackathons". They kicked out half of the cohort to boost their job placement numbers, yea maybe I wasn't ready to be a dev just yet, but you weren't ready to start a bootcamp.
Will Sentance of Codesmith
CEO
Apr 10, 2018
I know it was tough during the first full cohort in LA back in 2015. We were definitely finding out feet and there was a lot of experimentation to get the program right over that cohort - although grads from that first cohort went on to do excellent work at Ticketmaster, The Bouqs, Swoop and other companies
The goal of the program even then was to instill the ability to push through blocks and that struggle is often tough - but it’s what gives you the ability to learn any new technology for the rest of your career - and that’s always been the goal.
3% of graduates (10 out of 300) have not graduated from the program - and 3 of those that didn’t graduate were in that early cohort (out of a cohort of ~14) -
Anonymous
Solid Program for Experienced Developers, Not for New Developers
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Codesmith is a program for experienced developers in Playa Del Rey, Los Angeles. It is NOT for folks new to the software engineering space. If you have no background with programming, this school will NOT hold your hand and help you through the basics. On their website, they used to advertise that they were a school for 'experienced programmers' now they refrain from mentioning the type of student they accept instead focusing on what you'll get out of the program. This is left ambiguous for a reason. While there are plenty of programmers out there wanting more experience in web techologies like javascript, there are many more folks who are trying to make a career change and become software engineers. They are trying to appeal to both at the risk of the latter group of which I was a part when joining.
I first discovered Codesmith attending their JavaScript the Hard Parts events on Thursday nights. These are free, insightful meetups where you dive deeper into the basics of JavaScript and start getting a sense of how things you'll use everyday function 'under the hood'. These are very good sessions and I recommend folks attend especially since they are free.
I had no intention of joining but I was on the market for a code school and once I mentioned that, I was targeted via email by the CEO of the program who also teaches the Thursday night courses. I was convinced that even though it was billed for experienced engineers, I would do well in the program as I learned quickly and was a great culture fit.
I joined and am very unhappy with the results. Here's why.
1) Teaching Style - The program claims to abide by the "Oxford University" style of teaching. This seems to be code for 'very little teaching with problem sets for you to figure concepts out on your own.' You work through problem sets and follow the instructions which include reading documentation for a product you've never heard of and figure out it's purpose and how to use it. To an experienced programmer, this is somehwat normal. You are introduced to new technologies all the time, and therefore, for experienced programmers, this style of teaching makes sense. But for people brand new to the space, this is not only frustrating but time consuming - a luxury which one simply does not have in this 3 month intense environment.
Every 2 days you focus on a new aspect of programming with javascript and it leaves you very little time to fully grasp what you're learning.
Daily Schedule:
- Come in and code for an hour (practice algorithm problems that are common for job interviews)
- After that, you either go to a 30-45 min lecture OR you jump into the work for the day for about 2 hours
- If you started with lecture, you work on the work for the day. If you started with work on a new subject, you go to a 30-45 min lecture. You spend the first 10 minutes talking about how difficult it was and the rest of the time rushing through what the heck you just did and a high level overview of how it works.
- back to work until lunch
- lunch break
- another 30-45 min lecture OR you continue working on what you did that morning
- Stay until at least 11pm, but usually closer to 1am trying to figure things out on your own or with some friends in your cohort
2) Trust the Process Mentality - When things weren't going well, I made it a point to request feedback on my work and find out where I stood because there was no formal feedback along the way. When I expressed my doubts about my fit for the program, I was brought into a room to speak with the COO and a teacher. They gave me two options, defer to a later cohort or stick it out because I was "doing just fine" I just needed to 'trust the process'. The idea of letting me leave beacuse this was not the place for me was something I had to bring up and the conversation was diverted away from that. I have training in sales and this is a classic sales mentality which, looking back, is really sad. I genuinely believed my best interest was in mind at the time, but I am very skeptical now. In terms of my learning, I was not doing well at all - they just had no accurate way of scoring or measuring my progress.
I went through this side discusison, 'trust the process' loop 3 times throughout my time there (the latter 2 meetings included the CEO) and I never felt good about the outcome. I should have left early on but there really is a serious level of coersion, intimidation and manipulation that goes on in these meetings.
3) Senior Project - During the latter 6 weeks of the course you work on an open source developer tool. You're assigned to a group of your peers (usually 3-4 people), you all ideate on something that will be impactful and relevant for developers to use, you pitch your ideas to the CEO. If you're interested in VR, your project likely will not be accepted - they don't like VR projects. Very few have gotten through but they believe the technology isn't impressive enough right now. It's all about how your project will look to potential employers -- and potential partners of Codesmith. This process is about you but it's also very much about the school.
My group of 3 had a slew of issues but the biggest was that we were of vastly differing skill levels and some other members did not feel it was their job to teach me things - which I can agree with. They paid just as much as I did and did not deserve to have to spend hours every day teaching me things I should've learned in the weeks prior. The staff was not very helpful, in fact, my partners were more knowledgeable than most of them. This made asking for help seem futile and no project group really worked very closely with their assigned staff mentors.
4) What I have to offer now - I left Codesmith feeling really bad about the investment but willing to work on my own to get my skills to a point where I could get hired. Unfortunately, I've found that not only am I extremely stressed but I also just don't have much to show for the massive amount of time and money I spent on this.
I'm considering legal action due to the misrepresentation of the product and the manipulation involved during my time there.
TL;DR:
Pros:
- The culture is fun, they like to party and play ping pong
- The staff are generally very nice people
- They tend to find really nice, smart and driven students. If I left with anything, it's a solid group of friends. I only saw one person asked to leave and it was definitely warranted. Strange situation.
- Solid program for current engineers looking to add something interesting to their portfolio and take a deeper dive into Javascript and a few other web technologies
Cons:
- Teaching style is poor. It's barely teaching.
Ex. The machine learning/python section basically did not happen. The teacher literally rambled and sped through slideshows of both basic and complex machine learning concepts, asking every 3rd slide "got it?" to which we all just remained silent because we were so lost, we couldn't formulate relevant questions other than "no. don't got it. what are you talking about?".
- Misleading/Manipulating - The CEO is a great guy but comes off as super salesy. You can't help but feel like you're being conned, and, like any good con artist, you also feel bad about questioning the transaction. This is standard manipulation and it's being practiced at a large scale here. Be careful.
There are quite a few students who had a negative experience and the common denominator among them is that they had 0 or very little programming experience prior to joining.
Will Sentance of Codesmith
CEO
Sep 09, 2018
It’s a real shame you had a tough time with the approach of the program. The goal of Codesmith is to create engineers who can handle any new challenge they face - for the rest of their career as a software engineer. This can be tough as it involves going through challenges and hitting roadblocks and then using those moments to improve as a problem solver.
It would be much easier to do traditional lecturing/tutoring through the program but it wouldn’t work. The ‘secret’ of Codesmith student outcomes (they’re all individually logged here http://bit.ly/codesmith-outcomes) is that grads have learned how to problem solve and communicate complex technical concepts autonomously - so they’re able to handle any new framework/language/feature for the rest of their careers - not just the exact process they learned in a class. And it works - the average outcomes in LA and NY is $100k+ http://bit.ly/codesmith-outcomes
For some people this may not be their preferred learning style - it isn’t ideal for everyone. When someone has discovered that it’s not a good fit while in the program we’ve worked with that person to go above and beyond with one-on-one mentorship - getting you off the ground on a new concept with the help of an engineer on the team.
It can be stressful but if you have a super supportive community of fellow learners around you, it can be really powerful. Around 2/3rds of Codesmith students join without without prior professional software engineering experience. Around 1/3rd have attended a coding bootcamp, been a software engineer or have a computer science degree.
That’s why I teach the weekly JS Hard Parts workshops still - to help people who are new get up to the level where they can get into Codesmith.
It’s also why in the program itself there has to be an ecosystem around you for the tough times. On the curriculum side, lectures that go under-the-hood of the JavaScript language, code reviews and lectures on the core aspects of web development and computer science: DOM manipulation, Ajax, React/Redux, Node/Express, SQL/NoSQL, Computer science (data structures, algorithms, big O notation), programming fundamentals (OOP, functional programming) and many more areas. As you work through challenges in pairs Help Desk acts as the means to train you on building autonomy as a problem solver.
But also on the side of wellbeing - Circles each week to talk through the non-coding side of the program, Thursday evenings, relay race, beach days and the support of the team.
The projects you build at Codesmith are designed to impress the companies you interview with at Hiring day and beyond - to give you the best leg up in the job search process. The best way to do that is to build things in the core web technology stack and even better to do so in a way that solves the problems of other developers - this gets your interviewers excited by the level you’re working at.
The instruction team at Codesmith has 40+ years experience between it and speak at conferences and to audiences around the world. But codesmith is much more than teaching - for that I’d recommend the best youtube videos. Instead it’s about a community of people going above and beyond to learn and to build things together so they can do so for the rest of their careers. -
Anonymous
Codesmith helped me immensely
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I have a unique situation. When I applied to Codesmith, I had taken some online courses and applied to jobs, but wasn't getting results.
The first few weeks of Codesmith, we reviewed a lot of JavaScript fundamentals. During that time, 2 companies reached out to interview me. During my lunch, I went to the interviews.
I did so well that many of the interviewers said they've interviewed developers with 5 or 6 years of experience, but never seen them get so many of the questions right.
A lot of that was due to Codesmith's great way of teaching Comp Sci fundamentals that many bootcamps don't teach.
A lot of my success in these interviews is due to Codesmith. Thanks!
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Anonymous
Trust the process!
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At times, you'll feel like you want to give up. You think you're not good enough. Codesmith is not those "feels good" bootcamps that's all over the place. The first part of the program teaches the fundamentals of JavaScript. Coming from a PHP background, little did I know that JavaScript has such differences! It's a language with so many twists, and Codesmith explained it thoroughly and clearly.
The most intense part about the program, IMO, is the brainstorming week to come up with ideas for our senior project. This segment exposes us to vast amount of web technologies and trends. This gave us perspective on how big the web dev ecosystem is and what's possible.
Overall, I like the method and approach Codesmith is using, it trains people to be autonomous problem solving engineers, a skill employers value greatly.
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Anonymous
Programmer
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I made a huge gamble to choose Codesmith over other coding programs in the Bay Area. Roughly 9 months later after "graduating", I'm in massive and crippling debt with very little to show for it. My portfolio can't even make it past any recruiter. I'm no longer even looking for a developer job and I'm working minimum wage to make ends meet.
The curriculum may have changed since I finished but at the time Redux was not taught; you absolutely can not call yourself a React developer unless you know either Redux or Flux architecture.
The little interview practice we had was not helpful because we gave it to eachother. How are we supposed to know what to ask for and what to avoid if we've never interviewed and hired actual candidates?I'm in the Bay Area; companies, start-ups don't care about Codesmith and there is a non-existant network here. Will told me that 25% of hiring partners were from the Bay Area but they all seemed to have failed to show up for my hiring day. That career network and React was why I decided to study at Codesmith.
However, it took nagging and months until I was finally connected to 3 companies; 1 of which never called despite organizing a meeting and the other required that I have experience in RoR while keeping me on a thread for nearly 2 months.
I don't even qualify for Internships or jr. positions apparently and most of the advice I was given did not help me; in fact, it seemed to have done more harm than good because nearly all recruiters found my resume misleading and so I never made it past that round. Again, we were providing resume feedback to eachother and received little professional resume tailoring.
I think I actually only had 4 technical phone screens and 1 on-site in my entire search.Take it with a grain of salt when you hear success stories of people who graduated from here. It's a good program only if you're looking to relocate to LA where the bar is significantly lower.
Will Sentance of Codesmith
CEO
Jan 31, 2017
I'm sorry it’s been so tough for you in the job search - we all are. I know you and I have been on the phone together and with Eric and Hira on the team many times - and we will all continue to do so
In addition to our conversations together, keep talking to other Codesmith graduates working in SF to get their thoughts on strategy - I know they would be very happy to talk with you too.
The purpose of Codesmith is to be a community of people not only learning technical knowledge but growing as problem solvers and exceptional communicators. Redux is part of the curriculum for sure but the real purpose is to develop your capacity to pick up any new technology fast through the challenges, whiteboarding practice and under-the-hood lectures
I am truly confident in your ability. You have great projects and a strong computer science mindset. We’re here for you and will keep pushing with you until you get there.
Keep up the hard work and I’m looking forward to hearing back from you to my email
Will -
Blessing Ebowe
The Ultimate learning environment
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Codesmith to me was a very important learning experience, it doesn't just build you up as a tech-savvy Engineer it takes you into the rudiments of problem-solving, technical communication and project management. Most importantly handling new challenges without giving up, I was challenged to do more every day of the programme and the more challenges I overcame the more I knew and the more confidence I had in my understanding.
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Joshua Wright
I went to Codesmith out of High School, and I'm so glad I did
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Codesmith has a relatively wide range of individuals coming through the program. They range in age everywhere from twentysomethings to fifty or older, it's a really diverse program. I came when I was 18, straight out of high school, in lieu of going to college. When I was first considering going to Codesmith, I never thought I would leave with such a strong emotional connection to the people I met there, and such a feeling of community and connection that Codesmith has given me. Codesmith also has a universal reputation for producing really high quality, professional engineers- not just bootcamp grads- and I can honestly attest to the fact that I've grown more and learned more in the last three months than I ever did in any whole year of traditional schooling. Now I'm confident in calling myself an authority on frontend javascript development and state management, and that's something that people I know who went to other bootcamps like GE and Hack Reactor just can't say.
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Ben Gummelt
Life Changing Approach
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What set Codesmith out from the other similiar programs is that you had to be at least a junior level engineer before you entered the program. This process made sure you were prepared for the intense 12 week program that changes the way you approach coding and empowers you to be a mid to senior level engineer. The focus on communication was the missing block in my approach to becoming a great engineer and Codesmith fostered that approach in a very effective way.
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Tiffany
Game Changer
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I attended Codesmith at the end of 2017, and it's been the biggest game changer in my quest to switch careers. Codesmith offers a valuable, hands-on learning environment that focuses on teaching students how to become better pair-programmers, communicators and self learners -- something that's almost impossible to find if you're trying to learn software engineering on your own. But be forewarned that the program is difficult and will stretch your limits; there's minimal hand holding, and imposter syndrome can be a very real thing. With that said, if you attend with these expectations, you'll be able to graduate as a stronger researcher and problem solver. And while I needed more time to brush up on some core concepts after I had graduated, I found that I was better equipped to learn more efficiently because of Codesmith. Ultimately, I was able to land a software engineering job within three months of graduating -- so the entire experience was absolutely worth it. If you're looking for a software engineering residency that offers great culture and the opportunity to develop cutting-edge projects that you're passionate about, Codesmith is it.