Devmountain

I had an early midlife crisis of sorts when I realized I hated working in marketing. I became interested in learning to code, but I remembered how the entry-level computer science class I took in college beat me to a pulp, so I was hesitant at first. But since DevMountain was very close to where I lived, I figured it was worth a shot. After all, this sort of training is worth much more than a communications degree.

I enjoyed my time at DevMountain. I learned so much, and learned to manage high levels of stress at all times. There were many times where I wanted to quit, but all I had to do was remember how my career was headed towards selling cell phones in Sam's Club. That made me feel better every time.

Since I echo the sentiments expressed in most of the positive reviews listed here, I will instead list the things you need to understand to get a job after graduating from DevMountain:

1. Learn something outside of the curriculum while preparing to attend DevMountain. If you spend an hour a day learning something like Wordpress on your own, your job prospects will increase significantly.

2. Learn something outside of the curriculum while attending DevMountain. If you spend an hour a day after class learning something like PHP on your own, your job prospects will increase significantly.

3. Learn something outside of the curriculum immediately after graduating DevMountain. If you spend six hours a day learning something like C# on your own, your job prospects will increase significantly.

Obviously there's a pattern.

I emphasize this based on my exprience in the job market. There are not a lot of junior postions the require just the MEAN stack exclusively - most positions that I found in the west required at least one of the above proficiencies, along with many miscellaneous skills that are not taught at DevMountain. Rest assured, you're better off sticking with learning Angular at DevMountain that learning something like Python somewhere else - after a month of vigorous job searching, I can count the amount of junior Python positions I found on one hand.

If anything, DevMountain gives you the tools and confidence you need to continue learning. I spent eight hours a day for a month after graduating learning PHP and MYSQL. A lot of graduates land jobs doing something other than the MEAN stack, and that is perfectly okay. After all, a dev job is a dev job. I'd take PHP over hanging out in Sam's Club any day.

As for me, I landed a cushy work-from-home position that pays well. I got it because I was the only candidate that took the initiative to learn PHP. It's a contract-to-hire position, which is why I'm also a volunteer dev at a local marketing agency, where I learn from and build rapport with the dev team. It's my fallback plan, and if it works out, I'm be darn glad I took that initiative.

Initiative brings rewards. Never stop learning, and you'll get a job.

I first went to DevMountain a year ago and after going throught the course I was selected to be a mentor. I mentored for a class and a half and then worked for DevMountain Labs for a little while. I feel like DevMountain is a great place to learn for thoes that are willing to do all they can. Prepair for the course before by doing all the pre-course work and then some. When you go be willing to truly spend all your time working while at the bootcamp. If you do you will be rewarded with the skills to land a good job. I know the people who own and run the school and I know they are trying their best to give you the best experience for the best price. 

I did a lot of research before applying to DevMountain. I'm from the Bay Area California where you can literally walk into a coffee shop and pitch your idea to some person you find sitting on a couch coding. With that being said, I had a lot of people to talk to in regards to Coding Bootcamps. I got mixed reviews with the usual outcome being, College grads (Engineers) with mixed feelings and self taught (Engineers) saying yes to Bootcamps. Prior to DevMountain I had taken college programming courses and also paid online courses. Those courses were great but rarely offered a Full-Stack project. After visiting the DevMountain website and actually seeing what some students with no prior coding knowledge had built within a 3 month span really impressed me. 

Yeah there's Coding Bootcamps all over the Bay Area but I really wanted to be immeresed and DevMountain offered free-housing! why would I want to sit in 2 hours of traffic after class when I could spend that time still studying and working. Plus having roommates who were in the course and mentors around just seemed like the best bet for sure. 

DevMountain was one of the best decisions I've ever made. No, I wasn't a top student, some students had more background in coding, some students really enjoyed back-end and some students enjoyed front-end. With a fast 12 weeks, I saw it really come down to students sticking to technologies that interested them the most. DevMountain isn't a place thats going to hand you a new career or write half of your project for you. You really get what you give. For those who think DevMountain wasn't the right choice for them, to each his own. We all have a different learning styles, and some instructors had different teaching styles. I will say that some lesson instructions were really hard to comprehend and could of been written out in a clearer context, but never would I blame instructors, guest instructors or lessons to my lack of understanind a concept. If you really wanted to understand a new concept the resources are there and Jeremy made it clear that his students are his number one priority and he's there to help until you understand it. If you put in the work you'll get the results, just don't be unrealistic, and don't be too hard on yourself. If you are struggling, the DevMountain staff is full of support, just don't expect support if you don't raise your hand or ask for help, instructors will assume you understand and continue with their lesson. 

If you're wondering about job results, I started my job hunt as soon as my cohort ended and I continued to study while unemployed. Within 2 weeks I had multiple offers, because I was actively looking and I did feel prepared because I was still putting in time to code. Out of my offers I chose an internship where I could continue to work and learn along side a great development team. I am no longer an intern and now a Software Engineer for that same company. I actually don't use the MEAN stack at my job but DevMountain gave me the confidence to learn new technologies and I am loving every day of work. Jeff Chapman from the career-building team has actively been in touch during my job hunt and even after landing a job, so that's proof that the DevMountain staff is there for you. 

DevMountain was an awesome experience I met great friends, students and staff. Utah is one of my favorite places now, and that's coming from a California boy who loves to Surf. I highly reccommend DevMountain to anyone who is serious about learning and willing to put in the work, even if that means staying later or studying on the weekends. If I can do it, you can do it too. 

First of all, I think DevMountain is worth every penny. I've been lucky enough to go from making about $10/hr before the course to over $60k/year after. If you do the math, that means the course paid for itself in about 3 months (it was a tiny bit cheaper when I went). That alone speaks volumes about the value you're getting from DevMountain. But for me, it wasn't just about the money. I wanted a career that I could stay in for the rest of my working life, and DevMountain gave me the skills to do that.

If you're considering attending DevMountain, you should know that this course is not easy. There were multiple occasions when I wanted to throw my laptop out the window from frustration. So if you're not sure that this is a field that you want to go into, you need to figure that out before applying. If you decide it is what you want to do though, I really don't think there's a better value out there.

The only reasons I wouldn't give DevMountain a perfect rating are pretty trivial, and you can really sense that they are things that are being improved, but I should list them here anyway. First, there were a couple of instructors that really didn't do it for the class I was in. After they finished, the lead instructor for DevMountain had to come back in and reteach a lot of the lesson. Unfortunately for DevMountain, it's hard to know exactly how the instructor will really do until they actually teach. However, DevMountain worked to improve these instructors, and when one in particular wasn't showing enough improvement, they decided not to invite them back. That shows me they really are trying to make the course as valuable as possible. My other minor complaints are regarding the curriculum. A few of the projects have pretty confusing instructions (which they were working to fix as I was attending), and not all of the curriculum is super relevant. Mostly what I'm talking about is MongoDB. It's kind of a paradox though, because teaching a SQL database would add time and cost to the program, so an object DB is probably the best solution, even though it's not exactly applicable in the industry. Other than that, all the technologies they teach are definitely marketable skills.

Most importantly, DevMountain taught me how to learn. At my current job, I'm actually not using very much of what I learned during the course (I'm using python and PostgreSQL instead of node.js and MongoDB), but it was easier to learn these new technologies because of my time at DevMountain. Overall, I'd recommend this school to anyone who knows that they want to go into web development.

My experience at DevMountain in Dallas was incredible. The instructors and course work taught me in three months what would have taken me over a year or more to learn on my own, in addition to exposing me to technologies and frameworks I may have otherwise not knew even how to begin to learn.

Don't think though that you can just go through the motions and magically understand everything though -- you get out of it what you put into it. They are very clear and upfront about this too. It's going to be hard work but if you put in the time you'll come out with the results you were looking for with skills that are in demand.

Prior to enrolling in DevMountain I was working as a retail wage slave, and just last week I accepted an offer as a web developer starting a career I before could only fantasize about. Of course no one can guarantee you'll get a job, but if you're willing to put in the work, then doors will open up. They did for me, and they did for others that were in the course with me as well.

I came to DevMountain with almost no prior coding experience and 3 weeks after graduating landed a job as a developer with a 67% salary increase over my last job!  The boot camp was an intense experience, but not any more intense than a busy college semester, and it went by so quickly.  What is great about the structure of DevMountain is that you get a ton of hands-on experience just practicing building stuff with what you learn every day after lecture.  Then when personal and group project time rolls around, all you do is build something you're interested in and that's where everything really sinks in.  I poured my heart into my personal and group projects and those, along with a couple other projects we did as part of the curriculum and one I did on the side, meant that I had a pretty decent portfolio of work at the end. The mentors are wonderful, patient, and were always willing and able to help me solve problems as I got stuck.  In the last week, DevMountain organizes a lunch where students can meet potential employers and show off their projects.  I met my new employer there and 3 weeks later was offered a position.  My feeling leaving DevMountain is that it helped me to build up a lot of momentum learning web development--enough to launch me into a new career!

My experience at DevMountain was literally life changing and a highlight of my established career and education.  Prior to enrolling, I attempted to learn the basics of web development from YouTube, Team Treehouse, friends and other various tutorials. While there is a wealth of quality self instruction available on the internet, it is only accessible if you are fluent enough in the the syntax of development to take advantage of it. I would follow a tutorial and then get stuck at a "basic" point. I never progressed or gained enough comprehension to have any degree of autonomy. I was sick of being frustrated and it was obvious I was only going to learn from an instructor, so I jumped on the chance to attend DevMountain's first Dallas cohort. This turned out to be one of the best decisions I have ever made.

I came to the school with a clear expectation of leaving with the ability to build a fully functioning web application. Logins, security, external API's, permissions, testing, hosting... all of it. Not only did DevMountain meet my expectation but they beat it by consistently over delivering. Others have covered  the curriculum basics, so I won't rehash that, but I do feel it is necessary to address some of the negative reviews I've seen here.

In DevMountain, as with life, you are going to get out what you put in. The students airing grievances about staff, curriculum, projects and job prospects were 100% down the line the same ones who NEVER ASKED A QUESTION IN THREE MONTHS. Unsurprisingly they were also the same ones bitching about accommodations, desks,  coffee, elevators, etc.  It was a theme I saw from day one all the way through the hiring luncheon. 

The staff is not there to cater the entire program to a particular student's ability or attitude. Nor are they mind readers, channeling each student's inner thought for signs of comprehension. There are there to deliver quality instruction, answer questions and help students work through more complex problems. In three months, I never encountered an instance where DevMountain staff was unable to provide clear, actionable answers to my questions. If the did not know an answer immediately, they would research and loop back to you later in the day or keep pushing the question up the chain until someone could answer it properly. 

Regarding the curriculum, yes there are times when something is unclear or slightly outdated. Guess what?!? That's exactly how it is when you enter the workforce. Get used to it. If all problems were solved, there wouldn't be a need for employees.  I get the impression that some negative reviewers are long on opinion and short on real world experience. 

I wholeheartedly recommend this school. While others left with piddling complaints, I left with a fully functioning web application my company now uses daily and a set of valuable skills that allow me to learn more and build more in the future. What more can you ask for?

I went through a sort of mid-life crisis at Dev Mountain. About halfway through the cohort I looked at Course Report and read some of the recent negative reviews and this got my mind racing. Maybe I made the wrong choice. Maybe DevMountain isn't as good as it once was...

I'm happy to say I was wrong about all of this. For those of you who care about getting-a-job- results: Two weeks after graduating from DevMountain I landed a Front End Apprenticeship at a company called MX. MX is a fast-growing startup that is super well known in the Salt Lake/Provo area. It really was my top choice to land this apprenticeship, and I made that known to the career-building team at DevMountain (specifically Jeff Chapman) and they helped me land this.

This isn't to say that this career opportunity was handed to me on a silver platter. I worked hard. I did things that other people in my cohort didn't - i.e completed open source projects, networked, and just generally dove into the material. 

However, I also didn't go insane. I wasn't up everyday till 2AM working. I would go to class. Work hard for a few hours after class, maybe put in 5 or so hours on both Saturday and Sunday and that was it. I also had almost no prior programming experience. 

The curriculum and the instruction was great. I read a recent review that talks about 'instructors fumbling with bugs in their code'. I guarantee that anybody who live codes is goign to fumble a bit. Bugs come up, that's the nature of live-coding. I found that the instructors genuinely cared, and the curriculum was great. 

The kinks that were in the curriculum were more like growing pains that are caused by the fast-moving nature of Web Development. I mean this stuff moves fast. One day it's flux, the next it's redux, and who knows what it will be tomorrow. DevMountain instructors and mentors are really thoughtful about implementing stuff that will apply to the web dev world today. 

I'm going to cut this review here, but seriously, if you have any doubts about attending devmountain contact me. I found that the overall support, learning style, and project-based-learning environment were a better experience than my time spent at USC (university of Southern California) which is a top tier university, 

DevMountain lived up to its offer of being able to start a new career after going through their intensive three-month web development program. It was a very tough course that required many hours and dedication for three months. However, those of us who successfully made it through learned much more than I thought could be done in such a short amount of time. I walked away feeling comfortable with HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Angular.js, Express.js, Node.js, jQuery, Git, and MongoDB. We got a taste of other things like React, Firebase, and D3 as well.

Overall, I am very pleased with the outcome as I was able to get two job offers within two weeks after graduating. I accepted one of those offers to be a Software Developer for a company that came to our "Meet & Hire" Lunch sponsored by DevMoutain for graduating students. I will say that getting a job this quickly is probably not the norm from what I have seen. I was fortunate enough to be blessed with an opportunity that happened to correlate with previous industry experience I had before deciding to make a career change.

I believe that DevMountain prepared students well for getting a job, but it is still up to each student to learn as much as they can, become proficient in web programming, and make themselves marketable through social media such as LinkedIn and through networking. DevMoutain also does a great job preparing students for interviews and having a good resume and LinkedIn profile. They have someone dedicated to helping students get jobs, which is a great resourse.

I recently completed the Immersive Web Development Cohort at DevMountain. Going into the program, I had strongly debated between Development or UI/UX, as I am a very big design guy. I decided that I was confident enough in my design skills and that I wanted to learn something completely new.

The course at DevMountain opened up my eyes to so many new possibilities. I was nowhere close to being the best student, and honestly was probably in the bottom half of the group. However, I was able to gain such a great understanding for how full stack development works. I have no doubt that if I would have dedicated myself more to the program, that I would have excelled so much more in development.

I am now a designer for a premium clothing company, and I was able to get this opportunity through a friend I made at DevMountain who got a job as a developer for this company as well. I work very closely with the development team, and because of my time at DevMountain, I am able to communicate with them in technical terms in relation to coding, etc.

I am definitely looking to continue to develop my coding skills, but I wouldn't trade my experience at DevMountain for anything. Regardless of how well I did in the program, it opened doors for me, and I am not getting to do something that I love every single day.

It's all about how much effort and dedication that you put into it.

I would recommend DevMountain to anyone.

This course, or "cohort" as they called it, was riddled with inexperience, lack of preparation, and apathy.

More often than not my class would arrive early ready and hungry to learn.  The instructor would show up 15 - 30 minutes late and start looking for what today's lesson was.  It was not uncommon at all for the instructor to just adlib his way through the material.  Material that he didn't know we would be covering that day until he walked into class.  Instructors would make several mistakes, fumbling around until their code worked.

What makes all of that worse was none of the instructors cared.  It's quite obvious that at one time the provo location was a good thing and people felt prepared to continue in a programming career path after completing it, but those instructors and that curriculum is long gone.  In fact, if you look at the instructors they have listed as teaching their cohorts on their website, you are being lied to.  None of those instructors work for the school anymore, all that is left is assignments they wrote and study sheets they created gone over by someone that doesn't quite understand what the original author was trying to help the students learn.  It really makes me sad.

DevMountain employees what they call 'Mentors'.  These are former graduates that attend the classes and are (in theory) there to assist the instructor and help the students with questions, problems, or just give ideas when they get stuck trying to write some difficult code.  This also was NOT the case.  The mentors would sit in the back working on their own projects and seemed genuinely annoyed if we wanted help.  This caused a few students in my class to reconsider early on and leave the camp with a partial refund.

Their classes used to wrap up with a final-project show and tell night of sorts where all the students were excited to show the project they had built during the last 4 weeks if the camp, as well as see others' projects.  Students learned from what others had done and were able to improve their own work as a result.  Unfortunately this too has become a shell of what it was.  The organizers take all the shortcuts they can so the night feels like a quickly organized intramural meeting where no one really has an idea what the program is.  But hey they brought food right?! 

After leaving this school I really wish I had gone somewhere else.  There are a few opportunities just like DevMountain in the Provo area and I feel like I would have learned a LOT more attending another camp.  I would strongly recommend exploring other options if you are considering attending a programming boot camp.  You CAN learn a lot from other sources, I am not going to stoop to the level of endorsing any of them in this review, but I have attended another camp since DevMountain and it was exponentially better.