Flatiron School

Flatiron School is one of the few boot camps that offers an in-person program, and I delayed my entrance to the school so that I'd be able to attend on their Denver campus. I was pretty excited for this program, but when I and my fellow students showed up, we were surprised to find out that the lectures were going to be administered via Zoom. This was a pretty big disappointment to all of us, since we had expected in-person lectures. I have heard that they are now lecturing in person, which makes me feel gipped, to say the least.

Beyond the Zoom lectures, the curriculum was really thorough. But in the 6 months since the class, I've learned things that should have been taught in the first few weeks, but weren't. Such as the difference between development and production environments, which is crucial to the process of deploying a website.

My cohort was also one of the last to learn Ruby on Rails as the backend technology - they've now switched to Python and Flask, which I was able to snag the learning materials for upon graduation. Ruby is a bit of a niche technology at this point, so it's a bit annoying to have spent 6 weeks learning it instead of something more in-demand.

I loved my cohort and the technical coaches were pretty good. But, honestly this school isn't that equipped to make people job ready in the 2023 job market. Their jobs report on their website is called the "2022 Jobs Report", but it was merely released in 2022 and only includes numbers from the entire year of 2021. This is a huge red flag, and extremely misleading at 7+ months into 2023. So, I recommend requesting the most current jobs numbers from them if you're applying - they will be significantly worse than those of 2021. I have talked to fellow grads applying to 400+ jobs with single-digit interviews.

I don't regret doing the program because I am not sure I would have learned this amount of these skills on my own by now, and I don't recommend avoiding Flatiron entirely. But, just know what you're getting yourself into before committing almost $20k to paying for something that might be worth closer to $10k. Also, the student loan options start huge payments about 4 months after graduation, so be prepared for that as well. You should be able to request a 3-month interest-only grace period.



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I graduated from Flatiron School Feb of 2022. For 2 years I took my time delving into Full Stack development within Flatiron’s Online Part Time Software Engineering program. It still wasn’t enough. Peer programming should have been mandatory. Data structures and algorithms should have been mandator. I wasn’t communicated the importance of these subjects throughout my schooling and it’s frustrating. No wonder the Ed coaches told me not to worry about it until after graduating. More people would have flunked out if said topics were mandatory. Now I am currently left tutor-less and further in student loan debt. I am possibly apt enough to work at Revature starting with a low salary gig and tutoring assistance. Needless to say, I am skeptical about a low salary Indian company with a 30,000 employment contract break. This isn’t what I signed up for. Anyone thinking of joining Flatiron School or any other coding bootcamp, it’s not enough to even be remotely considered for 60,000 + jobs nowadays. You’re better off perusing an associates degree at a community college. Read less

I was given misinformation over the phone about the flex program which led me to apply for the full-time live session. Afterward, I was corrected and told the course takes a maximum of 40 weeks. I was then emailed by a separate department that stated you have 60 weeks to complete flex. It's clear that the departments don't fully understand their own program and will give whatever information they "think" is correct, which led me to a decision that was not good for me. They are hard to get a hold of, and student support is almost non-existent. The curriculum often repeats itself and is not very hands-on. Often you read about a concept and then complete a lab later on, which is helpful but usually looks for a "specific answer", meaning your answer can be correct but still fail if it's not exactly what it's looking for. Unfortunately, my time at FlatIron was not good, so I cannot recommend it. Read less

This specifically pertains to the Data Science BootCamp. I cannot speak about the other fields, though I imagine cybersecurity would be in a similar boat, and software dev and UI dev would be better as it is more acceptable to enter into those fields without a degree.

I entered into the Data Science Online bootcamp ($17500) with 3 previous years of programming experience and the following expectations that were not met:

1. Flatiron curriculum was taught by experts in the field and would equip me with the skills needed to be an asset in a professional role.
2. Flatiron makes finding a job easier than if you did it on your own
     2A - they have hiring connections / a network of companies that respect their degree
     2B - they have an expert career coaching program to make finding a job easier
3. Employers respect the BootCamp certificate to be somewhat similar to receiving a Master's degree.

Here is the Reality:
1. at least for the online course, the entire curriculum is free and open source on Git Hub as the learn.co curriculum. Most of the lessons had not been updated since early 2021, which is not only an issue because tech is rapidly changing, but also many of the functions used were deprecated or in the process of being deprecated, links were broken or had moved, and overall 1/5 lessons on average would not run all the way through. Lectures happened to rarely live so it was very unlikely you would be able to catch on on a flex schedule, but from watching the recorded sessions, you weren't missing much. The lectures were just going through the learn.co assignments. You are connected with a personal coach which may meet with once a week, but it is very hit or miss who you will be assigned to, and some are much better than others. I was assigned Joe Commex, who was fired by the company for an undisclosed reason halfway through and I was transferred to Morgan Jones. Joe was ok, but not super knowledgeable of Data Science, more of Python-Dev. Morgan Jones (Yeah I am naming and shaming) was utterly terrible. He knew nothing of the subject matter, and would often get tripped up on even the simplest of DS questions. He showed us one of his projects that had glaring errors in the NN, and when I questioned them, he got defensive and was rude to me. Also, you need to schedule a time to review each project you complete, and there are often no times available for at least a week ahead of time and you are not allowed to work ahead until a project is graded. so you often find yourself in a week of limbo where your time is wasted.

2A Flatiron has NO connections other than the FDM group. The FDM Group is a seemingly good company that pays for you to obtain training in a particular IT field and then guarantees you a position with an employer. They require a college degree usually, but let you wave that req if you are a Flatiron alum. They do not look for previous coding experience tho, so if you already have e degree, just apply to them and skip Flatiron. They have several other companies like this, such as TheDataSchool and Revature, and they have even said that graduating from Flatiron does not make you more attractive and that they expect you not to have prior experience. They have literally 0 connections with any real companies.

2B Although they do indeed provide you with a career coaching program, and my mentor is very nice and helpful, it does not provide any information you could not find online or better yet ChatGPT. Thus, My complaint is that it simply does not justify the $17,500 I spent on the program, given that it is the only helpful thing, and it is not that helpful.

3. This is the biggest one, for data science at least, NO ONE CARES that you went to a BootCamp. Data Science is a complex field and most hiring managers expect either a master's or PhD to be qualified. Even if you received a real BS in Computer science, you would not be considered very competitive for true DS roles. Instead, you would need to settle for much lower paying and less interesting Data analyst roles, or maybe get lucky finding a startup that doesn't have a lot of options and can't pay you well or offer any benefits.

TLDR
The Key takeaway is that Flatiron is for all intents and purposes not worth your time and money and that you would be better off either applying to a company like FDM or the Data School, or learning these things yourself on youtube or with the help of an LLM like ChatGPT, making a portfolio of simple projects on GitHub, and applying broadly along the way Read less

I went to Flatirons with the intent of breaking into tech immediately after leaving the teaching field. I didn't quite achieve that timeline, but within 1 year of leaving teaching I completed the bootcamp (full time, online for 15 wks) and a 6 month job search. I have just received an offer and am excited to be in the content area that aligns with my previous career. The bootcamp was very difficult and rigorous as I knew almost nothing going into it outside of the prep work. I definitely recommend doing it full time, and making sure you make connections and friends within your cohort. If you are a hard worker, and enjoy working through difficult problems/working with others this will be great for you! I feel like I particularly excelled because I know how to target areas of learning for improvement, was always making connections, and was constantly learning throughout the bootcamp and after. They teach you really well how to find those resources. 

The slack/discord channels were a great way to make friends and work with others to learn the content together. I heard other cohorts did not like their teachers/lead but I personally loved mine. My cohort started at 15 people and ended with 8 I believe, so it was nice to be in a small cohort. The code challenges were very stressful and challenging, but if you are willing to attend extra meetings and work on your own it is easy to be successful and pass. Career services during the program were not very professional or organized but after the program when you are actually in the job search they were great. I felt well prepared as I job searched and knew that the circumstances of the economy where mostly my problem at the start of my search.   Read less

They talk a big game about caring about your success, community, etc. but at the end of the day, they are just another for-profit school out to make a buck. 

They engaged in what I believe was predatory false advertising to get students in the Seattle area to enroll. I enrolled in Dec 2021 while the world was in turmoil and all physical campuses were closed due to covid. The message being given to students was the campus will reopen per CDC guidelines. This narrative was peddled until May 2021 when most all things had reopened and students noticed Seattle had been deleted from the school's website. Only then after several ignored messages about the subject were slack questions (not mine personally, another student was answered) on the matter and it was finally revealed that the building had been sold as it didn't align with business interests. The sale of a building takes a long time, (to be on the market, accept offers, go through escrow, etc) and I believe at the time of my enrollment they had no intention of re-opening the campus, and covid was the convenient excuse/nail in the coffin. 

Many more months later someone with flatiron admitted this was something they had been exploring for some time and failed to inform any of their students. When I inquired about this I was told a campus is not necessary for my success(?) and they would be offering no refund in any amount despite the fact they are more than twice the cost of many other fully online boot camps.

The good/caring teachers either get promoted or leave for other positions so the positive reviews are essentially meaningless as those instructors probably aren't there anymore. I was dumped into a new cohort mid-program and when I reached out to student services about it not being a good fit (my new cohort lead was really disconnected and inactive) they offered me to withdraw and re-enroll (and pay tuition again!).

There is no community there except what you make for yourself. My first cohort lead was excellent at community building but he soon got promoted. The "community managers" will try and get students to do all the work of organizing, hosting, and maintaining meetings. Otherwise, the "community" is pretty nonexistent, especially being in a city that they essentially abandoned and abandoned all the students there.

The flex program you will essentially self study so you may as well save your money and go to a more affordable BootCamp or Youtube U. No way without the campus is the tuition worth it and if I could do it all over I would not go to this school. They promise the moon but the moment you sign on the dotted line they stop caring. Read less

Instructor who was the sole reason the course wasn't a complete bust was fired the day before we finished. This is a scam and absolutely ridiculous. Look else where for getting into the tech field. Severely disappointed with the curriculum as well, the instructors criticized the curriculum as well and went above and beyond to educate the students. However, after the ending I will not recommend it to anyone, absolutely ridiculous. Read less

I received numerous emails about requiring a deposit but have yet to receive a call back as I requested. I wasn’t even made aware that everyone was out of the office for winter break. There weren’t any automatic replies when I sent emails but I surely was reminded that the due date for my deposit was approaching. Piss poor communication. When I did pay my deposit I still didn’t have access to TCs because once again, I was not notified of holiday hours. I had access to the chat feature for one day only and I’ve yet to see the chat feature again. They leave you on your own to code during prep. How is this novice friendly? Also, having to pay $17,000 to be told to bounce off your peers if your need help is unfair to students. Read less

The module curriculum was pretty good for what you could fit into a few months, although the free Odin Project is better if you are self motivated and can teach yourself. There is no way it is worth $17,000, and I assume the job placement numbers are massaged or falsified. They let in almost anyone, and I would estimate anywhere from 33%-75% of my class will never get a software engineering job. Most people had zero knowledge going in. Many did not seem to take it that seriously or work that hard, and many could barely grasp basic concepts or build a non-broken site by the end of the program.

The Denver on site campus was a joke. It was set up as remote, where you basically just work on modules by yourself all day, and there are lectures on zoom from people in New York. I never watched a lecture because it is a questionable at best way to learn how to code. If I wanted to, obviously it could have been from anywhere. The on site instructor had no industry experience and seemed to have the knowledge level of a recent bootcamp grad at best (very, very minimal and surface level). There was basically no value added whatsoever by being on site, as the occasional group activities were terrible. For example, in a coding walkthrough, the instructor robotically typed out a solution someone else had written, and did not do anything to encourage discussion, talk about best practices, or anything. He did not seem to fully understand all of the solutions.

Feedback I've gotten on LinkedIn and my resume from a career services person was reasonable, but was minimal and not substantive. I did not get the sense these people have industry specific knowledge, but rather they seem to be generic HR / resume writer people.



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They scammed me out of 15k 2 months before graduating & told me there was nothing I could do and they were kicking me out so 8 months of work down the drain for THEIR error in clarifying, I've been doing the same thing since I started and all of a sudden what I was doing was a problem when they told me to do it that way in the first place... 10/10 scam wasted my life my money my time DONT DO IT  Read less

I joined Flatiron as a part of their Flex program for Software development. 

Pros : Course content for the time I was on seemed organized

Cons : I joined the flex program because i was in a full time job with kids. I joined the program based on flexibility and during the time i was on had a job change due to which i could not commit to the corsework. I asked for extension multiple times, but they mentioned since it was a flex program, i had flexibility. However, they emailed me that they had to process my dismissal since i could not keep up with their timelines. Which meant i was out of pocket for thousands of dollars. So folks looking to join their flex program, do understand that it can only flex so much and at the end of the dismissal you have spent thousands of dollars already Read less

Applied for the Deloitte Career Advancement Program. I received an email stating that I need to take an admissions assessment. Requested a copy of the assessment and I was told it was not part of the admissions process. Confused already. Then I was told not to apply online to the Deloitte website. So why is the opportunity listed on several job boards? Sketchy. Then I received an email redirecting me to apply for another program at Flatiron from the same admissions person. If the admissions person wanted me to apply for another program other than Deloitte then why didn't she send the test results? The Flatiron website literally talks about the admissions personnel discussing the test results with the prospective student. It is possible the HR recruiter had something to say about my dislike for the CSU program I went to because she is a CSU graduate. Academic writing is not APA peer-reviewed literacy. The scientific method is required which is not taught at CSU global. The graduates don't know much about quality and are concerned with quantity which is why I left for a more thoughtful education. It is bothersome to get an inconsistent application experience. I do not recommend Flatiron for many reasons. 1. This program should not be difficult to get into because the core content is not challenging. 2. The program mentions Kali Linux which I am familiar with since the inception of Backtrack. This penetration testing environment is not used for higher end corporate environments and is strictly for developmental usage. 3. The program is ridiculously expensive and I wouldn't pay for another bootcamp after my previous experience. These bootcamps are never going to prepare anyone enough for a high paying career. I think businesses will make people feel insecure before not having formal education so they can pay them less. Be careful with bootcamps and higher education. Research the courses and ask for syllabus outlines of course content. 




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 I attended their online program 3-4 years ago. Unfortunately, I have to agree with those students who say their program didn’t teach the basics well enough. After much struggle I had to leave the program prematurely because I could just not keep up!  The majority of my time was spent on trying to find tutorials or additional information (Google/ Youtube) trying to grasp a basic understanding of the material so I can keep up with what they were teaching me. I asked for additional support, which I did receive, however it was still not enough to complete the projects! They were not able to explain things on a level that I was on. It’s sad as I even had a scholarship. If I knew it was so advanced, I would have let someone else benefit from it. I feel like it was a total wasted time and effort for months and months. 

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Don't think of this as an college education, this is a pure form of business. The first thing you should know is that there is "no money back", engrave that to your brain. Second you need to work your butt off after finishing the course, i mean u really need to do a lot of supplement study which in my opinion make the course itself useless.   I will admit that i only got my job because one of my good friend - i would had gotten this job with or without flatiron, my friend didn't even ask for my resume-  my friend had to hold my hand when I first started because i was nowhere near ready.  Think of it this way, flatiron for few months , few months of self studying and learning, then insane amount of learning and practicing on the job.  i would said flatiron contributed the least among the three and cost some chunk changes, i can afford it but for those who can't,  shouldn't put their money on this, there is far less expensive and better choices out there.   Read less

First thing first, if you are self paced don't bother the material on udemy is better.  if you are doing immersive which is all online now, still not worth the price, you are basically paying someone to keep you on track.  You are basically there to do some networking and hoping you can get hire.   The instructors are nice and encouraging but tats about the full extend of it, better off just learn it urself and create a profolio, it is a joke Read less

To be more practical and succinct I am going to use bullet points:

Pros:
- Good material. You have a lot to learn and not only on the "canvas/learning" website SOME instructors are no-nonsense and give you other websites to practice that are not linked to Flatiron.
- Nice people. I feel that majority of both students and Flatiron staff are trying their best. To be a nice person and to do what they want to nicely. Some exceptions I will get into in "Cons".
- Good lectures and instructors. The lectures are good, sometimes compressed and "in a rush" so you don't have time to ask questions. A lot of content for 1 hour I guess. The instructors are nice and pleasant, they would go out of their way to help us out and even answer slack messages out of business hours. 

Cons:
- The material can be and will be overwhelming. It is expected that you don't manage to finish all the material OF THE DAY, THAT DAY. But they do expect, and on the behalf of your career you should, finish on the weekends. Which is not the most fun, since you are normally studying 10 hours a day on the weekdays. A solution? Make the length of course longer or cut some of the subjects that are not applied in every company (Deep learning, NLP, Semi-supervised models and so on).

- Some of the staff is not the most pleasant/most professional. I had a semi-bad experience with my coach where she would go over each word I said and correct me in a "better" way to say it. I also heard of several cases where the coach started to be unpleasantly opinionative about the students PERSONAL LIFE. Both scenarios the coach instead of being a co-pilot/friend in the job search is being a "parent" and treating the students as kids in the worst possible way. The other mention here would go to the senior lead. She hosts events sometimes with her personal friends thinking she is super special and makes you feel excluded. Why host those events in the first place?

- My other con would be the career service team. They are nice people, but I think they have pressure from management since the companies they partner with and the positions they offer the recent grads are not good. Often IT Related and not even a Entry/Jr. position. It gives me the impression that they need to show results and numbers.


Overall an overpriced average experience. If it was half the price, would be worth it.

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The school is a complete scam. They take credit for students who find jobs but many of them found the jobs on their own. Career services does nothing. No job connections, just tells you Google is your friend. They do not care if you can barely afford to live as long as they get paid. If you can study on your own then do it. You do not need to spend thousands of dollars to learn how to use Google. If you have a cpmplaint, do not respect a response back. If they do respond they will laugh in your face. Read less

I went to Flatiron because I had friends that successfully completed their Engineering program. The UX Design program is much newer so it's still evolving and they're still learning to perfect it as they go on. Some things felt disorganized and scattered but for the most part, it was a really solid experience, I learned a lot and... got a job! It is a lot of work especially post-graduation. It took me 9 months to get a job and it felt impossible at times but if you stick with it, and put in the work I promise you'll be fine! I didn't commit 40hours a week to my job search because I had a lot of going on and took breaks in between. I noticed that all my peers that worked hard post-grad got a job a lot sooner. I always appreciated the fact that they take feedback very seriously and really try to improve upon it. Advice: If you have any concerns about your teachers or education I encourage you to be upfront and notify someone - they will listen. Their Career Services is definitely one of their biggest assets - utilize it as much as you can even if you opt out of the money-back guarantee!  Read less