Fullstack Academy

The course curriculum is great. Within the time provided I learned quite a bit about MEAN stack development. Being in the flex class I had the feeling they were having issues scaling up. 

After every cohort they will hire a handful of TAs to help out - unfortunately the majority will only be around to support the full-time class. As a flex-immersive student you will be missing out on extra activities, CS Saturdays, a few CTO lectures, and communications. 

Flex came across as a bit disorganized at times. Sometimes forgetting to schedule a TA to help, little to no handholding, and not being allowed to use campus facilities outside of our normally scheduled class-time. This last piece was particularly stressful during capstone phase. Speaking to students in the FT cohort, no such decree against coming to campus outside of normal hours was given. 

Another major difference between FT and Flex. TAs will act as a project manager and code reviewer for each capstone team. For someone just starting out- this is extremely valuable.

Job support is okay. If you don't find a job at the first hiring day, don't expect much help after. You'll not be able to come to future hiring days. Occasionally you'll get a check in to see how the job search is going, with much of the framework for what you need to do  provided. Speaking to GH alumni, the job support experience sounds very different. Perhaps this is because rather then being paid up front, they get a cut of the first year salary.

In summary, the course work was great, and the teachers helpful. However, if you want the full experience - go with fulltime and avoid flex. If you are already very confident of your ability- flex is viable. Perhaps you are already a developer? If so, flex seems to be a great stepping stone into a new tech stack. 

I did Fullstack's flex program (nights and weekends) and would not recommend it.

I would recommend Fullstack Academy.

• The instructors are great. They're all knowlegable and nice folks.
• You're learning node. Node.js is, in my opinion, a better language to learn than ruby on rails, which a lot of other bootcamps teach. Node does a better job of handling single-page-applications, which is where tech is headed. Also, if you know node, you know both frontend and backend.
• The cirriculum is good. It's not great, but I doubt any of the other options are better, unless you spend the time to go and get a degree. There is only so much you can learn in three months (or 6 months part time).

That being said, avoid the flex program. I did the flex program, and I felt like the red-headed stepchild of FSA.

• First of all, you don't get as much. There is less classroom time than the fulltime program. They tell you that you're supposed to review on your own of the off days, but if you're doing flex you probably have a job (and a life) and don't have a lot of extra time.
• There are significantly fewer resources available to you, simply because everybody has gone home. By the time you get there, the instructors/staff have already put in 9+ hours and are ready to leave. So you don't have the ability to get that extra insight/different viewpoint.
• There are a lot of great things that FSA offers, like guest lectures and hackathons, but they all happen during the day. If you can make it, great, but if you have a job you're outta luck
• They just don't cover as much. This goes back to the classroom hours. I heard from a graduate who went on to be a teaching fellow that the fulltime class went deeper into the material because they had the time to really jump in.
• And they charge you the same amount. If I had paid less for the flex, I wouldn't be upset because I would have gotten what I paid for. But no, it's that same hefty price tag for a fraction of the experience.

TLDR: Fullstack good; flex program bad.

The curriculum was rigorous, the people are all amazing. I learned a ton and highly recommend this program. The depth of my knowledge and skill has vastly increased. It was awesome!!