Fullstack Academy

Prior to my career shift, I worked in continuing education and interacted with some software engineering bootcamps that left much to be desired. When I learned about Fullstack Academy and the Grace Hopper program, I was equally skeptical. After reviewing their coursework and taking their online/discounted prep materials, I decided that the material and program was rigorous and worth pursuing. I ended up completing the program as a Grace Hopper Program participant, and then later as a teaching fellow. I'm really glad that I did!

* CULTURE *
Never have I been in a more inclusive environment. My classmates were thoughtful, funny, and pretty self-aware. The support (instructors, staff, teaching fellows) were always warm, friendly, available. I have made some lasting friendships from this program.

* MATERIAL *
The instructors are ON. IT. Software engineering / web development is a constantly changing landscape, and it is evident that the instructors are working to teach the most up-to-date and effective stack to their students. I often noticed typos and minor errors in the course materials, but I am now realizing that it is because instructors will rewrite/update their course materials constantly to make sure it is fresh.

* RETURN OF INVESTMENT aka, GETTING A JOB *
Holly was instrumental in helping me find my job! I was able to apply while working as a teaching fellow, and I was given an offer about two weeks after I started looking. The career success team is there to provide resources and real advice on how to pursue work, negotiate a salary offer, and build a network in the tech industry. Above all of this, they are here to help you deal with impostor syndrome and job search anxiety.

I really wasn't sure what to expect when going through this program but I am definitely glad that I did. This program is what you make of it - if you are looking for a program that will make you think, work, and learn, this might be the one for you!

I have so much gratitude and love for my Fullstack and Grace Hopper fam. The instructors are super knowledgable (S/O NATALIE LANE  AND DAVID ADEWOYIN), the career success coaches, my cohort mates, just the ENTIRE staff. You are set up for success the minute you enter the program. Despite the challenging pace and the jam-packed curriculum, I had the time of my life building web apps with teammates that I could later talk about in interviews. Staying engaged with the material and vocalizing your concerns will get you the personalized support you need to get up to speed in learning the newest technologies. The program is aptly named as an "immersive" course - there are workshops, lectures, office hours, panels, review sessions, and checkpoints to test your mastery of the material. The cohort sizes may vary depending on the time of the year but there are smaller learning teams with a dedicated teaching fellow who will help you navigate through the bootcamp's material. There is also a program lead that checks in with the cohort to address any real-time improvements that can be made to the learning environment. I put in my all, and as a result I've gained lifelong friends, robust projects that make me a competitive software engineer applicant, and a network of fierce women software engineers. 

I was part of a small class (just group of 10, eventually 9, students) and I think that was very advantageous to the students in our cohort, as each student got more attention and help from our instructor and fellow (teaching assistant). We also got to know everyone in the class - got more familiar with them and realized how to pair with them better/work with them better as a teammate.

I like how the curriculum started out with some foundations, especially Javascript, then progressed to DOM manipulation, then to React, then to Node and Express. And then eventually they added some PostgreSQL, then Babel/Webpack, then Redux. I just think that the lesson builds up from the previous technology/framework really well, and helps the students (especially those new to programming) feel less overwhelmed about all the new stuff they're learning. Eventually, all the things you learn are applied to group projects that simulate working in a real-world team.

I would say that our instructor, Prof. Erik, really tried his best to give us a learning structure that would make it easier for us to understand and also appreciate the language and framework we're learning. I loved how he would show first how to do something in a very vanilla way, show you the most basic way you can solve or approach a specific problem. Then in the next or a later lesson, he'll show how to work with a framework that makes life easier and addresses the tediousness of the earlier approach you were taught.

Aside from our instructor, we also have a teaching assistant (also called a fellow) assigned to our class. Haoyu was an ally as we tried to gain the most out of the course. When we have questions, he tried his best to make us understand how something works. He also made sure we are challenging ourselves by giving us stretches and algorithm practices. If we're done with an exercise and there's still time, he'd also suggest what harder use cases we can try to handle.

Aside from the instructors, our class was well taken cared of by the staff assigned to us - Crystal (our program lead), Chris, and Meg (our career coach). Crystal made sure that we are well fed when we stay late or go to campus on weekends. If we have logistic concerns, we raise them to Chris and he takes care of them for us. Meg helped us with career and job hunting preps - how to pitch yourself, how to make your resume/LinkedIn better, how to answer interview questions, how to negotiate salary, you name it!

Overall, I really enjoyed the time I spent as a student in Fullstack Academy's Part-Time Flex program. I would say that I spent my money wisely. I was able to level up my skills. I gained mentors, friends, allies. I became part of a community that makes me feel more confident as a Software Engineer!

Fullstack Academy was truly one of my best educational experiences! Not only was I able to learn the latest technologies / methodologies, but I was able to do so in a very collaborative environment, where everyone would go out of their way to help you. This program allowed us to learn a large amount of information in a short amount of time while also still having time to build several solid projects to build out our portfolios. I just want to thank my excellent instructors (Eric K., Eliot S., and Gabriel R.) and my career services advisor (Meg D.) – all of whom are very knowledgeable and genuinely care about our learning / job search. They truly contributed to an awesome experience. I highly recommend Fullstack Academy for anyone looking to attend a coding bootcamp!

Other reviewers here who were in my cohort have already said everything I might have to say to analyze the program as a whole or any particular people (see Eric's Review from 2/5/2020, and Jennie's review from 2/3/2020).

Just to quickly reiterate however:
Fullstack does a really great job picking the right people for their program, has a strong curriculum, and excellent instructors. The job search help is detailed and gives you a clear process to follow for interacting with potential employers. 

The instructors are wonderful individuals and it shows how much care has gone into selecting the right people to teach. Learning from Collin and Finn was a pleasure. Collin is one of the most knowledgeable, inquisitive, and patient people I have ever had the pleasure to meet. His instruction is excellent and very down to earth while maintaining a strong conceptual framework around whatever issue he is explaining. Finn is also very knowledgeable, and is extremely friendly, approachable, funny, and had a real knack for breaking any difficulty  down into approachable parts. Both of them are extremely supportive and among the best educators I have had the pleasure to learn from in any field. 

Holly, the career services lead, is amazing. Beyond knowing her stuff and having an excellent and down to earth approach, she is extremely supportive and was critical in helping me work my way through the job seeking process. To anyone who attends Fullstack, as far as job hunting goes, the best advice I can give is to listen to Holly, and talk to her regularly. 

If you are thinking about a bootcamp, Fullstack is a great program, but be aware of what you are jumping into. Fullstack is a ton of work. Depending on your background and level of experience coming in, it might not be unreasonable to expect to be doing 80ish hours of work per week. Even if you do have a reasonable amount of prior experience, this is an intense program. Relax before your start, take your health seriously, and ask for help when you need it. 

Finally,  a note about the other students. Fullstack does an excellent  job picking people who have a collaborative and growth focused attitude. Without exception, everyone I met at Fullstack was supportive and interested in working together. Despite the workload and time constraints. I would go so far as to say that I made friends here.

I won't drone on too long about how amazing this course is.  Instead, I'll just tell you what makes Fullstack special.
1.  You don't just feel like a number - Fullstack really cares about its students and that is clear from day one.  I was worried that I would fall behind and I would just be left in the dust, but every goes the extra mile to help you learn and succeed.  The instructors all know your name within the first day or two, and they cater to the specific needs of each student.
2.  The instructors are unbelievable - I don't really know what more to say.  They really, truly care about not only what they are teaching, but all of the students.  You can approach any one of them with any problem and they are patient, understanding, and extremely helpful.  They really made the difference for me.  Collin is probably the most knowledgeable person I've ever met, but even so, his patience was incredible.  I often had discussions with him in which I would ask the same questions multiple times, and each time he would patiently rephrase his answers so that I was able to understand.  In addition, he was willing to spend a great deal of extra time with my capstone group so that we could achieve a higher level of organization.  Our other main instructor, Finn, was incredible at using analogies and humour to explain complex problems.  At the beginning of every week, I honestly felt like there was no way I'd be able to understand all the material we were expected to learn, but Finn had a way of breaking down very complex programming concepts in understandable chunks.   In addition, he is relentless debugger.  During one of the projects, I had a very strange bug that he helped me to understand even though it took a long time.
3.  The other students - We all wanted to do Fullstack to change our life course, and it is very apparent that nearly every student is aware of this all the time.  I was astonished by the level of dedication shown by my classmates.  There was no sense of competition.  On the contrary, I felt like we were all working together toward a common goal.
4.  Holly rocks - the career services lead, Holly Valenty is such a rockstar.  Even though there were many of us (30-40 I think), she was willing to spend extra time with each student to make sure we all understood the tools we needed to get a job.  Holly really made me feel like I was ready to enter the job market.  I don't think I would have ever gotten a job without her!

When I started looking at software engineering bootcamps, I prioritized finding one with a challenging curriculum. Fullstack’s rigorous application process and focus on “productive struggle” during Bootcamp Prep made it my top choice, and the hands-on, fast-paced coursework did not disappoint. Fullstack’s magic, however, lies with its instructors, fellows, and career success team. Their support throughout made the otherwise daunting experience of switching careers feel very attainable.

Fullstack’s curriculum requires hard work, especially for those like me without a programming background. Students have to pass checkpoints in Foundations (4-week online course) to make it to Junior Phase (6-week on-site lectures / workshops), and there’s a similar checkpoint before the project-based Senior phase begins. Having access to fellows and instructors through help tickets and office hours helped me grasp important concepts for homework and looming tests. In Junior Phase, we had the additional benefit of weekly learning lunches led by fellows who answered questions on course content and their experiences at Fullstack.

Relationships with fellows and instructors deepened in Senior Phase: fellows advised us on our projects and instructors led code reviews. The Chicago campus instructors, Collin, Finn, and Priti, gave practical advice when we hit technical snags and encouraged us to learn beyond the curriculum. They held retrospectives for feedback after each project and seemed intune with our needs. (We received an impromptu lecture on React hooks, for instance, after they saw our interest in the topic.)

Chicago also has an amazing career success lead, Holly, who coaches students through resume and LinkedIn updates, technical interviews, and job offers. Holly brought in great companies for Launch Day, where local companies watch capstone project presentations and conduct interviews. Launch Day interviews can lead to job offers, and did for me.

I would only tweak one thing: while the team does a great job of teaching algorithms and data structures during Senior Phase, seeing those exercises earlier on would have been beneficial. 

Overall, however, I would recommend Fullstack’s program for its rigorous coursework and excellent support from instructors, fellows, and career success team. 

I have loved my time at Fullstack Academy! Honestly, I couldn't have asked for a better experience. I attended the program in September, and then applied for and was accepted on as a Teaching Fellow for 3 months. I was allowed to job search during the second half of my fellowship and recently accepted a software engineering role. Here is my impression of Fullstack during the time I've spent here: 

Strengths
-Admissions Process: Fullstack requires students to have a basic understanding of programming fundamentals before acceptance into the program, which allows Fullstack to focus on more advanced topics in its curriculum.
-JavaScript-Centered: Students learn both frontend and backend development focusing on one language: JavaScript. I think this allows students to gain a deep understanding of one language instead of basic familiarity of several. 
-Career Success: Fullstack has a great Career Success team. Each campus has an on-site Career Success Counselor who provides insight into the job search and hiring process. They will walk students through effective salary negotiation and keep in regular contact with graduates who are job searching. 

What Can Be Improved
-Curriculum Update Reconciliation: The only reason that I give their curriculum 4 instead of 5 stars is not due to the content of the curriculum (which is great), but the way that updates are reconciled in the curriculum. A strength of Fullstack is its insight into what up-and-coming technology the industry finds impressive and how it updates its curriculum accordingly. However, on the job a Software Engineer also has to understand and maintain older code, so it's important be familiar with previous versions too (think async/await versus .then() ). Sometimes, it's a bit confusing for students who are taught to do one version of a feature see an older version of a feature in a workshop, but I think the goal of Fullstack is to strike a delicate balance to figure out how to appropriately expose the student to both versions. It can just be hard sometimes to do that in a cohesive way, but that might just be a natural consequence continuing to evolve appropriately. 

All in all, I'm so happy with the experience I had at Fullstack; I'm glad I took the leap and made the investment. I got to work with smart and creative people in the program and am looking forward to my new career!

This entire program was a really rewarding experience starting from the beginning to the end. The curriculum covered in the alotted time span was taught in ways that worked effectively for me from both the instructors and teaching assistants. Thanks to the awesome instructors John M., Ben R., and Orlando C. were honest about their knowledge and provided as much information as possible certain topics to the best of their ability. You can tell they geniunely care for your progress and will take the time to answer any questions you have. The amount of effort that I put in was well received, and you can tell the staff at Fullstack truly want you to succeed. The culture is great and there are many people of different backgrounds that I have never encountered before and learned so much through each individual's story.

Enrolling at FSA,  just know that perserverance is key. You learn it through the program and you will have to continue after you graduate in the job search. I can't thank FSA enough for allowing me to explore the world of tech and fully start a new career in mind.

Never give up! Be hungry and strive for success. The only person that can stand in the way is yourself. Good luck :)

Hello everyone. Fullstack was a turning point in my life. I was working in completely different environmental, never deal with engineering before last year. But I was always interested in computers and technologies, so I started to study by myself and after I made some progress, I found an amazing school - Fullstack Academy. I graduated from it  2 weeks ago. It was a great 17 week journey. It honestly was an intensive course, sometimes very hard, but it gave me great knowledge and skills to become a Software developer. 

Beside that I met  amazing people - my classmates and instructors, who helped me to succeed. Everyone in school is extremely supportive. If you got stuck, or you think you are ready to give up, you can schedule as many office hours as you need and got a ton of help. I never heard 'NO' when I asked a question.

If you love technologies, looking for career change but dont know how to start - Fullstack is a perfect place for you. You will begin from the scratch and every day will build on top of it. If you will work hard and trust a process you will succeed.

Best of luck ;)

I graduated from Fullstack Academy 2 months ago. It was a great experience. My cohort was a diverse group of like-minded people who were eager to learn. It is as intense as you would expect, so make sure you have a good foundation before starting. The instructors were all passionate about teaching, not just about code, but also how to deal with things like imposter syndrome. The career success team really cares - you aren't just fending for yourself after graduation. They offer weekly remote meetings and 1 on 1 support during the job search. Plus you graduate with a cohort of people all in the same boat to keep in touch with.

As for the curriculum, I was told more than once during my job search that the skills I had stood out from the majority of bootcamp grads. One interviewer was surprised I had only learned React a few months ago. I put this down to the quality of teaching I received. I would highly recommend Fullstack Academy to anyone serious about attending a coding program and making a career change.

Fullstack Academy of Code was one of the best decisions I have made in my life. I believe all education should start to follow this model -- make education quick and affordable.  Fullstack teaches the essentials to get you a job as a Software Engineer. 

This is one of the best bootcamps in America right now. They are very selective on who gets in, they really want to make sure you are serious about your career switch. They take your education seriously. 

I would recommend taking Bootcamp Prep in a Month with them before applying! I can not stress this enough!!  Start learning code on your own before you apply. The more you know the better you will be. Just focus on JavaScript.  The bootcamp can not teach you everything, it is up to the individual to go out and be able to learn on your own. Fullstack Academy gives you the tools you need to get the job you want.  It can not teach you everything but it will teach you how to keep educating yourself.  

The support during the program is amazing.  Holly Valenty and the career counselors are just the best and most supportive people in the program. This is what makes Fullstack Academy great.  That support is amazing and very much needed when you are on your job search. I will say it is not easy, it will take dedication and perseverance to keep yourself going everyday.  But never give up. The job search can be frustrating and hard. But with Holly and the career counselors they will give you the support you need to get through it. No matter what keep coding and you will get a job!