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Hackbright Academy

Average Rating4.51
109 Reviews
3 Courses
Hackbright Academy is a software engineering school for gender equality in San Francisco, Dallas, and Lehi founded in 2012. In addition to in-person classrooms in the US, Hackbright Academy also offers their courses online. The school offers a 12-week, immersive full-time software engineering program and a 43-week, part-time program, both of which cover the fundamentals of computer science and modern web development such as the command line, Python, JavaScript, HTML &...
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109 Hackbright Academy Reviews

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  • Kelsey
    Anonymous
    Graduate • Full-Time (12-week) Software Engineering Program • San Francisco
    Oct 19, 2016
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    Please think carefully about Hackbright

    If you look closely at their statistics of "90% employed", they are actually from 2014. I graduated from Hackbright in June 2016, and almost 4 months later, I would say about a quarter of my group of 43 is employed. So simply, those statistics don't apply anymore, and sadly that 'quarter' of our group would include internships, non-software tech roles (like support engineer), those who went back to their old jobs, and those who had years of experience in the indu...

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    Sharon Wienbar of Hackbright Academy

    CEO

    Oct 27, 2016

    Dear Hackbright Grad,
    I'm deeply sorry to hear that we disappointed you. We are striving to change the ratio and although we’ve had hundreds of delighted alumnae, I felt that it was important for me to respond to you personally and to acknowledge your feedback. Our goal is to combine intellectual rigor AND a supportive, inclusive environment that lets all our students excel.

    Please allow me to address a few of your points.

    The Hackbright educational staff has a broad and deep mix of experience, including professional software development, prior teaching experience at advanced levels and other industry experience. The instructors who join our staff after completing the Hackbright Fellowship are among the most technical of our graduates from each quarter. And we invest heavily in their on-going technical training. Our instructors build the software Hackbright uses to operate. They also develop numerous outside projects, contribute to Open Source communities, host and speak at technical conferences, and host and win hackathons.

    We just published the Outcomes Report for 2014 and the first 3 quarters of 2015. We were indeed acquired by Capella, which has helped us bring a whole new level of rigor to our reporting. Unfortunately that has cost us and our community time. The report has been reviewed and certified by a third party audit firm, and has gone through in-depth legal review. That's part of a big company process....slower than a startup, but more thorough. I apologize for our delays.

    Hackbright was also licensed by the BPPE, the California regulatory authority over non-degree educational institutions. Very few other code schools have completed this process. As part of our on-going compliance we will publish annual School Performance Reports. 

    Last, I'd like to thank you for noting all the great continuing education options on the web. Many applicants to Hackbright use those, as do our grads. 

    Again, I am sorry our program did not meet your expectations. Our Career Services team is here to support you in this job search and for your technical career. "Once a Hackbright, Always a Hackbright" is our motto. I hope we can earn your respect and trust.

    Sincerely,
    Sharon Wienbar
    CEO, Hackbright Academy
  • Jane Hacker
    Anonymous
    San Francisco
    Aug 16, 2016
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    Feminists Underserving Women

    Hackbright Academy is an all female bootcamp which seeks to "Change the ratio," but what the start-up really does is "line their pocket books" via taking advantage of a niche market. 

    Learning Environment: 
    For $16,570, I'd expect a learning environment geared towards the individual students needs. At least this holds true for costly private institutions. Even in public institutions (community college class is roughly ~$300), students are guaranteed the professor's time by o...

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  • Anonymous Sue
    Anonymous
    Student • Full-Time (12-week) Software Engineering Program • San Francisco
    Aug 26, 2016
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    Hackbright Reviews Poorly

    The last reviewer did a good job in summarizing my unhappiness with Hackbright. I only have the below to add:

    I graduated with the June 2016 cohort.  Only 5 girls out of our graduating class have been able to find jobs and it's been 2 months since graduation. One of them went back to Hackbright to be a lab assistant, another already had a job lined up outside of Hackbright, another picked up what she'd been doing previous to Hackbright, and I'm not sure what the remaining girls a...

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  • Gayle Lukewarm
    Anonymous
    Graduate • Full-Time (12-week) Software Engineering Program • San Francisco
    Jan 14, 2017
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    Expect to learn but you're on your own after

    TLDR: I came to HB with 0 coding experience. I tried 3 different online courses to learn coding in my previous non-programming, non-tech career with no bueno. Based on my experience and what I have gathered from my classmates, friends from other bootcamps and tech companies, do not expect that "omg! I'm going to be a programmer after this bootcamp!" Expect that you'll know one way to build a website. That doesn't make you a hot Mission burrito in this town. It makes y...

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    Wendy Saccuzzo of Hackbright Academy

    Director of Career Services

    Jan 26, 2017

    Thank you for sharing your feedback about your session at Hackbright Academy. Congratulations on graduating from the program and while we’re pleased to hear that you had many positive experiences, we want to learn more about your disappointing interactions with our Career Services team. We’d like to talk with you directly to make sure that you’re receiving all the support and opportunities that Hackbright has to offer both current students and graduates. Please reach out to me directly at wendy@hackbrightacademy.com so that we may chat directly. We take all student feedback seriously and are continuously working to improve every aspect of our program. 
  • Regrettfull
    Anonymous
    Student • Full-Time (12-week) Software Engineering Program • San Francisco
    Nov 23, 2016
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    Dissapointed

    I am a current student at Hackbright and will admit there are some good and bad things about this academy.  The entire operation feels more like a community center than an institution that charges students $16,000+ for the 'education'. The majority of the ed staff lack professional training and do not conduct themselves professionally. There are a few great people on the team, but there are staff members who are very unprofessional and immature. Not something you'd expect for the price you...

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    Meggie Mahnken of Hackbright Academy

    Instructor

    Nov 30, 2016

    Dear Hackbright Student,

    I'm sorry to hear about your experience. Rigorous curriculum and a professional, inclusive learning environment are at the core of our educational values. I find it unacceptable that a student wouldn't feel welcome while learning at Hackbright, and I value your feedback. If there's any additional context you are able to provide, please email me at meggie@hackbrightacademy.com so we can chat directly about how we can improve our student experience.
    Sincerely,
    Meggie Mahnken
    Instructor, Hackbright Academy
  • Chung Nguyen
    Chung Nguyen
    Graduate • Full-Time (12-week) Software Engineering Program • San Francisco
    Verified by GitHub
    Jan 30, 2017
    Overall Experience
    Instructors
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    Professional Leveling Up

    As you can tell from the ratings, I really enjoyed my time at Hackbright. I'm more of a list person, so let's make some lists.

    Pros:

    • Excellent structure. First five weeks: lecture in the morning, lab, lunch, lecture in the afternoon, lab. Homework. Weekend assessments. Weeks six through ten: lecture in the morning, work on your projects the rest of the time. Weeks eleven and twelve: lectures and guest speakers on career things (interviewing tip...
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  • Lora
    Lora
    Software Engineer • Graduate • Full-Time (12-week) Software Engineering Program • San Francisco
    Sep 20, 2016
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    What a Beautiful Whirlwind

     

    As a recent graduate, I was fascinated to stop in and read the reviews here. Having so few reviews should be taken with a grain of salt, especially given that this bootcamp has been going strong for several years and has an alumnae network of more than 500 incredible women upon which to draw support and inspiration.

     

    To set the stage: I have a Bachelor's in...

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  • Barbara
    Anonymous
    Software Engineer • Student • Full-Time (12-week) Software Engineering Program • San Francisco
    Oct 21, 2016
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    Best decision I ever made

    Getting in was hard. Getting through the program was hard. But was it worth it? YES. I see a lot of inaccurate posts on this website and I've got to address some of them.

    Instructors: 

    The instructors have all had industry experience(seems that some people don't know that). TAs and lab instructors are mostly grads from the program who were exceptional enough to be able to assist others beyond their cohort end date. But all of them bring passion for teac...

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  • Tabitha
    Anonymous
    San Francisco
    Sep 27, 2016
    Overall Experience
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    Poor First Impressions

    My review is not about the engineering fellowship, but about the admission process as a heads up to future applicants.

    Hackbright Academy was the 4th bootcamp I applied to. I applied to the September cohort. Out of the four, this one left the poorest impression on me.

    The online application and coding challenge was straightforward. The notification for the first interview/scheduling it afterwards was fine as well. Everything after that was a poor experience though, espe...

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  • Becca Saines
    Becca Saines
    Graduate • Full-Time (12-week) Software Engineering Program • San Francisco
    Jan 05, 2017
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    Overwhelmingly Awesome

    Dear Reader,

    If you're reading this, you're most likely considering attending a Dev Bootcamp of some kind.  Awesome!

    It's almost surreal to look back on the time when I was deciding between bootcamps -- having just graduated Hackbright in December '16, there's no doubt in my mind Hackbright was the best option for me, and the best option for anyone with determination, dedication, and grit looking to transition into the software engineering community.

    Around th...

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  • Rena Tan
    Anonymous
    Student • Hackbright Prep Course • San Francisco
    Jul 15, 2017
    Overall Experience
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    Think Twice Before joining the Fellowship!

    During my part-time class, it was a "hit or miss", depending on your instructor and class dynamics.  My review is a bit late, but after several of my friends talked about problems with the full-time Fellowship program, I felt I could no longer stay quiet about the matter. So....here goes:

    There's plenty of blame to go around...from the typos in the curriculum, TA's who are recent grads but don't know enough to actually teach new students, lack of knowledge from some instructors a...

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  • Michelle K
    Anonymous
    Software Engineer • Student • Full-Time (12-week) Software Engineering Program • San Francisco
    Dec 13, 2016
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    Hackbright's awesome

    TLDR;

    enroll if you really like coding, learning new things all the time, working hard; join the surprisingly awesome coding community

    _

    I'm in my last week of Hackbright, and looking back I see that Hackbright has been a place where I've been really empowered and inspired to try my best.  It was a great learning environment to ask questions, be surrounded by curious and hard-working people, create personal connections with people who really care,...

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Hackbright Academy Alumni Outcomes

Recent Hackbright Academy News

Nat Davis
Nat Davis
Updated April 11, 2023
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Jess Feldman
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Updated February 01, 2023
Course Report January 2023 Coding Bootcamp News Roundup Happy New Year! Here at Course Report, we kicked off 2023 with the release of our Best Coding Bootcamps list and announced our most recent Alumni Review Sweepstakes winner . In bootcamp news, layoffs at tech giants like Google and Amazon receive a lot of media attention, but journalists uncovered the industries that are actually adding tech jobs right now. We saw skills-based hiring prioritized by private and public sectors, ...
Jess Feldman
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Updated September 29, 2022
Course Report September 2022 Coding Bootcamp News Roundup Happy fall, everyone! As we begin to look towards the end of the year, we saw more speculation on how the Pell Grant for short-term programs bill could pass in the U.S. There was also plenty of discussion about how regulators are shaping Income Share Agreements and Online Program Managers. A huge new tech apprenticeship initiative broke ground in the U.S., and we ll dive into a think piece about the future of women in tech ...
Jess Feldman
Jess Feldman
Updated September 02, 2022
Course Report August 2022 Coding Bootcamp News Roundup This August, saw over 175M in fundraises in the coding bootcamp space! Republicans in the US shared what they would like to see in an expanded Pell Grant program, and an OPM giant, 2U, had some growing pains as it shifts to focusing on edX. Skills-based hiring continues to be top of mind for employers, so we re shining light on the coding bootcamps that are working hard to eliminate gatekeeping for tech skills training and tech ...
Jess Feldman
Jess Feldman
Updated August 24, 2022
ACL Digital has partnered with Hackbright Academy and Devmountain to offer a Gender Diversity in Tech Scholarship! Rajat Sethi, VP of Engineering Services at ACL Digital shares how this full tuition scholarship will increase diversity on ACL Digital s global engineering teams. Find out what ACL Digital expects from their bootcamp grad new hires, and why other employers should consider diversifying their tech teams with bootcamp grads. This article was produced by the Course ...
Jess Feldman
Jess Feldman
Updated April 01, 2022
Course Report March 2022 Coding Bootcamp News Roundup What was the buzz in the bootcamp industry this March? So far, 4.35 million Americans have quit their jobs this year, and many are making career changes. We re rounding up the latest news about how bootcamps are helping these folks meet their career goals, and a new apprenticeship program that caught our eye. This March, two new organizations focused on bootcamp outcomes emerged and several bootcamp alumni were spotlighted ...
Nat Davis
Nat Davis
Updated January 25, 2024
Coding bootcamps are certainly the most efficient way to quickly make a successful career pivot. But what is a coding bootcamp actually like ? Since 2014, we ve spoken with hundreds of alumni about their in-person, online, full-time, part-time, and self-paced bootcamp experiences and now we re sharing their insights with you! Let s break down a typical day at a bootcamp, teaching styles, and exactly what to expect in a bootcamp classroom. What is a Coding Bootcamp Like? Here ...
Liz Eggleston
Liz Eggleston
Updated December 29, 2023
Women have historically been left out of tech careers and education only 21% of undergraduate computer science degrees were awarded to women in 2019. But bootcamps are different women make up 36% of coding bootcamp alumni, and while the industry hasn't quite achieved gender parity, the percentage of women improves year over year (41% in 2020!) and continues to outpace the percentage of women in traditional computer science degree programs . At these all-women bootcamps, ...
Jess Feldman
Jess Feldman
Updated February 10, 2022
Lisa Casner graduated from Hackbright Academy four years ago and then landed her first role as an intern at Opendoor. Now that she s been promoted to Senior Software Engineer, Lisa has launched an Apprenticeship Program at Opendoor to help recent bootcamp grads get on-the-job experience working alongside a rapidly growing engineering team. Lisa describes what you can expect in the 6-month apprenticeship, how to stand out in the interview, and why mentorship is an important ...
Jess Feldman
Jess Feldman
Updated December 27, 2021
Chloe Condon worked as an office manager to support her career as an actress before choosing Hackbright Academy in 2016. Five years later, we re visiting with Chloe to talk about the impressive career she s built as a developer evangelist and an advocate for bootcamp graduates. Learn about the projects that Chloe s working on as a Senior Cloud Advocate at Microsoft, her two pieces of advice for women building a career in tech, and what to look for in your first engineering job after ...
Rachel Meltzer
Rachel Meltzer
Updated November 10, 2021
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Jess Feldman
Jess Feldman
Updated September 01, 2021
Course Report Course Report Coding Bootcamp News Roundup - August 2021 August was buzzing with news about the benefits of credentialing for alternative, skills-based learning. We re sharing the latest on the Apprenticeship to College Act in Congress, and regional workforce development programs aimed at helping high school students and adult learners find tech roles through bootcamps in their communities. August also brought news of a 25M fundraise, an acquisition, two ...
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Hackbright Academy Alumni Reviews Summary

Overall Experience
4.5
Instructors
4.4
Curriculum
4.4
Job Assistance
4.2
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More Information
Guarantees Job
Job Assistance
Includes Housing
Offers Corporate Training
Accepts GI Bill
FAQs

How much does Hackbright Academy cost?

Hackbright Academy costs around $12,900. On the lower end, some Hackbright Academy courses like Hackbright Prep Course cost $249.

What courses does Hackbright Academy teach?

Hackbright Academy offers courses like Full-Time (12-week) Software Engineering Program, Hackbright Prep Course, Part-Time (24-week) Software Engineering Program.

Where does Hackbright Academy have campuses?

Hackbright Academy has an in-person campus in San Francisco.

Is Hackbright Academy worth it?

Hackbright Academy hasn't shared alumni outcomes yet, but one way to determine if a bootcamp is worth it is by reading alumni reviews. 109 Hackbright Academy alumni, students, and applicants have reviewed Hackbright Academy on Course Report - you should start there!

Is Hackbright Academy legit?

We let alumni answer that question. 109 Hackbright Academy alumni, students, and applicants have reviewed Hackbright Academy and rate their overall experience a 4.51 out of 5.

Does Hackbright Academy offer scholarships or accept the GI Bill?

Right now, it doesn't look like Hackbright Academy offers scholarships or accepts the GI Bill. We're always adding to the list of schools that do offer Exclusive Course Report Scholarships and a list of the bootcamps that accept the GI Bill.

Can I read Hackbright Academy reviews?

You can read 109 reviews of Hackbright Academy on Course Report! Hackbright Academy alumni, students, and applicants have reviewed Hackbright Academy and rate their overall experience a 4.51 out of 5.

Is Hackbright Academy accredited?

While bootcamps must be approved to operate, accreditation is relatively rare. Hackbright Academy doesn't yet share information about their accreditation status.

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