LAMP Camp

Kane (Head of LAMP Camp) does not care about your ability to code. He is not invested in your personal growth as a developer. His only priority  is to push production code for Cresca Group, while the "campers" spend their time trying to  figure out how to fix a simple bug. When you request assistance  good luck receiving it. Seriously !!!!!   LAMP Camp's leadership needs an immediate revision. 

After attending I kind of feel sorry for the "instructors" who are actually developers for the underlying company behind Lamp Camp.  They have to be getting paid really well because the instructors seemed pretty stressed out when campers asked them questions or requesting guidance.  They were trying to help you AND do work for the company in order to get their checks.  The guy who started it and is the VP (another developer) actually moved his desk away to a different room during the camp without saying why while leaving a more junior developer who also works for the underlying company to train us in his favorite language which isn't PHP but Javascript.  Poor guy...The school is a great idea but the underlying company may need to decide if they want to train or attempt to receive large sums of money from their private frameworks in an open source time.  It's tough...word of advice:  Have a plan B in your back pocket in case the developers are too stressed out to walk with you, this way you'll have your portfolio to share with employers where you've taught yourself because you will NOT be allowed to share the work you did for the underlying lamp camp company while in camp.    It could be better if the underlying company took the reigns off of their framework because developer students aren't allowed to show and share with other developers outside of school about great things we're attempting to build together.  The toughest part about the program is even if you've made and dedicated the hours at the school learning on your own, the school won't give you a piece of paper (or the certificate) saying you were a part of lamp camp because you didn't pitch into their bottom line.  You should go to this school and hustle to develop yourself if you really want to better yourself, but be weary of flying emotions and hustle smart.

This place is nothing more than a way to get free labor. From the first day until my last (premature by my choosing), it was a complete and utter waste of time. There is almost no instruction given by staff. You are expected to perform at a certain level before even showing up, which defeats the purpose of a boot camp entirely. Some liken this to an unpaid internship, which would be a fair comparison if there were companies that were driven entirely by unpaid staff who were kept in a single room which is essentially a warehouse lined with rows of computers. To be honest I am surprised that such a place is even legally allowed to operate.

My biggest complaint about LAMP Camp is they take in people who are very excited about getting started in the field and completely and utterly take the wind out of their sails by making one of their first experiences in development a negative one. I am curious how many people have had a change of heart about development after attending this "camp". I nearly did.

To the owners/managers, you should take a long hard look in the mirror and ask yourself how you sunk so low. I celebrate every opportunity I have to inform people of what goes on behind your doors. 

There are bits of truths in most of what the guy who left a really long rant said. When I signed up for this, I was definitely expecting to get a lot more guidance than I did. I remember this one day in the first week when they went over their proprietary PHP framework, and I almost shit my pants cause I was new to PHP, and they expected me to get a good grasp of the framework. But I tried to keep learning and I was able to figure out how to work with it in the end.

I personally came out of the program having learned a good amount of PHP and MySQL, but I know for sure that there are people who came out having learned jack. There were also some people who left during or towards the end of the program realizing how pointless it is to get that piece of paper saying you graduated at the end. 

I'd say this definitely isn't the best program out there, and if you really want to LEARN how to do web dev, you're better off actually paying for actual boot camps or learning online yourself. Ideally, LAMP camp would be great if you recently learned PHP and you want to actually apply your skills in real life. But then again, why would you do it for free when you can probably find a job/internship that pays you like $20 an hour? In any case, if you get in and this isn't your thing, you can just leave. So I guess it doesn't hurt to try it out at least.

I will say though that the people you meet at LAMP camp are some swaggin cool peeps. My fellow campers were super chill and the camp director and mentors were all really cool people. They sincerely want what's good for you, but they just lack the manpower and resources to do so. Overall, I would say you should really only try LAMP camp if you can't find anything better. Good luck!

LAMP Camp or Concentration Camp?

LAMP Camp Atlanta was designed to hold a capacity of approximately 40 people where you are essentially required to provide 480 hours of labor in order to receive a certificate of completion signed by staff.  The owners further accentuate that their employment recommendations for you are just as important as the certificate that they print out within your final hour of labor.  This program seriously teeters on the line between an internship and a flat out free labor bootcamp.  It is not a code school at all because once you sign up you are exploited from the start.  You are subjected to rules such as if you don’t code and log your work, then you’re not here regardless if you clocked in and were present the entire day.  The time that you accumulated is literally docked if they don’t see that you are working on the tasks given.  “Campers” (mostly students) spend very long hours inside LAMP camp and the occasional nap is taken.  In an environment where they occasionally drink beer during the day, you’d think being able to take a quick power nap is fine…WRONG!  You are criticized and singled out for taking breaks and discouraged to go outside for smoke breaks. Several people have had their photo snapped or called out by the owner Jay while taking a break in the “lounge area.”  To further prove the point of exploitation Cresca/LAMP Camp doesn’t even pay for cleaning services.  Who do they expect to take out the trash and clean the toilets?  That’s right…YOU.  They depend on the “campers” to do the chores.  They cleverly blend this in with the environment.  If you don’t log your work, you get your time docked plus a “scope creep ticket”.  The ticket is typically issued without any warning and holds your name and the date.  Staff issues tickets daily for frivolous reasons beyond not logging work and puts them in a container and draws two names each day.  Those names drawn are required to clean the restrooms, mop the floor, take out the trash and wash dishes.  Why would someone do all of these things? Simply because they disguise it as part of the environment and make “campers” believe that they did something wrong.  Instead of utilizing the situation for a learning opportunity you are yet again given additional labor.  LAMP Camp is a place for you to go and work for their ecommerce business that is hidden under the guise of an enterprise.  You definitely do not receive anywhere near 480 hours of educational instruction on the LAMP stack nor development.  You’ll walk out of the program just as empty handed as you came in.  For what you get out of the program you are better off spending half the time learning PHP via the web and working on your own projects.  At least you’ll have something to show for your time and effort.  The entire LAMP Camp environment is strictly designed to accommodate the extra manpower needed by a small group of people who are expanding their ecommerce business selling seat belt extenders.  Don’t believe what you are reading?  Just search for a “camper” through LinkedIn and ask. (*They pretty much made everyone create a LinkedIn page and add LAMP Camp to their profiles so they would seem bigger, so your search will be easy...take note of the year and time frame...it was apart of a LinkedIn presentation.

Opening the Matryoshka doll

In a few words the entire operation is a tangled web riding on the successful sales of a hot selling item.  The owners of LAMP Camp have defined the program as a fully-sponsored developer education program from the Cresca Group’s IT & Development Team that teaches people to build enterprise-level applications with PHP, MySQL, Javascript and much more.  That seems like a really great opportunity, but let’s takes a deeper look into the details because they have cleverly nested names and businesses probably for tax purposes or FREE labor purposes.  

• Who is fully sponsoring the program?
  • Cresca Group owned by husband and wife Jay Solomon and Eszter Boda.
• Who or what is Cresca Group?
  • A front business that provides customer service and administrative services for Seat Belt Extender Pros.

• Who or what is Seat Belt Extender Pros?
  • A company that sells seat belt extenders through ecommerce platforms.
  • Who owns Seat Belt Extender Pros? The owners of Cresca Group.
• Who really owns LAMP Camp?
  • According to the issued business license: More of Me To Love, LLC
  • Also owned by Jay Solomon and Eszter Boda.
• How does it relate to LAMP Camp?
  • The enterprise-level applications that you build are strictly for the seat belt company to help push it to a global and automated level of service.
  • Running a “full camp” will output approximately 19,200 hours of manpower towards the goals set, none of which include you the “camper”.
  • Without the manpower of the “campers” Cresca’s “IT & Development Team” is only 4 people strong, so you see the real need for creating a program that will increase productivity.

• Do they really teach you PHP, MySQL, Javascript and more?
  • In short, no.  The tasks involved require you to use these languages, but you are not taught how to code/program here.  You are expected to either know and apply or Google, learn and apply.
  • You are taught the basics of Git, Jira, and Cresca’s proprietary PHP framework.  Only because these things are necessary to output results for the ecommerce business.  Don’t know much about programming? You’re shit out of luck.  You’ll have to resort to online training sites and books because they never communicate below a certain level of knowledge.  You’ll need to walk in at least understanding the basics and terminology.
• What do you get out of the program?
  • You are given opportunities to have your resume and LinkedIn account reviewed by Jay Solomon. (No, he is not an expert in HR & LinkedIn, so it’s really a second set of eyes)    
  • You are given opportunities to have the staff “photographer” take headshots for your LinkedIn profile.
  • They feed you (pizza) and have industry professionals give presentations at least once a month. (Quality of industry professionals range from IT recruiters to Army recruiters).
  • The opportunity to work in a group setting.
  • The opportunity to do front and back end development for a real stakeholder.(with no beneficial rewards).
• What do you NOT get out of the program?
  • Instruction on how to program.
  • Education on how to fully work with the LAMP stack.
  • Meaningful work that you can share through Github or your personal portfolio.
  • A mentor-mentee relationship.
  • An assessment on your skill level with recommendations or tools to improve your skillset.
  • Something to show for your hard work.
  • Cutting-edge development learning environment. (Old Macs, Netbooks, and no use of popular frameworks/languages sought out by employers).
  • An education. 

As I finish my fifth week at LAMP Camp it’s hard to believe how much progress I have made in my ability to develop web applications using PHP. Prior to my LAMP Camp experience, the only projects I had ever programmed were assignments for class using other languages. Now, I am currently working with a team to help build the a key aspect of a core system and get to see code I am working on actually go into production. With the guidance given by the LAMP Camp staff and the hands-on projects we are given, I can only see myself continuing to get better.