Le Wagon

I have completed Le Wagon Montreal coding bootcamp in March 2020.

I had been working as a Marketing manager for 5 years, but I wanted to change career for a long time. It took me 2 years to decide to join Le Wagon.
I started to learn programming alone, at home. But it was very difficult to focus long enough, and I was progressing so slowly.

At Le Wagon, in just 9 weeks, we learned so many things! It was amazing to see people from different backgrounds, nationalities and ages arrive with no knowledge in programming, and leave Le Wagon, able to develop an app from scratch.

At Le Wagon, you learn about coding for sure, but you also learn about yourself and others as well. 
It's a coding and human adventure! Read less

I worked in various commercial roles over the past 4 years and was often being exposed to working with tech teams. I found it fascinating how these “developer guys” always came up with such useful solutions and decided to become one of them to be able to build my own products in the future.

I started coding on Codecademy and learned some basic HTML and CSS in the evenings after work. However, a few months in I felt like I was stagnating and I didn’t quite know where to go from here. That’s when I started looking into coding bootcamps. After reading about and comparing different programmes, I decided to join the full-time course at Le Wagon.

Now, 9 weeks are over, I finished the course and I would do it all over again!

The pace was fast and the learning curve was steep but thanks to the great team of teachers and TA’s I never felt completely overwhelmed. During the first six weeks, we started with a lecture in the morning and worked on various coding challenges with our buddy throughout the day. The buddy system was great. It made me realise how important explaining code to another person was for my own understanding. 

What have I learnt?

• Strong foundations: Ruby, Ruby on Rails, CSS, HTML, ES6, MVC, OOP, DB structures, Git, Github, technical workflow, Wireframes, prototyping, UI design and I’m confident that I will be able to build on these.

• Mindset: Probably even more important, I developed a mindset that will enable me to learn even more languages and frameworks in the future.

• How to build a product from scratch: During the last three weeks we built an Airbnb clone and our very own product. During these three weeks we learned every step from coming up with an idea, pitching it, creating a prototype, writing the code, pushing it into production and presenting the MVP.

The entire Le Wagon team is incredibly supportive and my fellow students were phenomenal! I can recommend this course to anyone who is looking to take on a new challenge.  Read less

Throughout my undergraduate degree in Business Management, I felt that I had too much time on my hands and I was definitely not learning nearly enough practical skills that I could apply to my future career. After graduating, I took on a job at a small Fintech startup as an operations analyst. Little did I know that being an operations analyst meant that I had to be filing documents and answering phone calls in which I had to repeat the same conversations over and over again. The work there was extremely tedious and mind numbing as we had to copy and paste data from the database onto an excel sheet to measure our performance. I had a look into automating the data entry and I used webhooks to roll out the process. That simple job saved the operations team 20 hours of work per week. As soon as I got it to work I got a rush and was extremely happy to have found a solution to that problem and to never have to copy and paste data into that excel sheet again. That is when I started looking into coding and potentially switching my career to do it professionally. I had heard about Le Wagon from a friend that had taken the course in France, when I looked at the programme specifications I was very interested to join.
I decided that if I was going to make a career change now was the time, so I left my job and enrolled as a full-time student at the bootcamp. From the first couple of days I was hooked to coding, I really loved the daily routine of getting to class and spending the whole day solving challenges with my buddy. It was extremely interesting to not only learn from the lecturers and TAs but from other students as well. Le Wagon teaches you how to think critically to solve coding challenges as well as collaborate with others which really made it feel like we were a team. This experience would not have been the same if it wasn't for the people that constitute the school, I was able to concentrate for long periods of time and also know when to relax with others and have a laugh even after the boot camp ended. I can say with certainty I have made very good friends at the course and I am now equipped to confidently build websites for a living.
I would recommend taking this course to anyone that is willing to commit to putting in the hard work to change careers because the bootcamp is what you make of it, so make the most of what can be the most defining 9 weeks of your life.  Read less

Personal Background
I joined Le Wagon because I wanted to change my career. I fell into teaching ESL as a way to fund my travels, and paradoxically it gradually became a career that kept me grounded. In my free time I had been learning coding through online bootcamps, tutorials, and courses. I learned Python, JavaScript, CSS, and HTML. But, I didn’t have the time or skill to put them all together in a very useful way. I realized that my self-study was going too slow so I decided to join a bootcamp. I did some research and landed on Le Wagon.
Location
My home is in South Korea, so I was looking at taking the course in a couple of nearby locations: Seoul, Tokyo, and Bali. While I analyzed the costs and weighed the pros and cons, ultimately I asked myself, ‘Where would be the best place to focus and immerse myself?’ Having visited Canggu on a number of occasions in the past for surfing, I knew it would be a good place to take Le Wagon.
Canggu has many amenities on offer to make a long-term stay comfortable and convenient. Housing, food, co-working spaces, and of course the beach, are all within walking distance and very affordable. I knew that the less time I spent worrying about daily necessities meant more time I could focus on the bootcamp.

Teaching Staff
I really enjoyed getting to know the lecturers and teaching assistants at Le Wagon Bali. They were all very knowledgable, personable, and passionate about their jobs. They never hesitated to work through a tricky problem or help explain a puzzling concept. I liked that the teachers rotated through different lectures. Each of the three main lecturers have a unique teaching style, so I appreciated the rotation to keep things fresh in the lectures.
Curriculum and Course Structure
The course is very fast paced. For me, the Ruby portion was a bit of a refresher coming off the prep work and some personal study I had done in the past. That’s okay, it meant I could do some of the optional challenges and dig into some more of the nuances of the Ruby language. 
The course is structured in a way that you are constantly learning faster and more efficient ways to code. Of course it would be nice to know the fastest and most efficient method from the beginning, but because I know the underlying principles I already feel more confident diving into another language or framework to supplement what I learned in the course.
Value
I am very satisfied with the quality of education and the in-and-out-of-classroom support from the staff. I would not hesitate to recommend this program to someone with the time and means to initiate a change. For me, the biggest non-quantitative value of the bootcamp is the people who were my classmates. I had classmates from 13 different countries, each of whom I spent time with working through challenges and getting to know between classes. Bali attracts people from all over, and I think being in a new place learning new things brought us together in a way I didn’t expect, but was happy to experience. Read less

I was studying Criminology and Sociology, and have always dreamt of becoming a detective. After my degree I realised there was very little flexibility in that sector. I needed more flexibility so that I could be around my 3 year old and not have to work full time hours. I started taking some UX / UI and Web Development courses on Udemy. I landed my first job as an Integration Analyst and then Solutions Architect but I found it very difficult to keep up with my lack of technical knowledge. A Developer friend recommended Le Wagon, I left my job and signed up! And here I am 9 weeks after, I am a proud Full Stack Developer with the world full of possibilities.
It was a tough 9 weeks, I started so confidently but there was a point where I thought it wasn’t sinking in and wanted to give up. However, the amazing staff at Le Wagon kept me going. Ben gave us reboot sessions, Cecilia took out time to explain her way of learning which really benefited me, and Celine listened to me regarding my worries and guided me to the appropriate support. Thank you so much to the whole team at Le Wagon!
The structure of the course at Le Wagon is incredible! I enjoyed the morning lectures, and then being left to work on tasks throughout the day. There is an amazing buddy system which allows you to work with a different person everyday, you choose how you want to work, you can pair programme or just sit next to each other and work on your own tasks. This was a great way of learning to work with others whilst having fun getting to know other people. I can say I made a lot of friends at Le Wagon and I am more confident in working with a tech team. The last 3 weeks are entirely product focused, we build our own version of an Airbnb clone and then our final projects. When working in the tech sector you hear coding is not the problem working with people is, and yes I also learnt this. I found it incredibly difficult to work as part of a team at first but with the guidance and support of teachers at Le Wagon I learnt that communication is key. And saying that we came together as a team and build an amazing product, Code for Change.
 
I excited about what the future holds and very happy about becoming a part of the Le Wagon family. Read less

As I was finishing my studies at UFRJ as a Graphic Designer, I decided to make a full change of career and embark into the promising life of a web developer. I heard of Le Wagon from a friend of mine, a former alumni, and I went there to check, with a few visits I fell in love with the place and decided that I wanted to be part of their intensive full-stack program.
During my time there(9 weeks), I was truly immmersed into an intense but rewarding life of a coder, thanks to the comfortable enviroment and the methodology of coding challenges that are given on a daily baisis; and that's the beauty of it, the students usually have a short to medium class in the morning, and then we spend all day coding and facing programming challenges, the moment you learn something you are already putting to pratice and also learning while praticing. With a great cast of teachers and teacher's assistants, you have all the support you need to fulfill any questions you might have about the challenges that are being faced. And by the end of the bootcamp you put everything you learn to good use, building webpages and web apps, doing what a real developer would do, and also learn much more while you do it. In the end you come out a web dev, with already good work on your portfolio, ready to face the market and start your life as a dev.
At least that's how I felt about it. :)
I can't end this without saying that even tho it was an intense and demanding experience, all the time I had support from my classmates, from the teachers, and the manager. I would recommend Le Wagon to anyone willing to undergo this path of coding. Read less

After a year of evaluating pros and cons I joined Le Wagon to gain new technical skillsets and become a web developer. It was an intense 9-week experience. You learn so much about yourself during this time.  I’ve completed the Bootcamp with 17 other students. We all came from different background with some or no previous experience. I have to say I’m impress how much we are able to accomplish now compare to the first day of the bootcamp.  Here you’ll learn your first OP language, you’ll solve challenges in team, build project from scratch in 2 weeks and have the necessary tools to easily learn any other language after the Bootcamp.  I really loved my experience at Le Wagon. If you want to change your career or just learn new skills for your current job, I would definitely recommend Le Wagon bootcamp.  Read less

Thoughts on doing a coding bootcamp

I graduated in December 2019 from Le Wagon Coding Bootcamp in Montreal, Canada. This experience has improved my coding skills without a doubt. Reading this, my guess is that you are not a developer, and you are wondering whether or not you should register to join a coding bootcamp.Why would you join a coding bootcamp?I am a French Civil Engineer. Moving in 2014 in Canada pushed me to abandon my career. Specialized in Project Management, my wife advised me to try applying as is in another field. I found a PM internship position in a major company where I was able to see another work area in IT (Information Technology). From there, I tried to learn to code by myself to get to understand how developers get the job done and to optimise my job using javascript-like code in Google Suite applications. This is how I found a new passion for coding. I can’t stress this point enough as it is one of the most important in your future choice. If you happen not to like coding, stop right now or you will suffer. Coding is made of rules, a lot of lectures, exchange with teammates, and of course brain computing. Your brain will code by itself before you even write one single line. As my wife would say: “zombie mod”. Registering to a coding bootcamp is a commitment to yourself that you decide to change your professional life. Furthermore, you will be out of your comfort zone as your personal world for about 9 weeks. If you don’t commit all of yourself into this project, you will fail. Guarantee!Courses reviewI have been able to teach myself some HTML, CSS, Bootstrap, JS ES5-ich, with a touch of JQuery. I made some static websites and I knew I had to structure my coding skills. This is where Le Wagon helped me the most. Let’s go straight to the point : lectures are very well made. All Le Wagon schools follow the same course pattern. This creates a strong community able to understand your struggle, if any. The bootcamp goes fast, you have to know that, which brings me to the next point: knowledge. Day after day, you learn a new topic, following that simple pattern:

• morning: lecture,
• afternoon: practice,
• end of the day: coding together topic related exercise. 

The first 3 days, people laugh thinking they will master everything in no time and effortlessly. At the end of the first week, most understand it won’t be easy without at least paying attention. Some concepts won’t get to you the first time and the courses are made to help you succeed. You will get stronger if you implicate yourself in lectures, practices, and studies.People reviewFor some obvious reasons, each class is filled with humans. And the diversity spectrum is large, from age, sex, country of origin, languages, etc. These differences amphasis different states of mind. I realize that money is a big factor of success and not in the way you probably think right now. Coding bootcamps are not cheap, let’s be honest about it. And it’s good. When something costs people, they get serious about it and want to know what they pay for. Saying so, there is a difference of personal commitment regarding any product when you receive something expensive for free versus something that you have to pay for. You will see some people that will spend their time showing you how good their “fruit” products are or sharing whatever pictures of unrelated topics on social media. Their personal commitment is close to null or nil (even though nil is not nothing). If you remember that, make sure to avoid them as they will pollute your journey and waste your personal investment. Fortunately, there are mostly very nice people willing to do what is required to succeed. Those will push your limit to the best of yourself.Final thoughtsYou want to change your career and become a full stack developer, a product owner, or whatever you are looking for in the IT area? Should you join a coding bootcamp, yes definitely. If and only if you commit yourself to it. Otherwise you will waste your time, your money and probably drain others into your bad game. Be the best of yourself. Join a community, learn to code and make something nice for a better world. You will learn very soon that you are a coding machine! 
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I signed up to Le Wagon after having heard very good things about it and I can definitely say it did not disappoint.
I had some prior experience in development and coding, but didn’t consider it to be enough to apply for developer jobs. I am now writing this review as a junior developer just a couple of months later.
The bootcamp offers a very well rounded program where you learn as much as you can over the course of 9 weeks, and you come out with a very wide range of knowledge and the tools to work on your own projects - be it in design, back end, or both! It teaches the foundations of programming that will help you to learn other languages, understand how to read code and how it works. All of the learnings you acquire are put to the test and solidified during the project weeks where you get to work with a small team and present what you created from scratch.
Other great parts of the program are that you can go at your own pace, the TA’s are great (they’ve done the course as well so they can help you accordingly), and the course support is amazing. There are videos on every lecture if you need to go back to one because you didn’t understand something, there are loads of exercises for those who want to do more, and the TA’s are always willing to help, assist and explain to make sure you got the concepts down.
Overall, my experience at Le Wagon was very good. I would definitely recommend it for anyone who is interested in the tech industry and interested in becoming a developer, but also for anyone looking to learn a new skill to incorporate into their current job.
And don’t worry too much about it! Most people there are looking for a career change and excited to learn something new. It’s a great opportunity to meet amazing people from different backgrounds but with similar goals and start building a network for yourself in the industry :) Read less

Learning how to code had always been a dream - one that I approached with apprehension because of my lack of a technical education.  But after having attended one of Le Wagon's free workshops, I could slowly see myself learning how to code.

I joined LeWagon to gain a practical skillset that would help me make informed decisions in my workplace. And after having completed the Bootcamp, I've never been more confident in translating client requirements into actionable solutions.

The Bootcamp sets you up with foundational knowledge required to learn a programming language and then equips you with an array of tools that you can choose to hone after the Bootcamp. Their exceptional curriculum, having stood the test of time, takes you from understanding things like 'What is the internet?' all the way to designing two prototypes from scratch; thereby giving you a comprehensive understanding of what it actually means to 'code'.

The curriculum is supported by a holistic learning environment that incorporates teamwork, problem-solving and decision making, all of which are critical skills that are needed in the workplace. Additionally, the teaching assistants are always willing to go above and beyond what they are required to do in order to ensure that your queries are answered, at a bare minimum.

All in all, attending the LeWagon Bootcamp has been one of the best decisions I have ever made and I recommend it wholeheartedly. I have articulated a more in-depth experience of my time at LeWagon in this article here, where you can also contact me if you have any questions. 

Good luck!

P.S: My team and I built a beginner's version of a Pokémon battle :)
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I joined the program with very high expectations and I was even more impressed. The platform is incredible, the teaching staff wonderful and the curriculum is very well thought out. I can say with no doubt that it changed my life, my way of thinking and opened so many new opportunities. I'll be eternally grateful and I am thrilled to now be part of Le Wagon community.  Read less

I initially signed up to le wagon to get to know the basics of web development after having graduated from uni. My aim was to understand how to structure a tech project, know the costs, timeline and be able to communicate with developers. I ended up learning an incredible amount of skills and discovered a passion for web development! Le Wagon will give you the tools to build an entire project from scratch, and the concepts allowing you to switch to any other programming language easily. I found a job in less than 2 months after graduating.

I would highly recommend le Wagon, whether you are looking to get an understanding of the tech industry, add tech skills to your current position or become a developer! 

In addition to this, it is a great place to meet fantastic people! Read less

So previously I was working as a fire install engineer. I wasn't unhappy but my ultimate goal was to be doing something I am really interested in and got be happy doing every day. I have always had a keen interest in technology/computers.
Whether that would be gaming or building a PC for myself or a friend, however I had never delved into the more technical side of it, programming... this is when I started on my search for an intense coding boot camp as I felt this would be a lot
more practical for me than to go back to university for 3 years.
This is when I found Le wagon and It exceeded any expectations I had of the 9 week course, from the people I met there to the skills I learned. The attention and support the teachers provide through out the course is amazing and you
 can really feel that they enjoy sharing their knowledge and skills with you. The Highlight for me was final week where we worked on our main project. We worked in a team of 4 and together presented an amazing progressive web application
 within 10 days. Never did I think I would be creating such a quality product within 9 weeks coming from zero previous programming. I have also come away from Le wagon with some very good friends, we catch up daily sometimes and keep
 testing each other on what we are learning. The whole experience has been amazing and i would recommend it to anyone with no doubts. Read less

My interest in code began in late 2018 during my first few months at university.  A combination of not enjoying my current Digital Media course and wanting to spend more time exploring code led me to the decision to drop out. Once home I immediately started out with online courses and learning the basics of Front-end development.  A month later and I had built and deployed my very first website. It was at this point I knew that coding was something I enjoyed and it was something that I could pursue. Fast-forward a few months and I was still going strong with online tutorials and decided to take on my first paid project for a client. This was a great, albeit stressful experience and really helped further my skills.
This brings me to October 2019 when I began my Le Wagon journey. I wanted to learn more about the world of web development and Full-stack skills with the aim of being able to secure a full time position afterwards. Le Wagon was an amazing experience. It wasn’t just a place of learning but a whole community that you instantly felt connected to. I think that was the stand-out aspect for me. I really enjoyed going in each day to work on a particular set of challenges with an amazing group of likeminded people. It had a perfect blend of a casual yet hard working vibe with many events both academic and social to attend during the week. I found that the amount of content we got through was staggering and I would be lying if I said that I didn’t feel overwhelmed. However, we had constant support from all the teachers and TA’s reminding us that Its a long process and you aren’t expected to understand everything right away. I felt I was able to talk to anyone at any time about how I was feeling which was very encouraging.  The fact that everybody on the course was able to come together in their respective groups to produce amazing projects in the final two weeks was a real testimony to the hours of work that we as students and all the teachers and TA’s has put in. I really enjoyed working in my team and gaining the experience of collaborating with other developers and overcoming the problems that  that inevitably creates. To cap it off presenting our projects on Demo day allowed us to really see how far we had come.
I loved my experience at Le Wagon. Its more than just a coding bootcamp, its a community of people all working together and supporting each other  to achieve their goals whilst still being a fun, relaxed and great place to work hard and play. Read less

After completing a Business degree at University, I worked in software startups in London for several years in non-technical roles. I've always had an interest in web development but found it quite intimidating at first. During my time in software companies, I had the chance to work closely with software developers and found their day-to-day role fascinating and impressive. I had heard great feedback from a colleague who had completed Le Wagon a few years before and after reading many reviews online and watching a few demo-day videos I knew that Le Wagon was the right choice.
My experience at Le Wagon really lived up to my expectations from start to finish. I have learnt more than I could have imagined during the bootcamp and have met some amazing people from a wide variety of backgrounds and experience. By the end of the 9-week course, you have all of the tools and knowledge you need to develop your own working application. The teachers are really what set Le Wagon apart from the rest, the teaching throughout was excellent and the staff are always enthusiastic and create a great learning environment.  
I would really recommend Le Wagon to anyone considering a career in tech! Read less

I signed up for the Bootcamp because I've always wanted to know how to program and I liked the idea of learning something fast and intensely! The Bootcamp is indeed intense, but the atmosphere of the staff who were all so friendly, supportive, extremely knowledgable, professional and so so helpful - was so refreshing and nice. All the students were very friendly as well, and I keep in touch with so many of them! So yes, I've learned a lot, and the course isn't easy, but most of all it was just an incredible experience that I will treasure and look back on for the rest of my life :)  Read less

In June of 2019, I was in Spain about to do a Master's in Linguistics when I stumbled on LeWagon's site. I was always interested in all things tech, and code. 'Bootcamps' have been really trendy the last few years here in the US (where I'm from), but the cost was always what stopped me from doing one. About 10 days before the next batch was set to start I scheduled a call with Gus to get some more info and I was sold from that moment on. He was very straight forward about the process, the price is very affordable given how much you learn and the salary you can earn afterwards, and the people you meet you'll most likely be friends with for years to come.

For the first 6 weeks, you work with a new partner every day. We had just under 30 people in our batch, so at the end of those 6 weeks you knew everyone pretty well. I think this helps you adapt to different communication styles, learning styles, makes you more patient and ultimately more employable. They have a very nice ticket system in place for when you have a question, instead of just raising your hand like we did in school, at least in the U.S. This was really efficient and made sure everyone was attended to. Don't be embarrassed to raise a ton of tickets, that's what you're there for!

The absolute cherry on top was that you're in one of the best cities in the world. After a long, maybe a tad overwhelming day of code, you get to walk home through the and see all of the old Spanish architecture, get some tapas and a cerveza, and you'll quickly be rejuvenated and ready for the next day. 

Some people might say 9 weeks isn't long enough. "You can't learn everything you need to know in 9 weeks!" To that, I would say that LeWagon's goal isn't to teach you everything. You'll never know everything, but if you're like me, that's the beauty of it. There will always be something new to learn. What LeWagon does is teach you how to think like a programmer, they teach you the fundamentals, they provide you with an enormous community of like-minded people, and they help you get started. That's the most important part.

Should I learn Ruby? Python? JavaScript? C++? What if I want to develop games? What's UI/UX? I see a lot of people get 'analysis paralysis' and they never do anything. Or, they read books and watch YouTube videos for a year and hardly write any code. Go to LeWagon, code every day, learn by doing, and everything else will take care of itself! You won't regret it, I promise. Read less

After three years of teaching science and math to high school students, I wanted to transition into a field where I could build on my technical skills to creatively solve problems.
The Le Wagon Full Stack Development Bootcamp was a standout with its positive student reviews, well-structured curriculum and practical approach to learning.
After 1 week of the Le Wagon course, I knew I had found the career and learning community for me. Over the next several weeks, every single person worked with unwavering determination and excitement to support their own and others' learning. This program has provided me with the skills, knowledge, and confidence to embark into this challenging and exciting field of creative problem solving and lifelong learning.
All the knowledge and skills developed over the Bootcamp culminated with three intense project weeks. I had an idea to create an app to support teachers to support their students’  emotional and social wellbeing. In a small team of three, we designed, built and proudly presented our app Sammi (sammi.live) in front of ~250 people at a live demo event. 
Thank you Le Wagon London for an unforgettable and positive learning experience. I definitely recommend anyone interested in developing their technical skills in coding to learn with the amazing Le Wagon team and the students.
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6 years ago, I came to London to study at a University a course my parents picked for me. I didn’t enjoy it, in fact I hated it. After graduation I spent years trying to find a job in the field I studied without success. Before Le Wagon I had been hopping from one dead-end job to another, trying to find the right fit. Last year I decided it was time to make a big move and start a career. I’ve always been drawn to technology and found a new interest in AI development. I then came across Le Wagon coding bootcamp and instantly felt it was the right path to follow. It’s a super intense course, and I really struggled in the first 3 weeks with the basics. I started to question/regret my decision, but the team of highly skilled teachers and teaching assistants always reminded me to “trust the process”.
The more I heard this infamous quote the more I began to hate it. But then, in the 4th week it all ‘clicked’, and suddenly everything started to make sense. I was coding with less help from the teachers and felt smarter and empowered day by day. Finally, the project days came, where we were randomly allocated to form teams of 3-4 students. That’s when we utilised all of our new-found skills to create real web applications and deploy them on a server. For the final project, my team and I worked on a mental health support web application for students and teachers called Sammi (www.sammi.live). We created a fully functioning MVP in only 10 days! How crazy is that? After Demo Day, where we presented our app in front of circa 250 people at the Barbican Centre, we were given workshops on how to pimp our LinkedIn profiles and CV’s to boost our employability prospects. Trust me, I had a zero confidence in myself to find a job. They call it impostor syndrome. I was afraid due to prior experience with failed job interviews that I would never get a job. Six days later I had my first interview, and later that day they offered me the position. I started the next day and am currently working for a great start up. I’m still turning down interviews to this day, when just 3 months ago I couldn’t even get responses to my job applications, it’s nuts! 
I can’t recommend Le Wagon highly enough. It’s not just about the skills you get from the course. There’s also all the post course content, and life-time support from the entire community around the globe available to you anytime you need. But most importantly to me, it’s the life-lasting friendships I have made there. Those are priceless. I am forever grateful to you, for changing my life!
- David Belka Read less