Makers Academy

Hopefully this review helps those thinking of applying for the remote course of Makers. To sum it up, as good if not better than the on site equivalent! I had only a small amount of coding experience prior to this before switching from a science degree to a programming bootcamp but the amount you learn in a relatively short amount of time is insane. The coach we had was extremely helpful and I loved every minute of it working with others from the cohort every day. 

I don't feel that I lost out in doing it remotely. We still did daily standups via video conference and screen shared when pairing for the rest of the afternoon. We all left at the end of the course with as much knowledge as the others but there is a lack of social activities to bare in mind. There also aren't as many(if any) remote jobs for a Junior Developer as they tell you so bare that in mind if applying from abroad or somewhere with a rubbish tech scene.

You have to be willing to work incredibly hard as Makers don't hold your hand throughout the course. You'll leave a much more independent and capable developer from it. Do some practice problems and join codewars to make sure it's what you want to do as a future career. 

I'm currently working at a fantastic startup as a backend engineer in London after doing the course back home near Birmingham and it wouldn't have been possible without going to Makers. Best decision of my life. Can't recommend enough!!!

An incredible experience if you're serious about a career change. Makers provide a vibrant and stimulating environment to learn important real-world programming skills (test-driven development, best practices, git flow) and modern technologies that will make you stand out against traditional computer science graduates in the right kind of companies. Take this from someone who did a conversion masters in Computer Science at one of the UK's most prestigious universities and still decided to attend Makers, and now works at an amazing tech start-up as a result.

Makers is not for the faint-hearted. Firstly, the cost of any bootcamp is prohibitive, though it pales in comparison to the cost of higher education (and don't forget that you need to sustain yourself for about 6 months, not 3 to 4 years). I would also recommend seriously trying to learn how to program on your own and in other ways (attending workshops, taking online courses) - not everyone who joins a bootcamp ends up choosing to become a developer, and that's down to personal preferences and warped expectations. Don't expect to be "taught" things in the traditional sense of the term. A few don't fully understand this and feel frustrated when they're struggling outside a traditional classroom environment. Lastly, don't expect to just be given a job. Makers are improving their ties to companies and are boosting their careers team, who are extremely helpful, but at the end of the day it is up to you to figure out where there is a good fit, to ace interviews and tech tests and to go out and find companies that want to hire you.

The coaches and staff are passionate and helpful, and the material is kept as relevant and up-to-date as possible. There's a lot of hard work and team projects, and ultimately you get out of it as much as you put in, since nobody holds your hand and there is a vast amount of knowledge to be uncovered. 12-16 weeks is a short amount of time, but the hands-on learning approach, being steeped in the right environment and surrounded by passionate individuals really does ingrain the knowledge in your head. People in the tech industry who are familiar with Makers and their graduates are consistently impressed, so no wonder some of the best software companies hire direct.

Do your research, go to open days and taster events and make sure you want to code for a living. If you do, Makers is the right place to start.

 

Experience was one of a kind, I had never study anything related to programming until I started preparing for this course, It's extremely important to do all the material given for the pre course, I could not get it all done before we started and I really paid the price through out the course, because once you start there is not stopping or resting! Its a very very intensive course the fact that I did the online one might have made it more intense I'm not sure but it was definitely challenging for me, I struggle with the lack of guidance or people to answer my questions, apart from other students they pretty much want you to find the answers on your own and I'm not very good at that so that made me struggle through out, my mentor was available but only to ask more questions... this is kinda their methodology no way around that, but on the other hand I loved that they help me get job ready, 4 months of studying and I was ready job ready, earning way more than a minimum wage salary, because I lived in London they also helped me to secure interviews and finally a job, I'm very happy I joined MA and regret not doing it earlier in life! its a major change in life style, you get to join an amazing industry that is very flexible when it comes to hours, holidays and family time, there is so much demand that developers pretty much choose where and how they want to work I haven't heard of any other industry that offers this! (obviously the more experience you have the more picky you can get) again I highly highly recommend anybody to go for it, its hard but totally doable

The whole experience at Makers changed my life for good, I think everything was good apart from the fact that important things like JS experience and Sass or even CSS were not cover with more intensity. 

Another down side was the "Hiring Week" it was a complete disaster, bad organized and when I applied for different roles I did not have a proper feedback about why I was not shorlisted in the pack of applicants, then I applied outside and I was called for interviews, but I must say that this part of the course has been removed and this issue does not occur at the moment. That week is another part of the course which I think was a great decision.

Apart from those previus comments, everything at Makers was phenomenal, Coaches were like big brothers or your best friend, communication was very fluid, Dana was awesome with her yoga and talks. The building itself was great, having fruit everyday was good, table tennis was something I quite did not understand at the begining but once you are inmerse coding 12-16 hours daily it becomes vital part of your daily excersice, I really miss that at work.

Making real friends was another big plus for me, I found several characters there which I consider a good influence not only in my career but in my personal life.

I have told my story to many people interested in doing the same, shame that they are not ready to sacrifice what is needed, so I started a Charity Coding Club with kids thanks to everything I learned at Makers and who knows maybe some of them would be Makers one day.

If you are reading this review I just want to tell you that Makers is a door that can give you access to a huge universe called Programming, just do it, you will never regret about it. 

I graduated from Makers in mid-August 2016. At the time of writing this, I have accepted one of the three job offers I have been made and am about to start working as a professional developer after only 6 months since I decided to change my career and do something I love.

Makers Academy is an amazing environment for learning, helping you develop fundamental skills that make a great developer rather than teaching a specific language or framework. Their career staff is extremely helpful, assisting everyone to find the right job for them.

If you know you want to have a career as a software developer and are looking for reasons to join or not to join Makers, just look at the biggest deliverable, which is how many people who studied here have then gone on to get a job as software developer (relatively) soon after finishing; that should give you confidence that anyone who wants to can make it and Makers is the best way to get there!!

In summary, just do it!

I'm really happy with my decision to go to Makers Academy - really happy. It's quite a big deal to quit a career and to start out completely fresh in something else but that is what I did and I couldn't be more pleased with my decision.

The course is fantastic and the instructors are all great and very knowledgable. They create an atmosphere which is just perfect to learn in. It's quite a fine balance as Makers walks the very thin line between giving you the space to grow by yourself whilst keeping you pointed in the right direction.

If I was going to make any criticism it would be that sometimes Makeres ered on the side of giving us too much space and maybe a bit more structure would have made people feel a bit more comfortable. Saying that though the whole course really is amazing and it is incrediable to look back at quite how much I learnt in whats really a very short amount of time.

A great foundation to kick-start my new career as a juniour developer!

I applied to Makers Academy (MA) after my younger brother had completed the course and I was, frankly, jealous of the job opportunities available to him, and that he had a literacy in something I could only dream of. 

Having graduated from uni I was left feeling like my degree didn't really set me apart and I wanted to upskill myself so I could compete with my peers in the job market. I also wanted to make moves towards a career that would challenge me and provide lots of opportunity for growth - something I felt I didn't have in my current role.

In summary, i've doubled my salary and wildly boosted my career opportunities in the space of 3 months, having never touched code before my interview preparation. You get out of MA as much as you put in. It's an incredibly hard course, and you're studying pretty much none stop for the 3 months. There were definitely moments where I felt like I wasn't going to make it. But I signed up to be challenged and thats exactly what I got. 

Experience:
The learning environment at MA is great. They acknowledge what a challenge it can be, and work really hard to create an environment that looks after people's mental and physical health whilst they're studying. It was those extra things, the focus on feedback and open lines of communciation, the ethos of supporting one another, and being surrounded by so many passionate and aspirational people is what really made it for me. 

Instructors:
For the most part I found the instructors/coaches great. They challenged me, often answered my question with another question which, whilst occasionally annoying, has made me a more independent thinker and confident at solving my own problems. I did feel like my cohort could have benefitted from greater contact time with the coaches. They often felt somewhat absent during the day to day runnings of the place, more so towards the latter half of the course - however, as we became more autonomous and capable their intervention was less and less neccessary. 

Curriculum:
The curriculum is rigorous and does what it says on the tin: gives you the skills you need to get a job as a developer. My learning is not over and I doubt it ever will be. But I felt like the structure of the course, and the sue of Ruby as a teaching lagnuage (followed by JS) gave me a fluid and comprehensive understanding of web development. The curriculum will always be a work in proress; students are encouraged to feed back on materials that they don't think are up to scratch or that aren't giving them the clearest understanding of the topic in question. There were a couple of weeks during my time on the course where I felt like that materials weren't as strong as they needed to be to thoroughly teach me that topic, however I have looked at the materials again since graduating and they have been updated and improved based on this kind of feedback.

Job Assistance:
I can't really comment much on this as I found a job relatively quickly after graduating based on my own networking. However, I would say that MA did a lot to encourage me into these kind of networking events, and the careers week at the end of the course in particular I found extremely useful in terms of teaching me how to approach interviews for this kind of industry. They also provide a whole wealth of resources that I will forever be able to reference back to, that cover technical interview questions and how to handle them, tech test advice, and more general guidance on how to job hunt in the tech industry. Their team is incredibly knowledgable on the tech scene in London and beyond, and they were great about advising me on the company I was applying to, and also gave me the confidence and guidance to negotiate a higher salary. I think with the job assistance you get out of it as much as you put in (ie: they won't chace you, the onus is on you to job hunt & keep them in the loop as much as you see fit) and there isn't quite as much support beyond careers week as students expect there to be. I think that MA could do to improve their connections beyond London within the UK but I am aware that they are currently working hard on this matter in particualr. 

The course isn't cheap. But I think it is a better investment than my degree, which these days appears to just be a tick I can put in a box. I am glad I did it, it was the right decision, and I would absolutely recommend this if you're the kind of person that doesn't shy away from hard work, likes to be challenged, and is looking for a way to break into the tech industry. 

I had a brilliant Makers experience. I first heard about the company after placing a Makers Grad in a role while in my old job as a recruiter - immediate validation. I contacted Nikesh at Makers soon after, and from that point on Makers had my complete confidence and haven't given me any reason to doubt them since, I just accepted my first job ten weeks after graduating.

From the get-go the Makers team were explicit about the level of commitment required to get the best experience out of the program, and ultimately - be successful in finding a job. Personally, I had always struggled in formal education; school was a non-starter, a-levels were two years of slacking off, and one year at university was the final step on the one-way road to educational disenchantment. So naturally, I was a little sceptical about whether or not I'd be able to maintain the level of dedication required to complete such an intensive course - oxbridge meets the marines they said. Actually, it's not THAT tough, however I think that's most likely testament to the way in which the course has changed since that famous line was written. 

The syllabus of the course is split into two six-week halves, the first half consists of weekly modules laid out in a challenge-based system - "here's some information, go and see what you can do with it". I don't think it was the case for everyone who came to Makers, but for me something just clicked. I found the syllabus engaging, and the amount of assistance given is pitched at just the right level, the goldie-locks zone for learning.

The second half of the course I am slightly less enthusiastic about (although still on the whole very positive). My week 7 consisted of the now reenvisioned "lab week", in which you were encouraged to consolidate the previous six weeks' materials, you did have the option to pursue a new technology, however I chose to consolidate. The lack of structure took the momentum out of my learning, and flitting between technologies ultimately didn't offer as much as if I had focussed on one vertical. We fed this back to the coaches and by the time the next cohort rolled around six weeks later, the syllabus had been changed (in true Agile fashion!). The impression I got was that the latter half of the course was going through a bit of a remodel to have more of an emphasis on group projects, which I think will eventually benefit the students, however at the time of my studying there were sections in between the two states that weren't at the same standard that I had come to expect.

Evgeny has done great job of putting together a team of world class coaches, who all share in the ability to translate difficult technical problems into easy to consume explanations (although be warned, the metaphors can get a little silly!). Tackling the fundamental principles of web development in the first six weeks was made that much easier by the coaches, who are infinitely patient and enthusiastic which is remarkable given that they do it every six weeks.

One of the few areas that still needs to be improved I think is the post-makers hiring process, a graduate portal of some form would really help maintain a good level of communication between graduates and the hiring team (rather than the current instant messaging solution). Shortly after the course I moved back to Manchester, and it did feel like I'd dropped off the radar for a while. At present the hiring team is best equipped to set you up with interviews and jobs in London, although inroads are being made in Manchester, Southampton and European tech-hubs. In spite of this reservation, two months after my graduation Ruben set me up with a fantastic company based in Manchester, who knew exactly what they were getting in hiring a Maker. I started last week, and another Maker is joining me next, brilliant!

Seeing as everyone asks about the money, yeah it's £8,000, but it's hardly an issue versus whatever universities cost these days. I've not got a degree, and yet I have every confidence discussing tech with CS students up to a year out of university. And what Makers offers you isn't just modules you aren't terribly interested in, you've probably heard the Makers mantra "learning to learn", my new job is writing in Python, a tech I hadn't used until a week before I was completing a technical test.

To summarise, Makers Academy puts you in an environment where you have every opportunity and the necessary resources to become a Junior Developer in 12 weeks, however without the necessary commitment of time and effort, don't expect to succeed. 

If you are on the fence about whether or not Makers is for you, do a couple of open days, and go and visit a Makers graduation event. If it's the coding you're nervous about, check out this link: http://imgur.com/gallery/uGdaN, it's my summary of how I got started (and basically everything you'll learn up to the beginning of the precourse), work through those and you should have a good feel for the practice.

Wow, this was longer than I expected, and has probably gotten a little incongruent at this point, if you still have any questions, do feel free to drop me an email at: mattbridgesbusiness@gmail.com

This review might be useful for those thinking of joining Makers Academy remotely from another european country. I am from Spain and I lived in Cambridge for a year and a half before joining Makers. At the beginning I was looking for an on-site bootcamp in London, but when I discovered the Makers Academy remote bootcamp I decided to change my plans. I joined the couse, packed all my stuffs and left the U.K. I didn't even have to go to the MA offices (I have actually never been there), everything from the very start was arranged using skype, emails and Slack.
  I went back to Cádiz, my home town city in Spain as it was easier for me in terms of housing and money and I accomplished the whole course from there without any impediment. Actually it was fantastic enjoying the course while being in my sunny city. I never had the feeling I could have learnt more if I would have been in London.

It is a really intense course and you really need to be 100% focused on it. From 9am to 6-7pm I was coding online with my pair partner. The fact that you are pair programming really push you to do your best everyday. The philosophy of the course is that you have to be autonomous from the beginning which I think it helps in the long run. Don't expect long technical explanations. People asks questions at the meeting, but then you and your partner have to code and try to solve the problems on your own before asking for help . Sometimes you need to stop and read part of a book or watch some videos about a subject but this is something you do on your own.
  The negative aspect of not being in London comes when the course is finished and you have to start the job hunting stage. It is obviusly a handicap. London in one of the most important cities in the world and is full of professional opportunities. MA is based in London and most of their partner companies are based in the UK, but I know they are doing a big effort to expand their influence. However, sometimes you can be warned of a position in Spain, Belgium or other european country. They don't do magic, they will help you as much as they can but at the end you have to find the job. My personal experience is that by showing all the projects you have developed during the course people get interested in knowing more about you.

I am now working in Paris as a junior developer, it took me about 3 month to get my job after finishing the course. Sometimes I think of myself 9 months ago before joining Makers Academy, when I was doing a job I didn't like. It just brings a smile on my face.

Few months ago I did not know what a "Hello world!" was.. now I have an amazing job in the start up I wanted to work for.

My experience.. in one word.. intense!
To get to the point where I am.. I worked from November to April about 12-15hours a day(the course was actually on december the precourse and then from january to april the course..).. I took one day off some weekends.. but in exchange.. the day I did work.. I work double! So it is possible.. but it is on you, you can work s much as you can.. even less is ok too..but it is not like something that just happens.. you are there to learn and this is your responsibility.. Makers is not there to teach you but you are there to learn.. they give you the tools and you need to use them:) all that efford.. pay off and at the end, I ENJOYED doing it!

Job hunting

They will not find a job for you.. this is the real life.. you need to find a job yourself.. but they will help you with references, tricks.. many stuff that make the difference in the job hunting etc.. but forget about you finishing the course and start to work for google.. ¬¬ it is on you too, and it is important you keep this in mind.. but I can say, I got an AWESOME job and I feel... happines!!! when the alarm wake me up early in the morning everyday! :D

Instructors
I did Ronin, so basically I had only one coach, SAM, do not forget that name because if you are lucky enough to be his student, you will fall in love with coding and you will not get just an instructor but a friend, he is an AWESOME DEVELOPER and a PERFECT teacher. The workshops with him were amazing, the way he explains stuff is great.

Well.. if you want to change your life.. they will give you the tools to make it possible..:)