Redwood Code Academy

I attended Redwood Code Academy in the Summer-Fall of 2018. I also graduated from the University of California, Irvine with a Computer Science degree, and had some previous Software Engineering experience. I had always wondered if I needed to attend a bootcamp to further myself in my career, and was extremely conflicted when deciding whether I should attend one or not. I hope this review will be helpful for those who are also wondering whether they need the help of a bootcamp or not.

To start, the bootcamp is VERY intensive. There is a lot of material to learn, and there is little time to digest all of it. Each day, we would start with either lab review, or a whiteboarding session. Then we would go into the lesson for the day, do a couple exercises pertaining to the lesson, and then move into doing the lab for the rest of the day. On most days, it would be difficult to finish the lab, and I would have to finish at home. In addition, if there were any difficult parts, I would spend the night coding more trying to fully digest what we learned. It’s very important to note, you get what you put in. If you don't put in the effort, you will most likely fall behind, and this is coming from someone with experience. I would not suggest attending if you give up easily, refuse to ask for help, or do not want to put in the extra effort to fully understand the material.  

Now, I would like to first address the negatives of the course.

• C#/.NET section: I was very disappointed by the second half of the bootcamp for C#/.NET. I had expected more from a bootcamp that claims they are specialized in the .NET framework. In comparison to the earlier JavaScript half, the lessons were not clearly planned beforehand. Harrison would have to debug issues that appeared during lessons. Other students and I had lots of confusion and issues on the labs because the lessons did not fully prepare us, and even other instructors weren’t well equipped to help with this section as well and would have to do a lot of research to help us. In comparison to the well-structured JavaScript first half, the second half was rushed and there wasn’t enough concept reinforcement. I had really wanted to learn more in this section, but core C# concepts (object oriented programming) were brushed over quickly, and there wasn’t practice to learn them.
• Curriculum: Not everything that was promised was went over to where I feel job-level comfortable. I had hoped to learn more about Agile/Scrum methodologies, Cloud Development, and Firebase.  They were either not mentioned, quickly brushed over online resources, or not given proper practice with.
• Job/Interview Preparation: Another section where I do not feel professionally prepared for the real world. Data structures/algorithms were quickly went over and we were told to learn the others on our own time. Resume review was lacking. I received a few lines of feedback from Redwood, but when I asked someone in the industry, they would give me paragraphs of feedback. We were only given one 30-minute mock interview with quick feedback. Yes, it gave me a sense how an interview would go, but I do not feel any more prepared to ace the interview than when I first started the bootcamp. I had also expected better connections or a chance to meet with hiring managers, but instead we only had the chance to meet with recruiters for a day, and most job postings were links to online job postings. Proper GitHub READMEs were also something hiring managers wanted to see, but this was something I had to learn on my own.
• Externship: The part I was looking forward to the most was being able to work together and connect with a working professional in the industry. Even though the project was intense and I learned a lot working on it, there was little feedback on our design, and zero feedback on our code. I had hoped to work closer with the client, but that was limited to just one meeting halfway through the project, and one more time at the final demo.

Now, the positives:

• The instructors: The two lead instructors - Taylor and Patrick - were fantastic and truly made my time at Redwood enjoyable. They spent countless hours helping my classmates and I and have been incredible resources this entire cohort. I have learned a lot from them and I cannot thank them enough for all the hard work and dedication they have put into teaching us. When I asked a question, they would make sure I fully understood what they were saying, and if they didn’t know the answer to something, they would look into it and make sure to get back to me. There were also additional office hours that taught supplementary material or to help with current material that was extremely helpful as well.
• Javascript Section: The Javascript/React/Node lessons and labs have been fantastic. Lessons were structured very well and the labs helped us further understand what we learned that day. Previously I thought Javascript was my worst language, but now it is one of my best and most enjoyed language.
• The classmates: Some people may think programmers are unsocial, but everyone in this cohort was amazing and friendly. Everyone knew they were here to make a change for themselves and everyone worked their hardest to work towards a new beginning. Everyone would work together and no one refused to helping another.
• Environment: The environment was very clean, there was plenty of parking around the office building, and there was a fridge and microwave for lunches. In addition, there was a ping pong table, chess set, and poker set that you could use to de-stress or to help process information.

In conclusion, I really enjoyed my time at Redwood. Unfortunately, the second half and job assistance part I came for were lacking, and can use a lot of improvement. I definitely feel more confident in my ability to program and I have projects I can display, but I wish I could have the same confidence for tackling interviews and landing that post-graduation job.

I hope you have found my review helpful!

Redwood has proved to me that they are efficient as a school and as a business. The staff maintains a great balance exhibiting professional and personable manners. I was never treated in any condescending way, as I had been at a previous coding bootcamp. The course is streamlined to guarantee every student picks up the languages at the same pace, build applications accordingly as individuals and as a group. Assistance is available at any time, after class and even when you're at home. 

I greatly respect the efforts Redwood's staff has put in, to ensure the students are crafted into full stack developers, and would invite anyone curious - to spend a day here to get a feel for what a typical day is like. Watching the staff work with all different kinds of students who learn differently, have different personalities and behaviors that shape them into their own kind of developer, it's fascinating to see how fast they all can move and handle such a variety of people. Every student's frustration and challenges were always taken care of. The E in Redwood could go for exceptional or efficient, either works well. Redwood has a community that is evident with previous students and professional developers coming in as guests speakers, who are able to use the environment as a mini work space or to just hang out and visit.

A very good friend of mine in my cohort had actually become employed halfway, week 8, (this is not to say you will be employed early on), he accepted the employment and Harrison was personally helping him with in-depth learning in a particular language, guiding him with problems and making his transition out of our bootcamp smoothly into his new full-time salaried job! This bootcamp does not guarantee its' students a job, but job assistance is most certainly available and is put in place. For anyone who is worried about job placement, at any coding bootcamp you go to - it's always going to be up to you to do the hours of searching, applying, interviewing and putting yourself out there. Redwood does provide the environment, time and effort being put into us to ensure we are maximizing our productivity of job search. 

As a business too, they genuinely care about how they're doing, if they're meeting the students' expectations. We have one on one's that check in on how the student's are doing, how they're feeling so far and what kind of feedback they have if any - this happens every few weeks. I have never read any coding bootcamp reviews about the schools' staff and Founder, taking the time to check in on student's personally and making sure that both sides are happy. They promise a specific cirriculum, and they delivered accordingly. 

I would like to preface this review with a disclaimer that this review was not meant to attack the school itself, but instead provide an honest review on how I experienced the program. I hope that my readers will take these points into consideration instead of meeting this review with anger.  I also want to give "Overall Experience" 3.5 stars since I did enjoy parts of the cohort (but there aren't half stars!).

I'll start with the cons:

• Job assistance: going into this program, I really wish that the recruitment process would have been a lot more transparent in terms of job outlook. If it will take an average of three months to find a job, please make students aware of it. I was very unhappy to learn that months into the program, considering I was encouraged to leave my full time job for the full time cohort, with the push of "You'll make [the 13k tuition] back in two paychecks." With interest piling up, I don't quite think so. Job prep definitely should have been more hands on- resume help should be in person and not over Slack. I had to seek assistance from my classmates to turn my less than stellar resume into something that really showcased my professional experience. It is also worth noting that interview prep and "recruitment" only took place over two days during an optional week. Please prepare students with more information on the computer science side of interviews. Integrate more concepts into lessons. I can code, yes, but can I explain it? Not really.
• C# and .NET: For technologies so marketable in the area, I was hoping that this portion of the cohort would be more comprehensive and involved. Instead, I didn't feel that I got the most out of this portion. It felt disorganized and rushed. Trying to study C# outside of the program really emphasized how little I knew about the language. 
• Externship: Our capstone project. I have mixed feelings about this one. On one hand, it was a really neat experience getting to "work" in the industry, but was it really work? There was no code review for our work - after the presentation, we instructed to just zipped our code up and ship it to, what I will assume is, our client. Nothing else was mentioned or said about the project. There needed to be more transparency and more professionalism with this project. There is no paper trail of our having done work for our clients, yet we were instructed to list the externship as work experience. I want to know what our project became since my group and I worked extremely hard on it. Also, there was very little communication with our client. 

The pros:

• The instructors: The instructors were absolutely fantastic. Super supportive, and fun to be around. There was no such thing as a stupid question to them, and I really appreciated how open they were to helping students to make sure nobody falls behind.
• The culture: Speaking from the perspective of the only female in the cohort. Everyone here was very inclusive. Not once was my gender made salient. The school was awesome in that regard.
• As I've mentioned above, there were parts I really enjoyed about the program. The first half of the program was very informative, and I learned a lot during my time here. But the second half of the program really could've used some fine-tuning. First half had really good pacing; second half was rushed. 

So, you might be asking why this stuff is being addressed here. Well, I think when you've initially graduated, the thrill and enthusiasm from accomplishing something big really fills you with positive feelings, but as I started to recap as I am preparing to get out there, I began to realize parts that were really lacking. 

I loved the school, honestly. I hope that this review doesn't discourage you from applying,as there were good parts, but instead helps you to really think about it. It's a huge life decision, so having both sides of the coin is helpful, in my honest opinion.

The best advice I can give regarding making a decision about attending a bootcamp at all, or if this is the bootcamp for you: go to the website to get in touch with and meet Harrison, the lead instructor & founder to discuss what you are looking for, and to get a feel for his personality and experience.

Harrison is endlessly knowledgeable in a ton of technologies, computer science theory, programming concepts, and best-practices. His real-world experience really shows in our lessons, the curriculum, career prep, and his industry connections. 

The assistant instructor, Billy, graduated from a bootcamp himself (General Assembly, LA). His bootcamp experience is incredible for us students, since he knows exactly what we are going through and how to supplement lessons when the class is struggling with a particular topic.

It will not be easy, but nothing worth doing is. Harrison will have prep work for you that is very helpful and much needed in preparation of the 12 week slam. Be prepared to do up to 70 hour weeks. I perosnally had around 65 hour weeks throught the bootcamp. It's as Harrison said to us many times, the bootcamp is like waking up and drinking from a firehose full of knowledge. There were a few times near the end of the 12 weeks in which I was told we would be going over a langue or two but never did end up getting the lecture or a one-on-one lesson. 

I was a unique student in the cohort as my employeer had sponsored me to go to the camp. I had moved from several states away to attend a .NET camp. There are very few camps out there like this one and the market for .NET is ever growing. However Harrison made sure to make a point of whiteboarding and preparing us for the job interview and application process. 

I want to start this review by stating that bootcamp, as a whole, may not be for everyone. Every day that you are attending bootcamp, you are making a commitment to yourself to put your best foot forward and become a better asset in the job market. When you read coding bootcamp reviews, they are usually all positive. People talking about how they were successful and how they landed their dream job. It sounds like a miracle! Who wouldn't want to have the opportunity of job security and a high paying salary? However, the truth of the matter is, coding bootcamp will not provide that for everyone. It will provide that for the people who show up daily and do the grind. The hours are long and you need to have self-discipline. At Redwood, they do their best to create a stress free environment by having ping-pong tournaments and class parties after class on occasion. They don't do this to distract their students, they do this to help us all out. We spend the day staring at a computer screen, working our butts of to get things done. When I was attending the bootcamp, I had no life outside of it. My dreams started to contain code, I started telling coding jokes! It invaded every facet of my life. And I loved it. I wrote things down that I didn't understand and I researched them when I got home. During the project weeks, I went home and worked on the code til the wee hours of the morning. It was fun to learn and I loved every day of the bootcamp! 

With all that said, this bootcamp is not a free hand-out. You can't expect to pay the money and have Redwood get you a job if you aren't willing to work for that job. If you are willing to work for it, Redwood is there for you. I never missed a day, I showed up on time, I asked questions and I put my everything into the bootcamp. At every turn, Harrison, Karim, Taylor and Zach were there to support me. They were all so supportive in their own ways. Some days I would come in and be so stressed out from a late night and Karim would be there with a joke to cheer me up. Any time that I was freaking out that I wouldn't get a job, Harrison would be there to pick me up with positive reinforcement. Zach and Taylor were always in the classroom during our daily labs, helping all of us with our problems and finding those pesky little syntax errors. 

Another thing to take into consideration when choosing this bootcamp is that you are entering a bootcamp that is small in size, relatively new and owned and operated by the lead-instructor. It isn't some huge corporate bootcamp that has been around for ages. But that it what I loved most. When I finally decided to take the plunge and start a bootcamp, I started looking around in the Orange-County area. Redwood was the only bootcamp that sent me a personalized email. When I went into Redwood for the first time, the first person that I spoke to was Karim. He greeted me at the door with a huge smile and a warm welcome. I spoke with Harrison as well, but briefly since the cohort before me was currently in session. Like I said before, Harrison is doing a lot. I have so much respect for what he does. But it's important to remember that people can't be in multiple places at once. I think one of the main reasons for my success at the bootcamp is that I used the staff for the things they were there for. I never fully relied on one staff member for my success. There is a reason that the people that work there are there and if you do end up going here, use them! They are all so nice and they all really do care. They wouldn't be working with all of us and our craziness if they didn't. 

When it came time to find a job, Redwood had my back. Harrison brought out some people that he knows from the industry to prepare us for what people in the market are looking for. They never sugar-coated the fact that the job hunt would be a grind. It really was. In the beginning, I was filling out job applications for hours a day. About 15 a day. It was exhausting, and I wasn't getting a call from anyone except recruiters. Harrison told us, never turn down an opportunity. So I answered every email and every call. I signed up for every job site I could think of. I took phone interviews from every company, leaving my opinions out. Within about 2 months, I was accepting a job offer.

I wouldn't be here without Redwood, Harrison and the rest of the staff. I will always have gratitude for the opportunity they provided me. It is an opportunity that I would relive if I could. There was so much learning, growing and fun had at Redwood! Thank you.

**NOTE: I have updated this 5 months after graduation, original review below this**

So I am 5 months out of graduation. I have a job that pays roughly 50% more than before. 

Was Redwood worth it? YES! For me, it was the only way for me to learn. I struggled being able to sit at home and teach myself. 

Redwood does a good job at preparing you for the real world. You learn full-stack development, and have resources to help you out. The people you meet there are all amazing. 

Should you take a course just to make more money? No. If you want to excel at Redwood and in the future, you need to make sure becoming a developer is what you want to do. 

Post Graduation was a bit tough. Without prior dev work experience, it's not super easy to get a job even though there are tons of them. You need to work harder than you worked during the course to find a job. Network, apply to 100 jobs per wek, etc... It takes time. Without Redwood's training I would have never had the job I have today.

Some tips that I wish I followed:

• Code in your free time. The 3 projects you make should take up all your time. I spent 2-4 hours after class each night working on my project, and all my weekends. When not in a "project week" I suggest you either continue to learn on your own, learn something else, or start working on a side project. The more code you can have on your github, the easier it could be to get a job.
• Network, Network, Network. Start going to meetups during after classes. Majority of open positions are filled by someones acquaintance. 
• Don't get down if no one respond to your job app. I got a bit depressed after 2 months of searching. Harrison at Redwood helped me out of it, and once I gave it 100% I was hired 2 weeks after that. Job searching should become your full-time job post-graduation. Spend 6-8 hours a day doing it. Oh, and did I mention you should be networking and going to meetups?

Redwood has the tools to make you a great developer, but you need to put in an effort to use the resources they offer. Slacking off, not trying, etc...will get you no where. You're paying a decent chunk of cash to attend and have them teach you, get all you can out of it. Don't squander it and expect them to snap their thumbs and make you a developer if you don't try.

This course will kick your butt. Let your family/significant other know that once this starts you need to dedicate your time outside class to learning/projects. 

I'm extremely grateful for Harrison and Billy at Redwood. I would recommend the course to anyone who was interested in becoming a developer.

You can't go wrong with Redwood as long as you put in an effort - during the course and after graduating.

**ORIGINAL REVIEW**

Where to start? Over the last few years I've attempted to self-teach myself using Code Academy, Free Code Camp, The Odin Project and a couple of books. Most of them went the same way. Pickup the fundamentals, then at a certain point I hit a wall and don't know where to go. New concepts become to difficult to learn, and I can't figure out how to use what I learned in a real life situation.

I decided that enough was enough and enrolled at Redwood Code Academy. I was scared to apply to a first cohort, but after meeting Harrison I was sold. 

Harrison (the owner and lead-instructor) knows his stuff, and is also very personable. Another reason I chose Redwood was that they teach .NET and C#. Not many bootcamps do this. Do a job search, do it right now. Search for "web developer." There should be a ton of .NET jobs at large companies. When I searched, I saw a significant amount of more jobs for .NET than ruby (what other bootcamps teach) or Node.

I've learned more in 2 weeks than all my self-learning combined and am actually understanding how to use this in real-life situations.

Is it frustrating at times? You betcha. But I knew this going into it. I would hit walls like I did when self-learning. The difference here is that Harrison and the TA (Billy) are extremely knowledgeable and I wouldn't be able to get past these hurdles without them there to explain things to me in more detail.

The culture is also a plus. Coming from a startup, this feels like home. It's that "work hard, play hard" culture, and Harrison does a great job at fostering that culture. Pepsi's stocked in the fridge (sorry all you Coca-Cola fans :P ), ping pong table that gets used every break, etc...

I 100% believe that after the 12 weeks I'll be able to find a job as a developer, and believe this is the best thing that's happened to me. In fact, this weekend I worked on some classwork. The big difference is that this weekend I couldn't wait to do some work. Before this weekend, I would have to force myself to work on code on weekends and considered it work - now I'm enjoying it.

Hello World, I'm Brian. 

I went to this "coding bootcamp" from Mar-Jul 2017. 

Harrison Spain, Billy Pruden, and Taylor Thomas misled, and misinformed me about their experience and qualifications to teach code, and scammed and defrauded me out of $12,500.

A LOT of students paid thousands of dollars to this "coding bootcamp" in 2016 and 2017 got scammed and defrauded by Harrison Spain (Redwood founder) because he frankly lied in a very elegant manner.

Playing A LOT of ping-pong, eating cheap pizza and junk food, getting cheap apparel with the stupid poorly designed "Redwood" logo, having my candy bar stolen and eaten without my consent, and spending OVER $12k for nothing is NOT what I signed up for. This is what happened to me at this place. I'm NOT making this up!

He claims that jQuery and Angular.js were "modern" javascript libraries and frameworks (they are NOT!!) These are NOT ES6 (ECMAScript2015) javascript libraries/frameworks, in fact, they are pre-ES6 (legacies). The curriculum was completely overpriced elegantly package garbage!

Coding-along = copying code from the projector screen while the instructor talks and types in front of the room, while you type out the code on your own computer screen, is NOT the way to teach someone how to code!

Until this day he has NOT provided FACTUAL PROOF of his claims and statistics when it comes to student outcomes and curriculum success. 

The Redwood founder has NO Github account to validate his "coding skills" for the "supposedly" 15 years of experience he claims to possess.

He has hired "former students" as TA's and given them the titles of "experienced developers", which is a complete lie.

Harrison doesn't have the experience to teach code, this is why he had to hire an "experienced" developer to take over his school as of right now in 2019. If he did this from the start in 2016, then he would NOT have any kind of problems and I would NOT have to write about this at all.

The "job support" was microscopically non-existence and the path to a developer job was NOT clearly given (applying to all dev positions disregarding junior-senior positions is NOT good job advice and direction)

Harrison has bragged that he was interviewed over 500 developers throughout his years in the tech industry, but when I ask him what they would ask me in an interview, he couldn't even give me ONE question or advice. He says, "you never know what they will ask you." This type of nonsense useless advice is NOT worth OVER $12k!

This "coding bootcamp" was operating unregulated by the Department of Consumer Affairs Bureau for Private Postsecondary Education from Oct 2016-Jul 2018, therefore any sort of fine or legal punishment against Harrison Spain, his associates, and most important his school, is non-applicable = meaning "Us" students from 2016 to 2017 got RIPPED OFF! The only way to get justice from what Harrison did is to take legal action against him and his school, which would cost thousands and thousands of dollars to facilitate.

There are A LOT of online coding programs that are better and more affordable as of right now in 2019!

Avoid this coding bootcamp. Avoid this place. And don't go here!

HERES THE TRUTH ("You" refers to Harrison Spain/Redwood Code Academy):

• You were NOT accredited by the BPPE while I attended your school.
• You didn't teach modern javascript - jQuery (library 2006) and Angular.js (framework 2010) are not modern javascript (ECMAScript2015 aka ES6) libraries and frameworks. (I can prove this).
• NONE of your students in the part-time front end developer night classes have NEVER gotten a job as a front end developer because you were not teaching coding properly to supplement those skillsets.
• The MAJORITY of your students from 2016-2017 could not get a job as a developer, whether front end developer and especially full-stack developer because you weren't teaching enough to substantiate those skillsets.
• You, Harrison, have NEVER made a single phone call or initiated a slack conversation to find out whether or not I had secured a developer position after attending your overpriced, deceptive, fraud school.
• You NEVER looked over my LinkedIn.
• You NEVER helped me write my resume or cover letter (I had to take a resume writing course after Redwood).
• You NEVER looked over my GitHub account and didn't teach me how to use GitHub the way that professional developers use GitHub in the workplace and workforce.
• After attending Redwood and ending in July 2017, over six months later, you told me to apply to every developer position out there, even though I was NOT qualified for any of those jobs because you didn't teach the right stuff to qualify for those positions.
• I expressed and complained to you and Taylor, and you accuse me of threats because I spoke up to a White Man; you didn't want to help me at all and you didn't care at all.
• You hire your past students (Taylor Thomas) as TA's to cut cost in hiring an actually experienced developer.
• You hired another developer with 25 years of experience (more than you) because your "experience" was insufficient and inadequate.
• You created fictitious reviews for your school online (I have proof!!!).
• You exaggerated and lied about your experience and qualifications (you did NOT win multiple hackathons)
• You have NO GitHub account to validate and show your claims as an experienced developer (where are you web applications that you've built in your 15 years of experience?).
• You told me that my projects were good enough to get a job (they are not).
• You provide NO substantial and factual proof to validate any of your claims.
• You blame me for not being able to get a job because I got pissed off at you and spoke up to you.
• At face value, most importantly, you are a deceptive, and calculating liar!
• You and your lawyer, Raeesabbas Mohamed at RM WARNER LAW (8283 N. Hayden Rd.  Ste. 229 Scottsdale, AZ 85258) are pathetic and sick individuals that make-up non-sense and untruth claims in your demand letter against me and tried to entrap me and extort me.

THIS IS WHY I HAD TO REPORT YOU AND WHY YOU WERE INVESTIGATED BY THE DEPARTMENT OF CONSUMER AFFAIRS BUREAU FOR PRIVATE POSTSECONDARY EDUCATION (BPPE) IN DEC 2018.

READ THIS:

https://bit.ly/2VuIJ48

Redwood Code Academy has been the gateway to infinite possibilities for me in the field of software development. I had no prior experience in anything having to do with computers. The course is intense, but that is because it is meant for people like me. Harrison, the instructor and founder of the academy, does an excellent job of making sure his student get a full-scope view of how these full stack programs work and are related to each other. The environment he has built at Redwood is creatively stimulating and comfortable. You can really get things done and be productive there. It is safe to say that being a part of this cohort was one of the best decisions I ever made. Enrolling in the intensive at Redwood gives you the tools to succeed in any software development endeavor you set your mind to.

Redwood Code Academy is an amazing coding school. Before I enrolled in May 2018, I also was looking at the General Assembly in Santa Monica. I went to both school meetings and started considering the pros and cons of both schools. I finally ended up choosing Redwood even though it was much further away for me as live in Torrance. The reason why I choose Redwood is that they seemed to really care about their students and were genuinely looking to help them learn how to code. I am glad I choose Redwood and here is why. I came from a real estate and sales background so I had no technical knowledge at all. The first three days at Redwood told me I definitely needed more help with understanding the concepts. So I went to the advisor's office his name is Karim and I told him I was struggling and I needed help. Karim right the way went to talk to the owner of the school named Harrison who then scheduled extra tutoring for me and other students an hour before class and another hour after class. With me getting more help I started learning more. Then again a month later I realized I was still having a hard time with JavaScript functions so I went back to Karim who talked to Harrison again and this is when I understood that this school really wanted me to succeed and was not just about taking my money. What Harrison did is he created an additional two and half hour during the first portion of the morning class to give students like me more tutoring. Patrick and Taylor who were both our instructors in class and our tutors took turns every morning to give us more practice exercises with JavaScript functions and concepts to help us understand it better. I am so happy now because of this caring nature of the staffs at Redwood I was able to learn to code and I can safely say that I am a full-Stack web developer. I am looking forward to graduating in August and starting to apply for jobs. I know that I have been thought well at Redwood and they prepared me for the job I will be doing. I had several conversations with senior web developers outside of the school and when I share with them the technologies we are learning a lot of them would tell me "I don't even know how to do that" and this made me feel good about the skills I learned here at Redwood. If you are looking to enrolment to a coding program I highly recommend Redwood Code Academy. I am grateful to Redwood for teaching me so much and not giving up on me. Mamma Fnu

I looked long and hard for a web development bootcamp in Southern California and I am so glad that I chose Redwood Code Academy's Full Stack Immersion Program. 

My favorite part about Redwood is the teachers. Harrison, Taylor and Patrick are extremely knowledgeable about complex topics in web development, yet completely understanding and encouraging to students who are learning them for the first time. They provide a ton of support for students who struggle with the material without holding their hands, ensuring that everyone grasps it on their own terms. It is abundantly clear that the instructors truly care about the success of each student, and will go out of their way to help them when they need it. 

Each day starts with a brief warm up period, which gives students the opportunity to practice writing and studying Javascript functions before the daily lecture where a major web development topic is taught and explained. After lecture, the rest of the day is dedicated to a lab where students take previously learned topics and actually code something. The daily labs given during this bootcamp are challenging, yet realistic, requiring students to leave their comfort zones and to apply everything that they were taught to complete them. 

If you are looking for a constructive and engaging environment to jumpstart your web development career, then Redwood Code Academy is for you. I would highly recommend for anyone who is serious about becoming a full stack developer

If you're considering joining a bootcamp, I highly recommend Redwood Code Academy.

The amount of information and knowledge presented throughout the course is amazing. Post graduation and I'm still learning from it all. Sure, It was tough at times, but that's because I learned more in the three months attending than my previous two years of self teaching. And not only do you learn full stack development, but you also learn the stages of developemnt and the strategies used to ensure success. You'll learn how to assess a given project, choose a combination of technologies to build with, and move forward with the knowledge of how they connect to make the whole. There is a good amount of white boarding and both of the Instructors have the knowledge, patience, and tools to help you succeed in this journey.