Software Guild

I attended because i wanted to get into advanced C# / ASP.net. I had a lot of coding experience as i had been a hobbyist developer on my own for over 10 years and mainly had good skills with basic website design.  We started out doing console applications which was annoying. It would be nice to at least start on a visual studio designer. They made us do console apps for the badges i was in which is horrible and outdated. I had completed the code at the last minute and had an issue with file access due to a bug in Visual Studio. The console apps open up flat text files which was ridiculous and should have taught us database at this point. I ended up losing out on my tuition. When i got to retake the course they gave me a new assignment structure to pass it since i was a former student in the same badge. Totally unfair. Usually you retake something and get the same content!! and for over $2000 its not fair. They gave me this game to program which i'm sorry but was impossible and i'm not going there for game programming. So i didn't make the next badge so instead i transferred over to Java so i wouldn't lose out on my money. It was good until they switched LMS and merged with Wiley. It used to be Canvas which was bad enough but looks like they moved to some old school open source platform. So now i am out over $6,000 and have no skills at all. And good luck finding an ASP.net bootcamp on flex schedule. I am from NY and all jobs are looking for ASP.net here and there is NO TRAINING for it.

It was a great and intensive program. All study materials were very well organized. They gave us only what we needed to enter a career in Software Engineering. All instructors are very helpful in all aspects of education. I was receiving a lot of support and help whenever I needed it. My instructor gave me the best advice that helped me to get through an intensive Bootcamp in a timely manner. It is "to understand the material and then to move forward with the study material". Obviously, I had to study hard to grasp the material. Even after graduating from the program, Software Guild still was supporting me in finding a job. During my adventure with Software Guild, I felt true happiness twice. The first time was when I graduated from Software Guild as a Full Stack Developer. I felt a great accomplishment! The second time was today when I received a job offer. I am very thankful to all staff at Sofware Guild for all their hard work and the most up-to-date resources that they make available for the students.

Worth every penny! I was definitely skepticle at first but I got started with an open mind and gave it my all to get through the boot camp. Commiting 100% of my time to studying and working on projects was stressful. I totaled 80 hours a week counting in class time, homework and weekend projects. The first half of the cohert was the most stressful as I had so much uncertainity I be able to meet the deadlines of weekend projects. With some help and determination I managed to get through it. The instructor was pretty was pretty awesome and hit all the marks to educate beginners. It took awhile for it to click in my brain but with some help from other programmers that would say the same things to validate his teachings I was able to understand the foundation of learning to code. After that I moved into the 2nd half of the cohort and worked with fullstack development and towards the end worked on employment information and practice to land a job after we graduate. Overall a great experience and very greatful to be given the oppurtunity The Software Guild gave me.

The Java program was fast-paced and contained a lot of important concepts. It taught Basic, Intermediate, and Advanced Java. It incorporated using databases (mySQL) in Java using JDBC template. The curriculum also included teaching about object-oriented programming concepts, MVC architecture, and dependency injection with Spring. The assignments were meaningful, sometimes repetitive to reinforce concepts. The code-alongs were very helpful too.

I am online java Apprentice as of the time I am doing this review.  I am on Badge 3 of Badge 4 as of the time i am conducting the review. Since I started the school with software Guild i always considered my self lucky to have known Software Guild.  I was thanked the friend who told me about the school.  When I came to software Guild i have taken java and some other programming related classes, However i didn't get chance to apply the knowledge i got from school and from studying by my own.  The greatest thing that I got from Software Guild is applying the programming knowledge that I got from the lessons.  The other thing is befor  i come to software Guild i tried to understand many concepts of programming from reading books and articles and watching YouTube but i couldn' t really understand. But when I read a software Guild materials i was able to understand everything.  Now that I am in Badge 3 i am feeling like I'm way more experienced than when I started.  I learned that programming is not only coding.  Even though coding one important thing there are also rules and best practices to become a good programmer.  Software Guild teaches everything that takes to make someone a good programmer.  It can be challenging for someone with zero coding skill but honestly feel programming is the easiest it can at software Guild.  A person with zero coding skill can still make it by giving some extra time to read the material and practice as well as to get help from instructors and openofficehour on slack. I strongly recommend software Guild for anyone who has passion for becoming a software developer. 

I started working in factories straight out of college and found out about the Software Guild in Minneapolis, MN. After about a year of dreading work I decided to take a risk and try out the Software Guild. I do not regret it one bit.
The instructor I had was great, and he helped me understand things I had trouble with. I had about a years worth of coding experience from college courses I took, but those courses taught me nowhere near as much or as effectively as the Guild did.
If I could start over I would have gone straight to the Software Guild instead of college, because it would have saved my tens of thousands of dollars and 4 years of my time.
If you can commit your time to completing the reading assignments, take notes, ask question about ANYTHING you don't understand, and actually practicing/ finishing projects, you can succeed and find a job afterwards.
The Guild does not hand you a job, they give the tools and resources to be able to find a job. They help make you look like a really strong candidate for junior developer positions.
The Guild in Minneapolis even gave us a chance to have speed interviews in the last 2 weeks of the course and I was one of the lucky few to get hired from that process. If you do not get hired during the speed interviews, do not worry, the guild sends out different opportunities that you can choose to apply to.

If you are questioning whether or not the Software Guild is worth it. I would tell you that It 100% is, and that you can become a developer if you put in the time and effort.

Personal Background

I've been messing around with programming ever since I was the age of 14 (I'm 21 now as of writing this review), and I knew that being a software developer was always what I wanted to pursue, so it didn't come as a surprise when my trajectory shifted from completing a college degree to joining a code bootcamp after 3 years of taking classes that didn't benefit my degree, and pretty much setting myself up to be in college for way longer than I hoped for. I really wanted to just jump into my career as soon as I could considering the previous experience that I had. After some research, I had selected my top three picks for bootcamps that I was interested in. 

The Software Guild really stood out to me because of the employment statistics, along with offering a .NET/C# course which I was also pursuing. After looking into the school, I learned more of the fantastic job prep skills that the guild offered, and at that point I decided to apply.

The Experience

Upon being accepted to the guild as an apprentice, I was given the pre-cohort coursework that is mandatory to be completed before starting, which is an introductory, online web development course that focuses in teaching you the basics of HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. This is so that all apprentices are on the same basic level of web development knowledge before starting that section of the actual course, which is very beneficial to your success at the guild (especially if you really dive into it!). It took me a little while to get the pre-work done, but it was very worth the time. 

At the start of the cohort, it is all fundamentals. If you are new to programming, or just object oriented programming in general, getting through the first half of the course WILL be fairly difficult. There's a lot of material to cover, and you have to make sure that you're pushing yourself to complete your projects on time, and to get all the help you can get from your instructor (that's what you're paying for, after all) in each course milestone. Even with my previous experience with programming, there were still so many new fundamental skills that I picked up, and the workload of the course certainly challenged me.

The next section of the course is where you'll be putting all that basic web development knowledge, along with your newly gained .NET/C# knowledge to use. In my opinion, this is the most difficult section of the entire cohort, since there is so much information that is being taken in, and each week moves by so quickly that it's easy to fall behind. However if you are to fall behind at all in the course, you can quickly get caught up if you are proactive and get all the help you need to get up to speed with the material you might be struggling in. I don't think that there was a single day that I was in class and didn't ask at least a handful of questions to my instructor on what I was working on or anything at all that I was curious about. 

There will be many presentations, guest panels, mock interviews, and other very beneficial tools available to you as an apprentice to get you ready for starting your job search that I STRONGLY would recommend not to pass up. Take all the notes and soak up all the information you can during all these sessions.

Concluding Thoughts

Like the title says, joining The Software Guild was one of the best decisions that I could have made for my career. I was provided with skills that I wouldn't be able to obtain on my own time, and it has opened up so many opportunities for me, as well as given me tools that are applicable to not only my software development career, but many other sections of my life too.

The #1 advice I'd give to somebody looking to join The Software Guild, or any code bootcamp in general goes as follows:

1. Be ready to work. You'll be very busy with projects and staying on top of course material throughout the cohort.

2. Don't miss up on all the opportunities & additional help that you're offered from the staff & instructors! You want to take in as much information as you can that can benefit you & your career.

3. Just have fun. Find ways to make the course enjoyable for you.

Background: I attended UofL Computer Engineering program for a year before dropping out in favor of this bootcamp. In 3 months I learned more than I probably would have staying all 4 years at university writing tic-tac-toe applications.

Coursework: Having some (although very basic) knowledge of Java helped me with the first week or so of the coursework. Regardless, the projects you will work on are challenging for a beginner; do not be scared off by this, it is good to struggle a bit when learning to code. The instructors will guide you through the purpose of fundamental techniques so that you can gain a solid foundation of learning how to go about solving problems through code. This is type of critical thinking is key to having a successful career after graduation and definitely seems to be the focus of the program, rather than just writing code for repitition sake.

Post Graduation: I have been working as a developer full time for nearly two years now and continue to use techniques that I learned while studying at the Software Guild. This program has been incredibly useful propelling my career and the community is great even after graduating -- I still talk with friends I made in the program regularly and sometimes go back for Wednesday night board games.

I can only consider my experience at the Software Guild as the best career decision I have ever made. Because of the skills I learned at the Guild I have been able to excel in an incredibly challenging, lucrative, and fulfilling career. You are thrown into a very expansive and comprehensive curriculum with only a certain amount of knowledge and encouraged to struggle and learn from the difficulty. This was key for my success in the Guild and now in my career. The single best skill I learned was how to effectively research issues, problems, code, etc and how to find the answer I needed. I will say at some point I do wish I was given a bit more direction at the beginning of the bootcamp when I knew practically nothing and slowly given less and less as I learned on my own but nevertheless I was successful. 

I had some previous coding experience through school but didn't want to pursue a bachelors so I decided to try the Software Guild out. I had a newer instructor so the first few days were a little rough around the edges but by the end of the program everyone was prepared for an entry level position and had the skills to continually learn new things. The course is really hard if you don't commit to it and use your time efficiently, several people switched to online because they couldn't keep up. 

They really do help you with finding a job, resume reviews, networking, interviews, etc. Basically the entire part after completion of the program. I found a job after about a month and the job market was slowing down when I was applying because of the holidays. (Nov - December)

I highly recommend checking the guild out if you are interested in a tech career. Also, you should probably research your job market when deciding which language to learn but it's not a big deal because they give you access to the other course at the end of the program. I learned Java but my job uses .NET/C#

I decided on doing the Software Guild after almost a year of casually teaching myself to code. Spending 3 months dedicated to learning a new trade with a cohort of motivated colleagues was the best career decision I've ever made. The work was hard, but I put my time in and came out with 3 job offers the week before the program ended. I never imagined that after only three months, I would be in a position to pick the job of my choosing. 

I was able to double my salary and enter a new career as a software engineer in 3 months, all thanks to the instructors, employment team, and my classmates at the Software Guild. I would do it again in a heartbeat.

I contacted the Software Guild on a whim. My enrollment councilor was great, his name was Steven and he answered all my questions completely and truthfully. Thanks to him I knew exactly was to expect. If you are even slightly considering a programming bootcamp I would highly recommend reaching out to the Software Guild.

 

Once I enrolled everything went so fast. Course work is hard and plentiful, it has to be for a twelve week session. Despite this, everyone working there is personally rooting for you to do your best. With knowledgeable instructors who love teaching, it's hard not to succeed. They help guide you just enough, while still pushing you to figure out answers on your own. Shout out to Alan and Austyn! They are both fantastic.

 

Toward the middle of the course, you start meeting regularly with the Employer Network Manager. At the Louisville school, this is Jacob. Jacob is well connected in the tech scene and will do everything he can to help you find a job you are excited about. He may also go rock climb with you, if you play your cards right. Overall I am so happy to have completed this course. Before I signed up, I was not doing work that I cared about. Now I am a full stack developer for a small start up in my favorite town. I don't know where I would be without the Software Guild. I can honestly say that my life is much more fulfilling exclusively thanks to this program and the people that make it possible.

It has been almost three years since I started my program at the Software Guild, and I figured I'd leave a review.  The boot camp industry is so crowded these days that it's important to tell the good programs from the bad, and the Software Guild is one of the best.  I constantly have friends asking me for advice on bootcamps, and good user reviews are where I point them first.

Unfortunately, the basic .NET and Java course are no longer available in Akron, but as long as the other locations uphold the same or similar standards, it's truly one of the best programs around.  12 weeks of instruction from staff who were true experts.  Every instructor had at least a decade or two of experience as regional experts.  One was a Microsoft MVP.  All of them invested themselves in student success.

The staff and instructors were totally dedicated to seeing every student graduate on time and employed (if that's what the student was seeking).  Personally, I accepted a job offer by the end of the eleventh week of the program.  The Guild brought in probably a dozen different employers to interview us on-site in week ten, which led to that offer.  The program focuses on preparing for the professional world and practical skills for the field, which gives it a big edge over other camps that might focus on surface level skills with buzzworthy technologies.

There were some students who did struggle with certain parts of the course, but they all graduated and found jobs because they let instructors know what was giving them trouble and they sought extra help early and often.  The Guild cares too much about its reputation to just churn out students and let them fall by the wayside.  Even now, more than 2.5 years into my career, if I needed the help, I could hop back in the slack and ask for interview & resume help, or ask someone if they have any connections at a company where I'd like to apply.  Every aspect of the program was top-notch, and I've found myself better prepared for my career than most of my peers with equivalent years of experience.  I'm now on my third job, having just moved across the country, and I'm loving it.

This next bit depends on the people in your cohort, but for me, I made friends during my time there that I keep in touch with to this day.  We would all hang out, support each other, and push each other through a light sense of competition.  The benefits of doing an in-person program, if you can afford taking the time off for it, cannot be understated.  It was one of the best decision I've ever made, and my only frustration is that I didn't do it earlier.

My biggest piece of advice, which you could figure out if you read between the lines of my review: you get out what you put in.  If you really throw yourself into the program and dedicate yourself to it, you will succeed.  When you have trouble, schedule extra time with an instructor or TA.  Hell, even if you're caught up, schedule extra time to learn something extra or solidify your basics.  Make friends.  Experiment with side projects and ask peers & instructors for feedback.  You will be in such a strong position when the time comes to enter the professional world.  Just make sure that you are ready to commit to the program and that you want to pursue this career track before you dive into it, or you might be disappointed.

I chose to roll the dice on a boot camp program after deciding on a career change, and I am really glad that I picked The Software Guild. I had next to no experience going in, and while the first few weeks were very rocky and full of conceptual leaps that I was half-convinced I would never be able to make, I eventually hit a certain stride and felt like this was really something I could do.

The support from the instructors was stellar and forthcoming, and I thoroughly enjoyed my time with the others in my cohort. While the experience was harrowing and emotional, I look back on it fondly because it was a lot of fun too.

The curriculum was comprehensive, modern and tailored to developing the skills in demand in the Twin Cities. I do wish that we had spent some time on learning at least one popular JavaScript framework at a more in-depth level, but that's the only shortcoming of the course that I could perceive.

My job hunt after graduation took longer than I expected it to (~3 months), and longer than it did for most of my classmates. Coming from a background of mostly manual labor and low-level administrative work, I began to worry that it wasn't going to happen for me, but TSG's job placement support helped immensely with my search during that time. Ultimately I was hired by a member of their employer network in a role that I thoroughly enjoy.

I'm very satisfied with my experience at The Software Guild.

A few pieces of advice for prospective students:

• Have a sense of whether or not you enjoy this type of work before committing to the program. If you know that you plain hate it before you even start, spending all day learning it isn't going to make you like it any better.
• This is a boot camp program. Unless you are doing the online program, be prepared to commit nearly all of your time to the program if you want to make it.
• DO NOT skimp on sleep. It is absolutely vital to the accelerated learning process. All-nighters will ruin you.
• Trust the program and your instructors. Much of the time you are likely to feel that you aren't grasping the material quickly enough or well enough, and that is normal. Power through and have faith.
• Expect to put in a lot of leg work in your job search. Demand for developers may be high, but you will still have to put in the effort of getting noticed.

Hope this helps any prospective students.

I just graduated from The Software Guild and am very happy with the program and the results - I ended up getting a great job offer on graduation day!

Quick note on myself - I have a CS degree and took an 8 year break to work in a totally different industry, I used the Guild as a way to get back up to speed with employable skills very quickly. My degree did give me a distinct advantage in job applications, but the other students in my cohort I keep up with are also interviewing with multiple companies this week.

Instructors

My instructor was great and the perfect fit for the 'flipped classroom' model. He was extremely patient with students' questions and had a great handle of the material. I appreciated that he could give us insight on what the workplace and interview process actually looks like and that he was regularly available on the weekends to help with questions on our projects.

My one issue was that he's a very gentle touch and I think our class could have used a little more structure. We regularly abandoned the flipped classroom to do more traditional lectures and tutorials and I think it was in part because only about a quarter of the class did the 'how to succeed' prework - the rest didn't really follow the model.

Curriculum

The curriculum focuses on core programming and Java skills in the first half and databases / web development in the Spring framework for the second half. The online materials are solid, with both text and videos (transcripts available) as well as detailed code-alongs to get some hand-on practice. There are regular sets of excercises accompanying the material that, while optional, do a good job of giving you practice on the topic.

Two small issues with the curriculum. First, the earlier material has been rewritten a couple times since the videos were recorded which means sometimes the videos are the only place where the material exists. This is fine but there are frequently HOURS of video that's mostly repetition from the written portion, digging through for those nuggets of new material was a pain. Second, while we leaned the practical skills needed, I wish we had spent a little more time on the underlying details of the tools we were using - I can describe what Spring does but I wish I knew how more about how it did it.

The course is very fast-paced with nightly reading and projects every weekend. There is a hard deadline after the first half of the class and we ended up losing 4 of the 12 students. The people in the class who had never written a line of code before struggled but some of them did make it through.

Job Assistance

The job assistance program is fantastic! We got a lot of great advice over several sessions on how to interact with recruiters, interview, find jobs and more. The course culminated in two days of 20-minute speed interviews with local recruiters and employers. While they emphasize there's no guarantees, I ended up getting a couple solid leads leading to a job from them. Job assistance continues after graduation, graduates get regular check-ins and emails with leads until they find a job.

tl;dr

This is a great program to learn Java web development quickly and move straight into finding a job. It is demanding, several people did not graduate. Great instructors, good but slightly disorganized curriculum, and a great job assistance program. Recommend!

If you want to see even more words about the Guild, I blogged my experience here: http://www.stu.systems

I came to The Software Guild to change careers from being a therapist, and I did not really know what to expect other than that it would be intense and I would learn Java in twelve weeks. In that twelve weeks, I learned more than I could have possibly imagined, and I was extremely impressed with everyone. From my instructor David who was an incredible teacher who spent so much time making sure every person understood the material, to Josh who handled the day-to-day operations and made everything run smoothly from a logistical standpoint, to Kipp who did an amazing job getting us all prepared to find our first career in software development.

I ended up accepting an offer on graduation day to work with an amazing company Kipp had invited for the speed interviews, but even if I had not received an offer, Kipp continues working with graduates to help find a job in the field. I truly cannot express how grateful I am for this program, and if you are interested in learning software development (and are willing to work hard for twelve weeks), sign up for The Software Guild. You will not regret it!!

I didn't know what to expect when I walked in for the first day of boot camp. I didn't think I would be able to learn something that could get me a job in such a short period of time. The instructors made it great and were there to answer any question I had. This bootcamp changed my life! I was in a dead-end job that I had been working for over ten years and I never thought I would get out of it. I would recommend this bootcamp to anyone who wants to change their career and find a new passion a long the way. With the help of the instructors and our employee network manager, I got a job offer before the bootcamp was even over! I am glad I made the decision, it changed my life.

The staff and teachers were excellent. 

I would recommend this experience to anyone who is willing to make learning their only focus for the duration of the cohort. 60-70 hr weeks is not an exaggeration. 

At times you may feel lost since it moves quickly, but eventually, it all melds together. 

With amazing support, I was able to find a job around two weeks after graduation. Some of my fellows were hired before graduation, as they began their search near the end.

Their motto is "Guild for life", meaning I can continue to count on them and other graduates for support in the future.

This program won’t teach you everything there is (that’s impossible in 3 months) but gives you a solid foundation that employers find valueable.  Instructors were knowledgeable in their field and always helpful. Employer Network Manager was very proactive in preparing everyone for applying, networking and interviewing. Everyone who graduated in my cohort and was looking for a job is currently working in the field last time I checked. Bottom line is that you can learn by taking online courses at Udemy but if you’re serious about a career change, then having solid, reputable networking and support from The Software Guild can really help you land a job as a developer. Just be warned if you make the commitment, be ready to work. This is fast paced and many felt like they were behind until they made it to the end. I’ve attended private and community colleges and always regretted it because the return on investment was lacking. I have no regrets about this one! One of the best decisions I’ve made so far.

In December of 2016, I applied for the first group of online students with the Software Guild. I went in with little to no programming experience, but a desire to learn more. 

I am so glad I did! I went in with not much confidence in my abilities, not just in programming, but in my ability to use my skills in the workplace. The Software Guild gave me a lot of confidence. I have learned the industry standard, and also have been guided in avoiding the common pitfalls junior developers fall into. 

Pros:

• The curriculum is organized really well. We started with very basic front end development in HTML/CSS and a small amount of JavaScript. Then we dove into the C# language, finishing up the end of the course by bringing the front end and back end together into one large mastery project. 
• The community is healthy and strong. Utilizing the "Open Hours" where they had two TAs available for a significant portion of the day to help with any questions, often there were alumni present in Slack and other mentors who could give feedback, or lend a helping hand. 
• Not only do they teach you to code, they teach you to code well. I was amazed at how well they were able to achieve this level of learning in a boot camp style of teaching. 
• Online course lets you have a more "flexible" boot camp experience. 

Cons: 

• With the boot camp being online, that brings the most "Cons". Communication is difficult when you are not there with your mentor, or in a class room setting.
• You work alone with the online program. I understand why they had to do this, but it takes away the experience that I think is important, learning to work well with a team. 

Overall: 

My experience was overwhelmingly positive. Although it was a very difficult course (also my daughter was born at the end of my course.) the guild bent over backwards to ensure I was equipped to succeed, all while not holding my hand. 

Shout out to Sarah & Randall for being AWESOME mentors! 

I came to a point in my career where I was bored and I wanted to not just explore my interest in software development, but to turn it into a career. After 3 years in the workforce, I had absolutely no desire to go back to a traditional university to pursue further education. I felt without any official technical training I was unable to even get my foot in the door in a more technical role. When I learned about The Software Guild, it immediately felt like a perfect fit. The overall value of in-person training, the 12-week time commitment, the quality of the instructors, and the skills covered in the boot camp were the biggest factors for me to choose The Guild. 

Don't take me wrong, the course was INTENSIVE, and that’s the point. You have to be "all in" to really get the most value out of the program. It was difficult and frustrating at times to learn and understand skills that were, for the most part, very foreign to me. The instructors were incredibly patient, and were able to offer their industry experience to provide us with realistic expectations about required skills in the market. The pair coding we did throughout the course was also incredibly valuable.

In the end, it was absolutely worth it. The Software Guild gave me the skills I needed to not only get recognition, but also succeed and thrive in a technical role I otherwise would not have been able to secure. I would highly recommend The Guild to anyone who wants to pursue a more technical career path, even if it is not necessarily a software development role as the skills I have learned are applicable in numerous areas

I was beyond excited to hear about the Software Guild on NPR, especially when I realized a couple of my old friends had gone  through the 12-week program with successful outcomes. I had wanted to get into software development for some time, and I was considering going back to school for a BS in Computer Science, but I saw that the career outcomes were comparable with high job placement of junior developers from the program (and in a significantly shorter amount of time!).

After reading many of the reviews on Course Report and speaking with some Guild instructors, I decided to drop everything at my marketing/project management role and prepare for what would be the most intensely satisfying 12 weeks of my career.

The Guild is no joke. They teach you exactly what you need to be an effective developer. In the software field, this often means being able to independently find solutions to complex and sometimes abstract problems. The 'flipped classroom' style of learning forces you to learn the material on your own time, after hours, so that you can apply your new-found knowledge to realistic business applications the next day at the Guild. Since it is more or less up to you to manage your time, it feels very similar to working in the actual software industry -- strict deadlines, adding maximum value to projects, and finding time to push the project to the next level beyond the minimum assignment criteria with new features and enhancements (a must!).

Pat Toner, the Lead Java Instructor at the Akron Software Guild, was (and continues to be, post-grad), the single most helpful mentor throughout my academic and professional career. For me, this did not mean sugar coating critiques or lowering the bar on assignment criteria (which has often been my experience in academia). Pat responds thoughtfully to well-developed, focused questions, and he will always go out of his way to offer the most honest, helpful advice and direction. Pat is a very friendly and funny instructor who has a talent for making his lessons very memorable. He is a great listener, and even after my time at the Guild, I still go to him for advice on all kinds of software industry-related questions (he still provides the same level of thoughtfulness and insight even with his new cohort in session).

Code is never handed to you at the Guild; You have every resource you need to excel on every single project. These resources come in the form of staff members who are dedicated to the success of each and every Apprentice (very small class sizes by the way, so you get plenty of help if you are willing to seek it out), a brilliantly developed online curriculum that builds very nicely on the previous lessons (you will be surprised how soon you create working, enterprise-level web applications), a suite of software tools and frameworks that are relevant and very useful even long after completing the Guild, and perhaps most important post-grad, the network of smart, talented, genuinely passionate, and supportive Software Guild alumni network with whom you will likely stay in touch for years to come.

Matt LoPiccolo, the Employer Network Manager in Akron, works tirelessly to help ensure each Apprentice is well-equipped to land jobs of personal interest. With Matt's help, I and most of the cohort landed really good jobs either during the program or soon after graduation. No matter how busy he is helping other Apprentices, he will ALWAYS find time to have genuine, meaningful conversations that will leave you with information on how to become a much more competitive, desirable candidate.

My advice to people considering the Software Guild for to facilitate in a career change to development is to spend a good amount of time coding beforehand to make it is something you want to do as a career. For most people this was the case, and those people also ended up doing very well during the program and continue to enjoy their new software developer jobs.

I will always look back fondly at my time at the Software Guild. I wish it existed before I started my undergraduate studies!

 

I attended the May 2016 .NET cohort at the Louisville, KY location.  The course was well paced and fun.  My instructor wasn't just knowledgeable, he was fun and was always approachable.  On multiple occaisions we had speakers or a Q&A panel from local companies.  There was an interview event with quite a few employers.  After the course, it took about two weeks, three interviews before I decided to accept a job.  I am still at that job a year later.

Learning to code and make web applications is not a one step process. Many many things are involved in this process. So while learning this on your own is definitely possible, it is quite a daunting task.  I took many courses online and learned how to do some simple code and make simple websites, but I never understood how the whole thing came together or how to make a web application with a backend and database.

This bootcamp brought it all together for me and made me understand the nitty-gritty to the whole big picture and helped get me into a place where I could get a software engineering job at a company that is not only in the Fortune 500 but also in the Fortune 100.

It was great to spend three plus months focused on learning without distractions and with a group of like-minded people. It is definitely a huge upfront investment in time and money, but if you make it through the pre-work without much trouble and are very interested in this field, just keep continuing on the path and eventually I believe you’ll come out happy like I did.

But this bootcamp is not magic. You must like coding and computers. You must be motivated to learn and code. If you are getting into this career for the money, you will probably drop out of this program quite quickly like several in our cohort did.

I was a part of the Java cohort in Minneapolis in 2016. Michael was our teacher, and he honestly was not the best, but us students still made it through. Now, I hear the teacher is Corbin. He is amazing. You won’t be disappointed.

Overall, this bootcamp changed my life and I am so happy I took the chance.

I'm a somewhat atypical boot camp case: I have worked in (manual) software testing for three years at an information security company in Chicago. I took a leave of absence from my job to attend the Software Guild in hopes of moving from testing to development within the same company. Management was cautiously supportive, and since graduating from the Guild and returning to work, I've been hired on permanently as a software engineer, with the salary to match.

I chose the Guild primarily because it was the most highly rated full-stack boot camp that teaches Java, staffed by instructors who each have over a decade of experience in software development. As someone with a previous background in instructional design, I was also encouraged to learn that instructional designers are on staff as part of the parent company, which I took as a good sign toward the quality or at least organization of the curriculum.

Having said that, the Java curriculum at the Guild deeply impressed me with its thoroughness and organization. Skills build on each other in a logical progression with a level of detail that ensures you understand the tools and technologies you are using on a more fundamental level than merely how to use them. My cohort had a "flipped classroom" style of instruction where we spent evenings watching videos and doing step-by-step code-along exercises that built an example application with you and explained all the components in detail. During the day, the instructor, Pat, led class discussion on concepts and broke the room into smaller groups to work on projects implementing what we had learned. Pat's classroom is a lot of hands-on learning - whatever you're thinking of trying, he'll say, just try it and see what happens - but he is able to answer questions, help solve problems, and provide insight into your design dilemmas, with just the right information-to-snark ratio. He's both knowledgeable and hilarious, which kept us smiling even when the work was tough and demanded long, frustrating hours.

Even I have been surprised at how exactly the Guild program matches what you see in the workplace. You will have stand-up every day, code review every week, and pair programming/collaborative design on every project. You use the same project management software at the Guild (i.e. Atlassian tool suite) that enterprises use. My colleagues have been surprised that I came back already familiar with not just Java and object-oriented design concepts, but also Spring, Maven, SQL, Git, and n-tier web application design - all critical knowledge that is not necessarily typical of junior developers. Most importantly, because you understand what the tools do and why they exist, you gain the ability to communicate clearly with experienced developers: to ask intelligent questions and to understand the answers, using the same common vocabulary.

The team environment at the Guild was what really made the experience for me, and why I endorse the full-time, in-person program for others considering a boot camp. I lived at the Lofts, the nearby apartments that serve as on-campus housing, only a five minute walk from the school, in a very nice suite alongside many of my classmates working on the same projects. We spent many evenings reviewing lessons together, discussing our designs, and even doing peer code reviews prior to the official ones in class. I only had to go next door to get a fresh perspective on something I didn't understand or see a way of doing something that I had not thought of before. Toward the end of the class, many hours were spent rehearsing interview questions with one another and reviewing each other's resumes over beers. That kind of cameraderie is invaluable for learning and for morale, and something you just can't get from an online class. I have never met a group of smarter, more driven people for whom I've had so much respect.

If I decided tomorrow that software wasn't for me, I would still consider my time at the Software Guild to have been a great investment. It was like four years of college (but much cheaper!) smashed into the space of three months: I was the most challenged I have ever been, learned a great deal that will serve me well wherever I go, made friends and connections that will last, and had a ton of fun. To be honest, it was difficult to leave and go back to my normal life. If you're thinking of doing this boot camp thing, and you're not afraid of a challenge, just do it. It's more than worth the time and money.

Graduated May 2017. Working with a great, small company and all after I moved to minneapolis with nothing but a duffel bag and a whim.

The biggest strength about the Sofwtare Guild over most bootcamps is, in my opinion, the help you get finding a job after the fact. They (and by 'they' I mean the employement manager Kipp) stick with you until you get that job. Not to toot my own horn too much but I am a smart, friendly guy who had a pretty good time with this bootcamp. But that doesn't do you any favors if you don't have any work experience. The Software Guild is built around the idea of getting you ready to work as opposed to just passing the class.

Honestly, I can just whittle this whole review down to one thing:

I moved halfway across the country for this bootcamp. I don't regret it.

The Software guild was a challenging and rewarding experience.  The overall experiecne was great. I took the Java track in Akron and lived in the Lofs.  Living at the Lofts was super conveniet as the buiilding is nice and it's a quick walk to school. The Software Guild is selective about who they let in, so if you make it through their screening process you will be surroundded by smat, like minded individuals. The Guild is no joke, and you have got to be willing to put the hours in or you will be left behind.  I came in with a failrly strong background, having been through FreeCOdeCamp and having taken numerous courses on Udemy, but that only gave me a good start until week 2 when the Object Oriented Programming began. If you want to do well and get all you can out of the course, plan on 10 hours a day minimum, especially on the weekends.

My instructor Pat is a great guy. He is very enthusiastic about Java and teaching. He keeps the class lively and exciting. Their are also a lot of other instructors available for you to ask questions to, but it is up to you to seek them out when you need them.

The curriculum is good over all, but I felt the material that was provided for first half of the course was batter explained and laid out than the material in the second half. It would have also been nice to have more group or pair projects.

My main mission was to get a job straight out of the guild, and I was able to do that. There is a careeer advisor available to help you and you can ask any of the instructiors to help you prepare by giving you mock interviews. I definitely felt prepared once I started intterviewing and I was able to answer technical questions well.

All in all if you are looking to get into tech as I was and you want to do Java, come to the Software you won't be disappointed.

I just started the bootcamp at Frontend Simplified and I've received constant support. You can set up zoom call appointments, but if you don't want to wait, support is always available with around the clock mentors that have answered my questions in less than 2 minutes EVERY TIME! There is also a built in AI feature that targets code questions, which is another extremely helpful resource to have. Overall, the constant support, check-ins, visuals, videos, and step by step instructions have helped me learn so much already, and I've only been enrolled for ONE DAY! I highly recommend this program to anyone who is interested because the mentors at Frontend Simplified guide and support you every step of the way :)

Before I came to the Software Guild (TSG), I had a deep 20+ year experience in technology specifically infrastructure.  However, I had a little functional appdev background and no object oriented.  I went through the .NET bootcamp and learned a ton.  I feel confident with OOP skills now and have built several apps.  After graduating from the program, I went on to .NET Core, Azure, etc.  TSG gave me the background required to go forward.  I just took a position at Fortune 100 and part of the reason they hired me is my application skillset.  Thanks to Randy Hash, my TSG mentor, Kipp Graham, my support in recruitment and Matthew Gozel, a fellow classmate.  There are also several people in the background that made this possible.  I would recommend this program to anyone that wants a future in programming.

I attended the Software Guild's 10 month online Java Bootcamp from Oct. 5, 2020 until Feb 2021 while working full-time. I found full-time employment with a company within a month of graduating from the program and have been employed for 3 months. It was a wonderful, life-changing experience for me. I enjoyed the self-study, self-paced aspects of the program and felt supported by my lead instructor as well as open office hours. I highly recommend The Software Guild to anyone who is interested in a career in software development.

I absolutely loved my time at the Software Guild. I did the .NET/C# self-paced track online. The flexibility of doing it online worked really well for me. I was able to do the coursework around my schedule and keep working full-time while enrolled. It took me about 10 months to complete the program.

The curriculum was well-balanced and prepared me well for interviews and for working as a software developer building business applications in the corporate sector. My instructor was very knowledgeable. The program was also great at teaching me how to fish. Upon graduation, I had the skills to be able to continue my education, to know how to find answers and to understand which directions I needed to grow. Coding is and always will be a life-long learning process. I felt the Software Guild gave me the skills to continue to develop on my own.

Upon graduation, their support in my job hunt was second-to-none. They offered guidance on my resume, LinkedIn, networking, basically everything. They have a very strong network of employers they work with. They were able to help me get interviews, do interview prep and walk me through the entire interview process. They don't do everything for you, you still have to work at it, but they were very supportive the whole way through.

From the day I finished the program to the day I got my first job offer was a little over 6 weeks (in the middle of a pandemic). The Software Guild was a great investment for me and my family. I absolutely recommend their program.

The Guild jump-started my career as a software engineer. I opted for the online C#/.NET cohort and it changed my life! The instructors are friendly and push you to achieve your goals. They are knowledgeable and do a great job to answer any questions you have. Their system of delivering you information is organized and easy for tech beginners to understand. The Software Guild covers a lot of real-world coding styles and solutions that are relevant in the modern tech world. Upon graduating the Software Guild, I still got plenty of assistance when it came to finding a job. This prepared me for the real-world coding interviews that can be very intimidating to newcomers. I highly recommend the Guild journey to anyone interested in furthering their career as a developer. 

I came to the Software Guild because I had some experience in coding, but couldn't get a job in it with just my non-computer science degree. With my background knowledge and prior self-teaching, some parts of the course were very easy, but most of it introduced me to higher-level topics that I probably wouldn't have been otherwise exposed to. I went from writing simple algorithms and console applications to building full-stack applications in 6 months. The material was very approachable, yet challenging. My instructor was always readily available to answer questions. I would recommend the Software Guild to anyone looking for a bootcamp. I really enjoyed the self-paced online learning and it was probably the most reasonably priced bootcamp I've seen, but it's still very highly regarded by many employers in my area (Twin Cities, MN). I actually got my job offer right as I was finishing my course. 

I discovered the Software Guild through Cal. State Long Beach, which was advertising the boot camp as a continuing education class. I was definitely nervous about enrolling as it was a large expense however it was not as expensive as some of the other options and there were a large number of positive reviews. I am very glad that I chose to enroll. I loved the experience and felt like I learned a lot. I was assigned an instructor who was great to work with and would help me if I got stuck on anything. 

One of the things I was nervous about prior to enrolling was the fact that the Software Guild was clearly focused on the mid-west, and given that I lived in California I was unsure how much support I would be getting compared to those that lived closer to their hubs. I do feel that they made an effort to work around my schedule and the time difference, however I think this is still an area that they can improve in.

While I loved working with the instructor assigned to me, and felt he was very qualified, I did begin to realize that the different instructors had different standards for work. I feel that there should be a more closely aligned rubric between all instructors so that everybody gets more or less the same experience.

The job placement assistance felt satisfactory. Once again I think there was a slight disadvantage in this department with regards to being located outside of the mid-west where most of the software guild's resources are, however I think my experience here should be taken with a grain of salt, the Covid pandemic set in a month and a half after I graduated and made the job hunting experience much more difficult than it might otherwise have been.

I've been a tech enthusiast for over half of my life and I turn 25 this year. I've made my own small projects just outside the scope of hello-world, and learned a few things here and there about algorithms. I picked up some concepts that developers lean on and how they use them. But I knew I could never actually DO the work to make a cohesive application that stands up on its own legs by itself. There was always something in a tutorial that eluded me, or it was an outdated piece of information I was learning from or what have you.

Well I'm glad I found this company from a friend who works with an alumnus. Because as of March 5th, 2020, 4 months after graduation, I landed an Automation Engineering position at GE, Haier here in Louisville making 2.5x as much as I've ever made. I wouldn't have seen an interview without this place and what it has done for me as a developer and critical thinker will stick with me for the rest of my days. My colleagues at GE possess MBA's, BA's, and MD's in the various sciences. And I get to work with them! Me! A college dropout! It's not about knowing everything in the book before you get there, it's about the thirst for the journey. That's what your future employer will be looking for.

The Software Guild will go down in my book as one of, if not the only private education specialized to produce competent developers that can actually thrive in the workforce. I believe more than half of my class (11 graduates) have landed a job already as well. That's all thanks to the staff, who are SO incredibly passionate about what they do; they have the guidebook to unlock your understanding for all levels of experience, zero to hero. If you're already a hero, they'll see that and push you even farther. If you're at the zero, they know exactly where you're going to go wrong and when you're going to feel like quitting and are there for you. Is there a better position to be in when you attend? No. I already had a great deal of knowledge relative to my classmates, as some of my classmates were just finding out what the cmd prompt was. Some of those students got jobs way faster than I did.

I 10x'd myself as a critical thinker, programmer, designer. All because the instructors are patient, humorous, down-to-earth and above-all accomplished and brilliant. The supporting staff as well, like Jess and Kipp and Amy ( and more ) are all unsung heroes too. They aren't part of your software education per-say, but they are part of holding you accountable to pursue that job and how to carry yourself to land that job. Those staff members mentioned are the ones who are providing job leads, practice interviews, resume building, networking opportunities, seminars, weekly check-ins; that all support you in your final stretch to landing your life-changing job.

Thank you to everyone at The Software Guild. Best decision of my life. I hope if you aspire to be a developer but are at ends meet with being self-taught and think you can do better for yourself; consider looking into investing 1/4th of a year into this place. I highly, highly doubt you will regret it.