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! 

Intense 12 week immersion into Java development, including full-stack projects utilizing MVC architecture including Spring, AOP, JDBC, TDD, Web Services, and Javascript.

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!