RIP Coding Bootcamps
Coding bootcamps are wonderful for learning programming, but absolutely suck for aspiring career-switchers.
@caifanuncle
Jan 2025
I initially found great joy in sharing my passion for building digital products and relished the creative process of helping students materialize their capstone project ideas.
However, coding bootcamps suffer from an inconvenient truth that has not only eroded the joy of teaching for me, but also challenged my moral conscience as an instructor.
Mismatched expectations
Most students join a coding bootcamp with the intention to eventually quit their jobs and find a software engineering role after graduation. This is understandable given how coding bootcamps tend to market themselves.
However, the harsh reality is that most students who find "decent" coding jobs after the bootcamps do so due to unfair advantages — internal reassignments or job referrals from personal connections. Most students either end up with non-technical roles or shitty dev jobs that are either underpaid or lacking in technical leadership, which will very likely stun long-term career growth.
This comes as little surprise given the influx of computer science graduates in recent years. Why would a decent company choose to hire a coding bootcamp graduate over a university graduate who is also likely to have a couple of internships under his belt?
Sure, little of the former's four year degree actually translates into real-world practice. If a coding bootcamp graduate with enough aptitude is given a year of hands-on industry practice and decent technical mentorship, it is also not unthinkable that he will be able to catch up with his uni grad counterparts. However, at the end of the day, degrees are valued not for their actual curricula but for what they signal: prospects who are likely to have decent cognitive aptitude and the appetite for rigor. Such is the reality of life, and this is the reality for many of my students.
What a shame, really, because I still firmly believe that coding bootcamps are wonderful for learning how to code.
Why bootcamps are still great for learning
Forced Discipline
Coding has a steep learning curve, making it way too convenient for one to end up procrastinating or get carried away digging one rabbit-hole after another. Adhering to a rigid learning schedule with fixed deadlines definitely helps with acquiring the necessary skills in as little time possible.
Community of Like-Minded Aspirants
Learning becomes a more memorable and inspiring experience when surrounded by classmates with similar aspirations. Also, you can look forward to capstone projects which more feature-rich and robust since you are expected to work in teams.
Localised insights from instructors
As much as programming is a technical endeavor, it is also highly ideological and opinionated. This adds flavor and spice to the industry, but also makes it potentially confusing to navigate.
Instructors can help students discern signal from noise. Of course, they inevitably do so with their own bias and preferences, but it still serves as a good starting point for students to begin figuring out what resonates.
If only we build for fun
It is ironic that while it is becoming increasingly challenging for coding bootcamps to deliver on their promises for aspiring mid-career switchers, there has never been a more exciting time to learn how to build digital products given recent developments in tech.
A single developer is able to get a lot of things done today with modern tech stacks, APIs and developer tooling. With Gen AI, the possibilities of what an amateur can build have also immensely expanded in scope. This makes approaching software development as a creative outlet more enticing and accessible than ever.
I wish coding bootcamps were more like cooking/art/music schools. One rarely signs up for a water-colour painting class expecting to become a full-time artist at the end of it. If only coding bootcamps appealed to aspiring tech hobbyists. Perhaps with enough talent, luck and hard work, one might eventually make that coveted career switch, but even if that doesn't happen, one should still be able to see things as a net win.
Coding bootcamps empower students to create digital products they wish existed, more so today, in an environment that inspires one to do so. In an ideal world, that itself should suffice.