App Academy

Simply put: App Academy was worth my time and effort (and it requires both in huge quantities).  I do have specific issues with the program, but as you attempt to weigh those against the first sentence, remember that no bootcamp, no undergrad, no educational program will ever be perfect.  You know the old adage 'you get out what you put in?' App Academy will absolutely convert your effort into the desired result.

One piece of advice that I don't think is specific to App Academy:  only compare yourself to yourself.  I guarantee there will plenty of people who seem smarter or better at everything.  Ignore them.  Only you know if you're putting in the time, if you're staying engaged throughout the day, if you're holding yourself accountable to be the best that you can be.  Do your best and the rest will take care of itself.

PROS:
 - The staff - the TAs (catchall term for instructors) are uniformly knowledgeable and excited to teach.  Nearly every lecture was well presented, well communicated, and directly relevant to the material.
 - The material - the curriculum is rigorous and challenging.  Many of the projects that we struggled through in the first weeks will make valuable portfolio additions when we go back and attack them with everything we've learned.  
  The rhythm for most of the curriculum section is learn material - > assessment -> pivot to new material.  This can give you a feeling of whiplash, but what remains constant is the idea that you 'always be learning.'  I feel much better equipped to learn new things in a short period of time than I think I would have had the transitions been more gradual and forgiving.
 - General culture - For 12 weeks the fellow students in your cohort will be your allies both in learning and life.  Nobody else will really understand what it's like to go through the program.  This might be specific to my cohort, but from what I've seen of other cohorts the sentiment holds true.  Beyond that though, the general culture, the interaction between students and students, students and staff, and aA employee culture are all just really positive, really goal oriented and at the same time really forgiving.
 - Project phase - After the curriculum, you'll work on projects.  Working on full stack projects was just a fantastic way to tie together all the things we'd spent the last 8 weeks learning.  There is, however, a somewhat stark drop off in how much help you'll get from staff from the course curriculum phase to the project phase.

CONS:
  Feedback void - Every day you'll be required to give feedback on your partner for the day, and several times throughout the course you'll be asked for feedback on the experience as a whole.  At no point was I given any indication that my feedback was considered.  Several times throughout the course I specifically asked to hear the general sentiment of feedback people were leaving about me, and I got no response (beyond 'yes we can do that' but then nothing).  To be clear, I do believe that feedback I left was at least read by human eyes, but that's just a hunch because again, communication was an entirely one way street of me to anonymous form.
 Further, beyond assessments testing basic functionality of your code, there is no feedback around code style, code smell, or overall code practices.  The code we're exposed to in the project skeletons and demo is generally good and tightly written, but there's no checking to see if any of that has sunk in.  I was particularly disappointed by this because on day 1 a TA made a point of saying that aA graduates write more readable, cleaner code than CS graduates, but then there was just no system in place to ensure that.
As far as I know no human ever evaluated the quality of my code.  Maybe the lesson there is, 'if it works, it works' but that seems short sighted and not in keeping with the idea of producing quality software developers.

I'm resisting leaving feedback on the job search section because I'm in the middle of it now.  That said, thus far we've covered basic algorithms and data structure in greater depth than we did during the curriculum.  We've worked on our resumes, our personal pitch, and what to expect from the whole process.  I think I won't know the true value of the job search support until some time after the program.

PS I did a fair amount of research into various bootcamps before I decided on aA.  Obviously my experience is limited to the one I choose, but investigated Hack Reactor, General Assembly, and Berkeley Boot camp in addition to aA.  Of those, only Hack Reactor seemed up to the same level as aA.

How does 4 stars in curriculum and 4 stars in job support get an overall 5 stars? Simply, you have to look at the whole package, my only critiques with the curriculum are the tech stack. I was looking for a course that offered python in its curriculum but had to compromise for what I felt was the best instruction and program. I don't want to gush or be over the top, but through people I know in industry and from reading on forums I came to the personal conclusion that App Academy was the best holistic package, setting me up for a career in Software Development. All I can do is point to their self proclaimed acceptance rate of 3% and their longstanding subscription to the pay-after-employment model they pioneered. It truly shows that they are invested in their students and have faith backed by dollars and success stories to show that this model works.

I personally believe my experience at app academy was very unique, as I was the youngest of my cohort and I was 1 of 4 African American students, so on top of the stress of the curriculum and assessments  I had a series of other problems. But, the first sign of distress the staff picked up and wouldn't let that effect my performance through out the course. This open line of communication between the director and my circle TA allowed me to be prosperous through out the course and grow not only as a developer but as a person. 

-Darian P. 

I feel like I could write a novel on my time at App Academy, but I'll try to be brief. Without question, a/A was the most intellectually stimulating, intense, and overwhelming experience I've ever been a part of. If you're only reading this review because you heard elsewhere that the curriculum requires about 90+ hours of work per week and you're just trying to ascertain whether it's even possible to work that much, you can stop reading here. It is absolutely in that ballpark. Of course, it's different for everyone and some topics will come easier to some folks. I didn't find that I was spending 90 hours every single week, but the time really begins to add up quickly between the 45-minute commute there, morning lecture time from 9 AM - 12:15 PM, afternoon pair programming from 1:30 PM to 6 PM, another 45-minute commute home, and then any required readings, videos, and homework for the following day's material which could often take up to 3 or 4 hours. All of that happens 5 days a week, with no holidays or time off. It also wasn't completely unheard of for members of my cohort to be in about an hour early or to work through lunch in order to solidify some of the concepts.

I can say that I WAS able to carve out a little time on the weekends to maintain my sanity, but for at least the first half of the curriculum (when assessments are on Mondays) every minute you spend on the weekend not studying is just going to fill you with a combination of guilt and dread on top of the stress already placed on you by the rigor of the course. As other reviews have mentioned, the assessments are not easy but they are always very fair. It is definitely not subjective in any way and assessments are graded solely based on how many test specs you can get to pass before time runs out. The quantity of material you need to know for any individual test is large and studying will sometimes feel insurmountable. However, it is absolutely possible for every person in the cohort to get a perfect score since the tests are not designed to trick you or test you on something you weren't explicitly told to study for.

Anyone who isn't scared off by the absolutely massive scale of the curriculum and the short timeframe you're afforded to cram it all into your brain in a useable way will be rewarded with an incredible toolkit and the confidence to apply for any software developer job. I'm in the middle of my job search currently and I'm applying to tons of stuff, including and especially jobs that work on a different stack than App Academy teaches, strictly because I am now confident that there is nothing I can't teach myself using the skills I gained at a/A.

Lastly, I can't say enough good things about the Teaching Assistants at a/A. They are super knowledgeable, great at debugging (as they likely see similar issues from cohort to cohort), and are genuinely invested in your success. I asked for help often and was never made to feel inferior or bad about it in any way. I expect that the curriculum may change as long as new languages, frameworks, and technologies are always popping up in the tech world. However, a/A will remain one of the elite coding bootcamps as long as they continue to train their staff the way they obviously have been.

At no point will you feel like what you have to do is humanly possible, like learning javascript in a week, react in a weekend, redux in a day. but at the same time you will never feel like you are alone and have no help. It is easily both the hardest and most rewarding thing Ive ever had to do in my life. IF you can actually get in then you have to just suck it up and put in that 100+ hours week because If you can get in then you can finish the program.. it all depends on your dedication.

A little about me, I came from the civil engineering field with no experience with coding except one or two courses in college. I went to App Academy looking to learn a new skill and shift my career towards software engineering. Below is my  experience of the course.

Pros:
- Large amount of materials, everyday is a new topic. They make you learn continuously with time practice and put concepts into use.
- Staffs are supportive and helpful. Staffs are always there to answer a technical question or to talk about other issues like handling stress. Most staffs have gone through the course and have great ways/tips to help jiggle all the different tasks.
- Lots of pair programming. Gives the opportunity to work with different people and to practice talking about programming and explaining things in easy to understand ways.

Cons:
- Tons of work. In addition to lecture/pair programming during the day, there are hours of work on most nights like readings, homework and reviewing the day's solutions. There is really no time to do anything besides learning.
- Stressful, physically and mentally. It can be difficult to get enough sleep trying to keep up with the program. Also, it's rare to completely finish a day's problems during the day, so there's always the pressure of falling behind.

Even with all the work and stress I had to deal with, I think attending App Academy was the right choice. It has taught me a lot and I feel like I have a better chance to change my career afterwards.

A bit about me, I came to App Academy from 6 years in a non-software engineering career, with a bit of HTML, JavaScript, and CSS experience.

Pros:

- You will learn a lot and very quickly. The schedule of lectures and projects means you will be learning new things and practicing them constantly

- Excellent staff. Supportive, knowledgable and fun

- Tons of additional resources for you to go back to when you complete the course

Cons:

- It is stressful, the volume of work combined with the pressure of testing will make you stressed.

- A lot of outside work is necessary. You will need to be able to self-motivate to get through the hours of homework each night

I found App Academy incredibly rewarding. I learned more than I thought was possible and collaborated with a passionate and intelligent group of people. If you're prepared to put in 100+ hours a week, they'll prepare you to change your life.

I already knew App Academy would be tough before I applied, but I never would've thought it was the most difficult experience I had ever imagine. As someone with no prior coding experience, I would say the first few weeks were really hard on me and it doesn't get easier. Eventually, it's something that everyone gets accustomed to. Before I knew it, it was 3 months already and I can finally tell people that I'm a software developer.

To sum things up, App Academy is harder than anything you imagined, but it will also be the most rewarding experience in your life.

Scroll through the other reviews, but stop Here.

App Academy is hard, they tell you about not knowing the difficulty and it’s kind of true, the problem is the exams get longer and your more at risk of being behind so probably on average it does get harder. I don’t know why they say that but it’s probably rooted at the top level. This is what you need to know.

To get into App Academy it will be pretty hard to just apply and pray...you need to Study. If you do study than look for the app academy problems online or go on GitHub(entry level) and search for them. Jumpstart can help if your background is weak(only couple months), but I certainly noticed an edge for those who did Boot Camp Prep(I didn’t and I was a little envious). 

So who Am I ? Well I just graduated Today...take my review with respect to that aspect of App Academy’s curriculum. Reviewing them is a little tough because everyone is different, some people pick it up faster(I’m diligent so it’s at what I call a normal pace) and others pick it up faster, but those people which will be in Your cohort have some type of strong technical background most likely. The tests are hard and it is true you can’t tell which one is the hardest normally due to the differences in people. They will overwork you on purpose and try to see if you can pass because if you can’t they want you to fail out. Part of the reason is the last ten days of the main part of the curriculum they let you work on the full stack, but it’s an extremely expensive operation and probably not profitable for them if you can’t do the basics of coding. Not to mention once you start the Full Stack project you need to be able to do it mostly on your own so you can put it on your Resume and say “I did that.” 

The best part? The Teacher assistants without a doubt. I was actually surprised at home many there are(around six plus the main instructor). The teacher assistants are highly skilled and during the course you will likely learn the most from them more than anything else. 

When you put it all together App Academy’s program is very good and costs quite a bit of capital to run, remember these teacher assistants are paid well. 

A couple of last notes. They are now like a well oiled machine. They hire in advance, train the next leaders before they leave, prep the next cohort as soon as you start yours, and they do not stop for whatever reason.....in App academy there are no days off and they work through almost all holidays. 

If you want to go to App Academy I recommend it. Better if you can pair it with a degree, but standalone it’s good too. If I was you and you were accepted I would not hangout on the weekends. I went to a wedding one day and felt behind the entire course because of it. There’s so much homework that catching up is really hard and the weekends are for studying the tests since it’s pointless to do the homework if you can’t pass the test. Overall four stars because of the lack of support for stressed out individuals. They say talk to us, but it’s not very inviting and I took it as a clue for an opportunity for them to say to you “this course is not for everyone.”

Students attending App Academy come from all over the world with drastically varying backgrounds, however everyone just loves to code or is passionate about technology. From the moment you walk through the doors you'll start engaging with people that'll make you feel right at home. The curriculum starts off with Ruby and Rails in order to ease students into a programming mindset and learning the MVC architecture widely accepted in web development. It late transitions to pure JavaScript through the MERN stack. Throughout the course you will build projects, utilities, games, things you never thought were possible just through typing a few lines of code. Overall this was an amazing experience, and if you are passionate about coding and don't know what to do about it, App Academy is definitely the right choice.