Hackbright Academy

At the beginning of the year, I decided to leave my decade-long career in Customer Support and attempt a transition to Software Engineering. I considered multiple bootcamps but ultimately settled on Hackbright Academy after the admissions interview.

The main thing that stood out to me in the admissions interview was that the questions focused on how I might support my cohort throughout the program. What I took from that conversation was that Hackbright uniquely cares for its students and aim to provide as many avenues of support as possible. That feeling was reinforced time and time again as I was going through the program. The instructors and extended faculty support their students every step of the way, positive affirmations written on post-its adorn the walls of the school, and if a student has a bad day, the whole cohort gets together to support them. In addition, a couple of weeks in, each student is matched with two volunteer mentors from the industry who dedicate an hour per week to offer advice and support.

The curriculum is very well-paced for students who have had a prior introduction to programming. More advanced students may find some of the material in the first five weeks to be a review; however, every lecture and exercise comes with additional material for further study which I found to be invaluable.

After the first five weeks, the cohort breaks apart into individual projects. Students pick their project with assistance and guidance from their advisor, then start development from scratch. Independent projects cover database design, to back-end server development, all the way through front-end design and deployment. The purpose is to reinforce the skills developed in the first five weeks through practical implementation. In the end, students demo their projects in front of a visiting panel of companies followed by an evening of networking.

Finally, the last two weeks are focused on career development. Cohorts visit tech companies in the area, practice interview skills and get guest lectures from hiring managers and alum.

Throughout the program, Hackbright staff asks for frequent feedback. Feedback forms are sent out after every lecture, the data from which is used to help tailor future lectures.

Upon completion of the program, the school continues to support students through the job search. Career development staff will check in with students to offer advice and assist with connecting to hiring managers. Instructors host bi-weekly study sessions for alum and can provide additional practice interviews.

Circling back on my personal experience, I found several companies from our project demo night reached out to me to offer interviews. After interviewing with several companies, I ultimately chose to accept a job offer from one of the companies who visited our demo night.

I honestly couldn't be happier with my choice to attend Hackbright Academy. Everyone from the instructors and career development team to the extended faculty genuinely cares for their students and are passionate to #changetheratio. My experience was a transformative one that couldn't possibly repay. I can't recommend the school enough to anyone looking to make a positive change in their life.

The most valuable resources you need making a major career switch is a strong network and support system. The community at Hackbright is unbelievable. I started school with a competitive mindset and just wanted to make a quick career switch and get sh-t done. At Hackbright, I learned how to build community and what it means to empower others, especially women. I felt more accepted than I ever had by a group of peers (besides my best friends from childhood). My incredible cohortmates inspired me daily, and the alumni network was very supportive in my job search. Hackbright also has an excellent mentorship program (2 mentors : 1 student ratio), and a network of industry partners that regularly host job fairs and whiteboarding sessions to help you shine in the job market.

I could easily write 20 pages about how much I loved Hackbright but I’ll try to keep this a little shorter than that. Just as a background, I might not be the traditional Hackbright student in that I came to Hackbright directly after getting my degree from UC Berkeley.

 

Overview:

The program starts off with two lectures and two labs per day. You give anonymous feedback after every lecture which they use to improve the course. Then there’s a few weeks to work on a final project and the last two weeks are career focused. You get an advising group where you and three other students have a specific advisor who helps guide you in your quest. Fridays are fun.

 

Instructors:

I have never seen such dedicated and caring instructors. All of the instructors went way out of their way to help me. On several occasions I had instructors send me a follow up email to something I had asked them about with more information and sources. During project season I got so much help and always felt so encouraged by them. They’d also do that thing that really great teachers do where you ask a question and then somehow they make it so that you figure out the answer yourself like I don't know how they do it but it's magical.

 

Career Services:

At first I was very overwhelmed by anything career related. I came in totally clueless when it came to that area. However, in the last two weeks (that were totally career focused) that changed. They set up guest speakers, workshops, field trips, taught us how to network with other people (so scary!) and more. I always felt like they were there to support me and help me with everything I needed help with whether it was with my resume or just a pep talk. Finding a job is a lot of hard work but they don’t just send you out into the wild. You can talk to career services at anytime after you graduate and they also send out weekly check in emails as well as emails that have all the future events, alumn talks, etc. I never would have imagined that I would successfully negotiate my salary offer over the phone (it was so scary!) but career services gave me the help and confidence I needed to do that.

 

Lastly, here are just some of my favorite parts of the program:

1) Turns out your brain actually functions better when you get a full night sleep (who would have guessed…). Hackbright’s mission is to make you learn a ton of stuff in a short period of time so they encouraged us to get a full night sleep and make an effort to take care of ourselves. It worked.

2) There was no competition. I felt like every student wanted to help each other and build each other up. It was so great to learn in an environment when nobody was trying to prove they were smarter than you (cough, uc berkeley)

3) I felt supported by students and staff. During the program I had two close family members pass away within a day of each other and Hackbright was such a comfortable and supportive environment that I was able to get through it. 

4) And for my favorite part of Hackbright: All the confidence I came out with.

I had very little, if any, confidence going into this program. I never would have imagined that going to Hackbright would change that. And unlike while I was at Berkeley, I was able to gain confidence without desperately trying to compare myself to other people. In just 3 months, Hackbright was able to build me up and give me confidence I never would have thought I could have.

 

Conclusion:

I went into this program thinking I’d learn how to code better and yeah I came out with all these sweet coding skills but I also came out with a huge support network, a good understanding of the industry and interview process, I learned how to talk to strangers, and I have more self confidence than I’ve had in my entire life. I’m now doing things I would have never imagined I could do before.

I would highly recommend this program to anyone who is willing to put in the effort and work hard.

       

I applied for engineering roles before Hackbright, but I rarely heard back from recruiters, and I couldn't succeed in on-site interviews.

Hackbright Academy gave me the skills, confidence, vocabulary, and connections to excel at interviews and land my first software engineering role!

The atmosphere at Hackbright was superb. I felt supported every step of the way—by the instructors, by career development, by my mentors, and most of all, by my cohort! Even the learning areas are fantastic, as they're not a row of desks but fluffy soft shaggy carpeting, floor seats, and generous couch seating, in addition to a row of tables and chairs. Support staff (i.e., stuffed animals) are spread throughout the room, and named adorably.

Hackbright gave me the opportunity to pair program with my colleagues, which not only reinforced the exercises, but it helped us learn to verbalize our ideas about the functions and algorithms we wrote. Hackbright also matched each of us with two mentors, who met with us weekly to reassure us, build our confidence, teach us, and help us practice to prepare for interviews.

Hackbright's alumnae network is invaluable for mentorship and for networking throughout my career, and probably the most valuable part of Hackbright.

After having worked in semi-technical field for a couple of years, I wanted to move my career forward and learn programming. I began with online javascript courses, and one fine day bumped into a Hackbright ad online! I was amazed with the #changetheratio mission, and the academy's purpose of empowering women via Tech education.

  I was new to Python, hence I joined the part-time program first, to get a feel of the culture and curriculum (and I wasn't disappointed at all!). From the takeaways that I got during part-time education, it was easier for me to decide that pursuing a full-time program at Hackbright was  the way to go forward. This was indeed one of the best decisions I've made for my career advancement.The teaching style of having theory and lab assignments together in each session helped me remember the concepts clearly. I was able to apply them practically in my take-home assignment as well as my project. The staff and lab instructors were quite knowledgeable, and provided answers to our queries, both in theory class as well as in the labs, with a smile!    Throughout the program, I got to interact with every fellow student from my cohort, and was inspired by how women across different backgrounds could motivate and help each other learn and grow! Because of the friendly and supportive environment, I felt encouraged to persist in an attempt to learn something totally new as Python programming, and ended up successfully building a web app and deploy it. Also, the field trips and various talks from the industry experts / volunteers (organized by the career team) helped gain more practical insights into the industry. I learnt a great deal of soft skills and networking skills which I was able to apply during my job search.    The Hackbright community also values your personal time, and ensures that you get a balance in between the intense nature of the program. The schedule and the program structure is very flexibly designed (with no compromise on the quality / content of the curriculum) and that helped me complete the program successfully, despite every day commute all the way from South bay.    Also, both the ed team and career team take your feedback very seriously, and you could see them constantly working on making their process better. Even after graduating, the team has been welcoming, and helpful with your queries. With Hackbright, I was exposed to a very open network of women willing to help you anytime. The 12-week immersive program at Hackbright was definitely an all-round personality development experience, than just a curriculum-driven educational program.

Like any bootcamp you will not leave as a Senior Software Engineer. But you will be a proficient Python/Javascript web developer. And have the tools you need to learn any programming technology.

The first five weeks you will learn Python, Javascript/jQuery, Flask web framework and Jinja (templating), HTML/CSS/Bootstrap, SQL/SQL Alchemy and other technologies you will need on the job.

The second five weeks you will work on your capstone project and present it on Demo Night, in front of prospective employers and other people. Here you will all about MVP (Minimum Viable Product), debugging, testing and researching APIs and other issues that come up when trying to meet a deadline.

The final two weeks are spent with the Career Development team. You actually work them every week thoughout the program, but the last two weeks you get them fulltime. You will go out and do white boarding and technical interviewing at tech companies in San Francisco. You will learn about networking, salary neogiation, interviewing skills and much more.

The 12-week fulltime program is expensive, tough, but rewarding. They have a great Alumae network that you can plug into and scheduled Alumni events (think networking). The women you go though the program with will be your friends/network for life. As one of the instructors said, "you will get your first job, but the women you graduate with will get up your next job."

Before I found Hackbright, I never considered being a software engineer. That option was never offered to me in high school or college, and by the time I decided to study it on my own, I immediately regretted not starting sooner and taking CS classes in college. Luckily, Hackbright quickly entered the scene and showed me that my chance wasn't over. By taking me on and feeding my desire to enter a technical field, Hackbright ignited a fire in me that I doubt will ever go out. I learned so much in my 12-week program, and I haven't stopped seeking out new things to learn since.

To give more specifics...

Things I found that Hackbright excelled in:

• Teaching a tech stack that is growing in the industry. In my current position, I use Python every day and I love it! Not to mention, Hackbright was the first to teach me how a computer works in the first place. :)
• Structuring our time together efficiently. Given the mountain of material we learned in 3 months, I was constantly impressed that I never felt overwhelmed. Lectures always contained the right level of depth into each subject, and the corresponding lab sessions were perfectly tuned to train us in the concepts we had just learned. The program leaders clearly listen to past cohorts (taking surveys after every lecture and checking in every week), and implement changes to the structure that greatly benefit the students.
• Kickstarting our professional network with a mentorship program. Each student was paired with 2-3 local working professionals in the industry. These mentors were volunteers, drawn to Hackbright's mentor program with desires to guide the next generation of engineers! I was given 3 completely awesome mentors who continued to help me well into my job search.
• Nurturing a safe, fun, encouraging environment. Weekly check-ins and evening socials provided time for both students and staff to relax and get to know one another. Unfriendly competition was never welcome in our cohort, as was evident by our frequent pair programming sessions and supportive demo-night practices. The bonds we created allowed us to flourish in our time there, and we frequently reconnect and remain a strong network of support.
• Providing tools and techniques to help with the job search. Weeks 11-12 were entirely devoted to career services, and I felt well-equipped for my job search. Most of the benefits I received came later, however. Hackbright offers discounts for its alumni to use a variety of study tools, and I took advantage of several that really made a difference in my job search. In particular, my cohort was given beta access to Interviewing.io, a platform that conducts technical phone interviews between anonymized participants. It was a fantastic opportunity to get interview practice in a low-stakes environment, and potentially make new contacts!

Things I think Hackbright could approach better:

• Project guidance. At the culmination of 10 weeks, each of us had built a coding project that was entirely her own, and Demo Night was a chance for us to show it to enthusiastic representitives from leading Bay Area tech companies. Planning for that project began around week 3, and each project idea had to be approved by one's appointed project advisor. However, I feel that the project I chose, while interesting and fun, didn't allow me to showcase all of the tools I learned at Hackbright. I didn't know this at week 3, but by week 10 I had a few regrets. I wish I had been advised to change my project concept a bit earlier on.
• Being a better representative to partner companies. At several points in my job search, I found a favorable job listing at a company that was in partnership with Hackbright. I sent a request to our Career Services for a formal introduction to the company (as is procedure), but each time, there was a holdup—either Hackbright had since lost their contact at the company, or Career Services advised me to approach the company myself. I felt unsupported and didn't end up getting any facetime with those companies.

After experiencing Hackbright, I was ready to face the industry with staff, company partners, and 600+ alumni at my disposal. But regardless of the resources I was given, I am still most grateful to Hackbright for taking a chance on me and nurturing my curiosity into the behemoth it is today. Now I know that I will never stop learning, and I never want to!

I've written a post on Hackbright's blog with more information on my experience and my current position as an engineer. If you have any questions for me, please reach out on LinkedIn—I'd love to help! Cheers, and good luck!

Coming from a nursing background, I had zero coding experience prior to attending Hackbright's prep course (and onto the fellowship). After talking to tech recruiters regarding what bootcamp to attend, they all unanimously pointed towards Hackbright.

There are 4 dinstinct qualities about Hackbright that make it stand out from the rest: the transparency, continuous passion for improvement, support system, and alumnae network.

Transparency - They held info sessions for prospective students, were timely with email exchanges, and are part of a 3rd party outcomes report. Just looking at the website, you know exactly what you're getting into, up to the day-to-day schedule of the program.

Continuous passion for improvement: During the prep and fellowship program, every lecture was paired with a feedback survey, as well as the TA writing notes in the back for potential powerpoint typos, areas of clarifications, etc. They also restructure the curriculum from time to time to keep up with the latest versions of programming languages / if a certain technology is starting to be prevalent in the job market.

Support system: When you're attending a lecture and look back, seeing all the other instructors/TAs literally attending the lecture WITH you, you know you are in the right place. What an amazing staff. I never once felt insecure about asking a question, and never once had no one available to ask the question to.

Alumnae network: Hackbright continously hosts events where alum and students connect with one another, as well as the career services team being more than happy to introduce you to previous graduates. It's by far the strongest community I've seen. We are all proud Hackbrighters, easily spotted in the city with our red jackets.

My only room of improvement would be the tech stack they teach. It's a carefully curated one, intended for pedagogical reasons. However, in terms of the job market and what's prevalent out there, it does not exactly align. But, this bootcamp above all else taught me HOW to learn new frameworks/languages in a short amount of time, which is absolutely the most important skill you can have going into the tech industry.

I began my coding journey by following along MIT's introduction to programming course and various Codecademy courses here and there. A few weeks later, I decided to check out Hackbright's fellowship application. It was a day before the deadline for the next cohort, so I stopped halfway through the application. I figured that there's no way I could complete the whole process in one day. Then I got a call from Victoria from Admissions, who encouraged me to submit my application since the deadline had moved back by 2 weeks. I got accepted within the month, and it's surreal how much my life has changed. 

I absolutely loved the program. A drawback I read online before was that an all-women bootcamp doesn't prepare you for a male-dominated workplace. I can say that that is untrue. The environment simply provided the women with a safe place to focus on learning. 

Pros (+):

- Energetic staff and knowledgeable instructors who revamp the curriculum based on feedback

- Study/life balance for student's ability to decide how to spend time after 6pm

- Exposure to full-stack webapp development. The individual projects are so each student can fully own her idea/execution

- Mentorship program is careful curated - I had three mentors: a frontend engineer at mid-sized startup, an engineer at a small VC, and a backend engineer at a large-sized company. They all used different languages and were available for support on project and whiteboarding. 

Cons (-): 

- Pace was slower than I would have liked, but in a way it forced me to absorb the information deeper

- Algorithm is taught mostly with whiteboarding, but I think it's important to instill the importance of logic & algorithms early on. I studied algorithms on my own time after class ended for the day.

Overall, I met really great people and found my job ( which I love ) within two weeks of graduating. I would recommend this program to anyone who wants to change industries and needs a structured path. 

I had a positive experience at Hackbright Academy. Hackbright was a supportive and positive environment for me to learn how to code and prepare for the job search.

First of all, I was super impressed with the collaboration environment among the students. It did not feel like a competition where there is a sole "winner" of Hackbright. I feel like we ALL came out as winners at the end and we all helped each other in our own way, whether it was emotional support or help and ideas technically. I definitely got that "these are my people" feeling!

There was a lot of support and encouragement from the educational staff and career services team as well. The quality of my instructors was excellent as well as the TA's and lab instructor. The instructors were great about checking in with the students making sure we were understanding the material and encouraged us to ask questions. They were also very good about requesting feedback after each lecture. A school that takes feedback seriously is a good sign in my opinion!

Hackbright tries hard to set you up for success, already connecting each student with 3 mentors that work in the tech industry. All three of my mentors were helpful and involved. I still communicate and meet with them even though the fellowship is over. I have a much bigger network now than I did before Hackbright!

Career services were also strong. Very organized and thought out material. The last two weeks of the fellowship was career services focused, bringing in people from the industry to talk to us and give us a wealth of advice for the job search.

Of course, make sure to put in the hard work, time, and dedication to make the most of Hackbright! 

As you can tell from the ratings, I really enjoyed my time at Hackbright. I'm more of a list person, so let's make some lists.

Pros:

• Excellent structure. First five weeks: lecture in the morning, lab, lunch, lecture in the afternoon, lab. Homework. Weekend assessments. Weeks six through ten: lecture in the morning, work on your projects the rest of the time. Weeks eleven and twelve: lectures and guest speakers on career things (interviewing tips, negotiations, whiteboarding, field trips). It's a very professional setup and I felt well cared for. [Side note: I also felt like I probably could have learned all the things I learned at HB on my own, but it would have taken at least 4x longer and be much more frustrating, so that alone justifies the tuition for me.]
• Lots of feedback mechanisms in place. After every lecture / talk / event, there's a survey. And they take the survey results seriously and implement your feedback (if warranted). HB is not perfect, but they sure do work hard and constant improvement.
• The network. Besides the people who work at HB, you become a part of this amazingly supportive alumnae community. I was actually really afraid of being with the same classmates all the time and also with a lot of women who may want to socialize a lot, but the end result was that I could put in however much effort into socialization as I wanted. I didn't feel pressured to grab lunch or talk. And regardless of my lack of socialization investment, I still felt like one of the team. And it was a great team. I really miss my cohort. And HB. 
• The mentors. I had varying degrees of closeness with my mentors but they were all amaizing and oh-so helpful! So cool that HB has this in place to further support us.
• Career support. The career services team is resourceful, encouraging, and supportive. We updated our resumes, LinkedIn, wrote cover letters, ... we basically had everything in place to hit the ground running for the job search as soon as the program was over. I lucked out and landed a job with a partner company about a month after the program ended. I was prepared to allot myself 3 - 6 months for the job hunt, as that is a more reasonable / likely amount of time.

Cons:

• It's not cheap. Plus, you'll be doing it full time (plus!) so you won't be able to get a job. I feel really privileged to be able to take this leap, but I understand that not everyone can do it. Definitely consider your personal financial situation thoroughly before leaping.
• It's tough. The program is tough. Software development is not easy work. It requires attention to detail, problem solving skills, patience, teamwork. This is a double-edged sword because I was thinking back on my old job where I knew most of the things to know and was not very challenged and made decent money. I definitely could've stayed on that trajectory. But I love challenges, so I went to HB and I know now that I'll be challenged for the rest of my life. Know this before you choose this path. :)

If you have any questions about my experience, feel free to read my blog post on it and reach out to me with questions. Happy to answer them!