Boot Camp vs Bachelors vs Both?
What's your honest opinion on boot camp from a desirability in the marketplace perspective? I read a lot of mixed reviews and would like to know from possibly hiring managers here what is important to your hiring decision. I'm going for my bachelor's in Software Development already and just about to get my ComptTIA A+ certification in a few weeks (entry level certification I know but we gotta start somewhere). I've been with IBM for about 4 years now in a non-IT role that was client based and that project is over, so I could consider this downtime to do a boot camp while attending school. Do you think it's all that beneficial? I'm already seeking my bachelor's but that is at least 1.5 years away, and I want to take this opportunity to switch gears into a better IT role, but I have no experience in coding yet. I saw a 5 day Data Science Dojo that brushes up on Microsoft Azure, Python and ML those are all great topics for me to learn, but it was 4k for 5 days, so not sure if cost/benefit is justified. Then there are other boot camps from 3 to 6 months, some online and few here in my city that are brick-and-mortar. Idk if it would help me to switch to a SD or similar role sooner, or if managers won't even consider it as experience. I read that boot camps can actually set you back in your career? Why is that? Isn't knowledge great despite where it comes from? Anyway, if you have a practical experience in this, I would love to hear it. Thanks! TC +/- 70k YOE +7, 4 at IBM but non-tech roles. Not in a tech hub city, work remote.
Boot camps are the equivalent to those self-help seminars: You pay a big lump of money to attend, you learn a few hacks, and you leave thinking you learned something but in reality didnโt learn anything useful.
Haha, yes, always avoided those fluffed up seminars. I reeeally want in at Microsoft, and learning more about Azure sounded good for me, but I know what you mean.. Tough decisions ahead... ๐ค
Some of the bootcamp are pretty legitimate but most are scams. Hack reactor and app academy stats are bs these days (lot of fibbing going on). That being said I had friends do Hack reactor and some ended up at google, dropbox, fb. Generally these were people who were already okay at coding before though
Thanks Haggle. That's the thing, I just want a kick start on coding and other concepts since everything is so new to me. Some boot camps have pre coding exp as requirement, which makes no sense to me. Lol
I think youโd be better serviced taking some cheap / free software classes blind, working on side projects, and then joining a more exclusive bootcamp. Regular ones arenโt worth it imo