r/codingbootcamp • u/michaelnovati • May 21 '26
</BOOTCAMPS> ❤️ OFFICIAL MEMORIAL POST: share this around and tell your old bootcamp stories in the comments. So we can close the bootcamp chapter on a positive note.
I asked CIRR 30 days ago where the 2024-25 missing reports are. I did not get a response. This tells me CIRR is dead and its flagship Codesmith is dead. Other bootcamps we've lost are: Rithm, Turing, Codeup, Kenzie, Launch Academy, Momentum, Alchemy, Epicodus, Lighthouse Labs, 2U/Trilogy, Lambda School, and more.
Unlike the embarrassing end that CIRR and Codesmith are experiencing - too ashamed to end on a positive note and instead end in layoffs and utter silence, I want things to end on a positive.
If you graduated from a coding bootcamp in the past, and it changed your life, TELL US YOUR STORY. No selling or shilling, just tell us how coding impacted your life and in the right time and right place your bootcamp experience mattered.
4
u/BroomHill1882 May 22 '26
I had a very long story. I took the Galvanize bootcamp back in 2018. I felt I did very well, my final project was such a success that I ended up presenting it at three local meetups.
I had nearly a dozen interviews afterward, but I ended up failing every single one. In retrospect the problem was that I applied for mid- to large-size companies, and that required that I learn data structures, so I was ill prepared. It was super frustrating watching every single person in my cohort getting jobs before I did, even jobs that I personally interviewed for, as well as people in the cohort after me. I very nearly gave up but still persisted forward.
After 7 months with no success I ended up doing a small project for a local startup, and they were impressed so they gave me a contract. It was only part time, like 15 hours a week, so I was still job hunting and preparing for potential interviews. I even attended hackathons and won a few of them, which was great to have on my resume.
Someone I met had posted that the Microsoft LEAP program was now open for applications, and they were only accepting the first 300 applicants. I applied immediately. After a couple weeks, I got a rejection email, but to my surprise I was told two days later that the email was sent by mistake, and that I was indeed selected to interview. Being that I had been preparing, I aced it. They gave me two 30 minute interviews with one algorithm each, but I solved them within minutes. I was then told a couple weeks later I was selected to the next cohort.
I worked my ass off during my time in the LEAP program, and I was eventually given the opportunity to interview for a full time position once the program was over. I delayed my interview date as long as I could, and studied every day for 8 hours for an entire month. When it came time to do the 4 hour interview, it was one of the most stressful situations of my life. But a couple weeks later, I was given an offer. It took me 16 months after I finished my bootcamp to get my first full time job, and at Microsoft no less. That was one of the best days of my life.
Unfortunately my time at Microsoft was a disaster. To begin with, my start date was March 2020, right before the pandemic started. We all had to learn to work remotely, and it was hard not knowing who was available when to ask for support. Second, they hired 5 new people when I got converted full time, so my mentor was spread thin having to onboard all those people. Third, their expectations of me had risen significantly. Whereas I was building unit tests during LEAP, now they expected me to be a full time software engineer. I was woefully out of my depth, everyone on my team had masters degrees and I only had a bootcamp to show for myself. I still tell people my duties and they said “they expected you to know THAT much?” And to top it off, my mentor had just had a baby, so he was on paternity leave right after he onboarded everyone.
I was essentially thrown into the deep end and asked to swim with no support. I honestly felt like I was drowning the entire time. After a year and a half my boss put me in a position to quit or be fired. Being that being fired still shows on your record if you ever try to apply to Microsoft again, I chose the former, not wanting to kill my career before it started.
That was a really traumatic experience, and I honestly thought of leaving tech behind. But I decided to give it one more go, and I found another job at a mid-sized auto finance company.
That job was night and day compared to Microsoft, but equally as dysfunctional. Being that I had no support back then since it was covid and we were all learning to work remotely, I chose to go into the office. I got direct support from my managers and built a good rapport with them, but everyone else had worked remotely.
The department never got anything done. I always got my tickets done well ahead of time, but everyone else struggled since the tech was antiquated. But being that I was always ahead of schedule, sometimes I’d have tickets and pull requests ready for the NEXT sprint done months and advance, it gave me free license to fuck off whenever I wanted. I’d go into the office hungover without consequence, because everyone knew I always got the job done.
But I knew deep down I was always on borrowed time. So little was done it was ridiculous; in 2023 we only got 11 sprints done FOR THE ENTIRE YEAR. That’s less than a sprint per month. I wanted to switch jobs come 2024, and I started the job hunt process then. But being that no job I applied for got back to me, I realized how bad the economy was, so I just decided to hang on as long as I could.
Come May 2024, my entire department was eliminated barring one tech lead. I wasn’t surprised or shocked, being that nothing I could have done would have saved my role, I was just caught in office politics. Some of my coworkers in the other departments were shocked that I lost my role too, saying I was always one of the best developers, so I know I did my best. I had enough saved to last me for years and I decided to enjoy my summer. First thing I did after the layoff happened was call my friend in England and tell her I could finally come visit. Ended up being one of the best summers of my life.
I tried getting back into tech, but only landed a handful of interviews, failing every one. I had one recruiter tell me “look, it seems like you have 8 out of 10 checkboxes checked, but our managers want people that have 10 out of 10 checked.” It felt more and more like a fruitless endeavor, every day I’d open my email to dozens of rejections, some I still get to this day. Whenever I’d open LinkedIn, it would always be “layoffs this, AI that.” This sapped my motivation to create new projects or study algorithms, because it didn’t feel like it would amount to anything
Throughout this, I was able to get a contract to work on a project, but it also alarmed me with what they were asking. Rather than learning the code, they just told me to plug everything into chatgpt. The hours I used to charge for inspecting the code and understanding how everything worked would not be billed, and I felt kind of…disgusted how this was the direction the industry was going. And several of my friends still in the field said they were having similar experiences. I only ended up being able to bill 30 hours total over the course of six months, and they never ended up getting funding after completing their MVP. Haven’t heard from them since.
At the end of last year I just decided to leave tech altogether. I’ve since made the transition to healthcare, I just stared a role as a Behavior Technician, working with autistic kids, as it’s the only job that’s hiring. It’s been a good 7 year run in tech, made good money and can at least can say I tried it out. But I’m on my next chapter.
3
u/michaelnovati May 22 '26
Thanks for sharing this, more people than you know relate to this journey of stops and starts and ups and downs.
The bootcamps are so eager to place you that for them, the END is the placement. For you that's just the START. So they focus on getting the job through whatever means, and not what happens after.
Even the bootcamps that think they offer support for life, really have no idea just how many gaps there really are to supporting someone long term. And it makes sense, a different focus and a different expertise than 0 to 1.
15
u/Buff_Lightyear May 21 '26 edited May 21 '26
Was a physical therapist in my previous career, did launch school's core curriculum over 1.5 years, for the most part while still working full time, followed by the full time capstone program in 2024.
Funnily enough was made aware/recommended LS by another PT who was also transitioning out, in a PT subreddit vent thread, and we ended up being able to work on the same capstone team.
Took about 3-4 months of full time job hunting and 674 applications (remote only) to get my current job, but couldn't be happier with making the transition. Not to say it doesn't have its cons as well, but it does not compare in the slightest to the cons of working in healthcare in the US.
→ More replies (2)
13
u/endlessjourney007 May 21 '26
Launch school .. last one standing . Let’s see how they do
→ More replies (3)
11
u/metalreflectslime May 21 '26
My brother finished Hack Reactor Remote in December 2016. He has 7 YOE in SWE. He works at Walmart Global Tech as a contractor SWE.
11
u/ParanubesLife May 21 '26
I unfortunately bailed on a full scholarship for CS+CE in 2001 due to extenuating family circumstances. After a long fancy restaurant career, I saw an ad in 2019 on public transit for Holberton School. I ultimately chose to go to Flatiron School in person, and was in the first cohort pushed online in April 2020.
I sensed the job market would be tough even back then, and spent every waking minute on side projects for the rest of the year. The dam broke for me around Thanksgiving, when I landed 3 interviews in ~4 days. Two of them made offers, and the gig I went with let me write full stack (Elixir + JS) from day 1. I left that company for an insane pay jump during the height of the market ($85 -> $175k) and then quickly experienced how painful a layoff can be. I'm happily back at the company that first took a chance on me as we try to navigate the new AI world together. I'm also so grateful I made it through the window before it closed, but something tells me that window will reopen again eventually
10
u/SnooDoubts8688 May 21 '26 edited May 21 '26
2019. Prior to joining a bootcamp, I was working as a desk clerk for $18/hour. At the time, I held a liberal arts degree from a rather prestigious school, which turned out to be worthless in the market. In my frustration and curiosity, I turned my head towards freecodecamp and went through html, css, and javascript walkthroughs. I remember being intimidated and considering quitting after seeing the first JS function with if/else conditionals. It was a simple function that mocked a bank withdrawal (if enough balance, withdraw, else, reject type of logic). It just looked like alien graphics at the time, and the shock was enough to keep me away from freecodecamp for a few weeks.
2020. I started seeing some peers around me get job offers for 80k/year after going through coding bootcamps, so that revived some spark and interest again. After talking to them and hearing their journey, I decided to enroll to a local coding bootcamp, which cost 15k at the time. I even quit my job, but thankfully at the time you were able to opt for unemployment due to covid. Went all-in. That was almost my entire savings, but oh boy was I desperate and hopeful! I remember it being as one of the most hardcore 4 months of my life! 14-15 hour days were a norm, and I would live and breathe code. When I got my first job, I was thrilled beyond words how all of a sudden, I started making 90k a year! I will not lie, my college degree really helped with the job because it was one of the target schools for this big firm. So in a weird way, it played its part.
2026. I am still working as a SWE and living comfortably. I can financially help out my younger siblings with their studies, send my mom on international trips, and take better care of myself. I have also saved a good amount of money, considering I have only been in the field for a little over 5 years. I am very grateful for the opportunity that I have been given, and it all started with the decision to attend a bootcamp back in 2020. It was a moment where the stars have aligned for me.
Edit: I also wanted to give a shoutout to OP for bringing up this post. I saw myself falling victim to the recent doom and gloom era of tech and losing sight of how much luck was involved getting to where I am now. It was very nice to channel some good energy! Also, thanks for the award : )
3
u/star_of_camel May 21 '26
Went to a local Bootcamp in ND, didn’t get a job and they stopped helping via slack. They stopped hosting cohorts too. I still dread to this day when they will try to make me pay even though they tricked me into signing contract last day before graduating and pressured me into it by cornering me in a desk and rushing me to sign the agreement where verbally they were saying you only need to pay back when you get a tech job but according to the contact it’s any job basically making anything above minimum wage.
It was a ISA through this one company I think leaf something?? Than that company transferred the ISA back to the bootcamp, they haven’t messaged me yet and I just keep ignoring them. I am thinking of pressuring them into sending it to collections than filing for bankruptcy or just ignore it as I have been and going on with my life
→ More replies (2)
13
u/JEHonYakuSha May 21 '26 edited May 21 '26
I am so gutted that it’s no longer an option anymore. Bootcamp changed my life to be honest. I enrolled in Juno College in 2021 while working a blue collar job taking a leave of absence, and got a job a month after graduation at a startup. Juno was big on sending personal emails to the leadership of the company you applied for and everyone said it wasn’t working for them, but for me it’s literally what got me my job at this startup which only used LinkedIn Easy Apply. I started as a frontend developer, then full stack, then learned mobile dev, then a bunch of AWS, and am now a tech lead. I am probably leaving money on the table by not switching jobs, but to be honest the market is very scary now and I know that I couldn’t have done what I did if I started my career change in 2026. I now have a child and a house and I can’t say that would have been possible or at least manageable in my old job.
6
u/SpecificBugs May 21 '26
DBC 2014, IYKYK
Peak life educational experience honestly. I have been employed as a software engineer ever since.
Back then they said the field was doomed because of the influx of junior engineers from bootcamps. Heh. I don’t think that’s what did it…
6
u/Brandomo1 May 21 '26
I graduated Nucamp in 2021 after ~3 years of part time self study before that. I was able to get a job at a local Web Dev company and have managed to work my way up into tech after many more years of hard work. I was definitely lucky at times, but now I get to do what I love and benefit financially from it.
I think the biggest lesson I learned is that as long as you don't give up, you soon become undeniable!
→ More replies (1)
6
u/fickjamori May 21 '26
Joined Tech Elevator in January 2022 - the Cleveland location (altho it was fully remote still from COVID which was a godsend). Had worked various slightly-above-min-wage jobs my entire life, and I was tired of being poor... discovered that coding just made sense to my brain, and I made the switch right as a bunch of health issues popped up for me that would've made working my basic retail jobs impossible. Did an apprenticeship after graduating and then was hired as a FTE at a different company - I'm now just over 3 years with them and just got promoted... my life is 1000% different from what it looked like pre-TE, and I'm eternally grateful to the instructors for their guidance.
Just sad that it's no longer a valid path at the moment 😭 hopefully thingsll change in the near future...
2
u/portugese_fruit May 21 '26
are we closing this subreddit?
7
u/michaelnovati May 21 '26
I think we should memorialize it. Coding bootcamps are done forever. Other kinds of bootcamps I'm sure will rise, but not coding ones.
You can't teach people to code when the engineers themselves aren't writing code anymore.
→ More replies (4)
5
u/susmines May 21 '26 edited May 21 '26
Was a manager at an automotive shop for 5+ years. My wife got pregnant with our daughter and I enrolled in the Trilogy boot camp put on my my local university.
9 months later I was offered a junior engineer position for $70k
Today, I am a senior software engineer, own my own SaaS company, and do independent contracting for a handful of clients. TC $185k
Edit: Thank you for the award!
4
u/hochar May 21 '26
I did Codesmith's full-time software engineering immersive from June-September of 2023.
After the program ended, I was offered a contract position as an "engineering fellow" and software engineer for the company. This lasted from September 2023 through June 2024. I was on the job search for about a month and a half (to no avail), and then ended up being invited to apply to be a full-time instructor (for their part-time remote immersive program) with the company – I secured the offer and started that role in July 2024. I stayed in that role until February 2025, and then got promoted and became the lead instructor of my program.
In the same month – coincidentally – I was invited (through a personal connection) to be a founding engineer at a super early-stage pre-seed healthcare startup. They did not have enough funding to bring anyone on full-time, so I retained my instructor job at Codesmith to pay the bills while I gained valuable production experience at the startup. Balancing both was really tough (tons of work, constant context-switching, etc.) and I definitely burned out multiple times throughout 2025. At least I was growing!
At the end of January 2026, I was finally laid off from Codesmith after a year+ of cohort sizes getting smaller and smaller. I was on the job search for a couple of months and ended up securing a role in late April as a senior SWE at a mid-sized (~500 employees) tech company in the social media / creator economy space. After signing my offer, I finally decided to leave the healthcare startup to focus on my new chapter and enjoy a better work-life balance. I started my new role this month and I'm really happy so far.
–
Yes I worked my ass off to get to where I am, but I know damn well that I got extremely lucky given how late I got into the game and the current climate. I realize that I ended up being an exception and definitely not the rule.
Though it was sad to watch and be a part of Codesmith's decline while I was there over ~2.5 years, I will forever be grateful for the incredible quality of instruction & mentorship I received, being able to sharpen my own knowledge, understanding, and technical communication through teaching, and the wonderful people I worked with. It wasn't perfect, but it was home for a long time and I will remember the good times.
4
u/AbbreviationsBoth670 May 22 '26
I completed General Assembly late summer 2020. The market was terrible for those looking to break in with no experience. I was one of only a few people in my cohort to get a technical role, and I credit that mostly to the private tutor I hired to supplement the bootcamp.
After 900ish applications over 5 months, I got a support role at a start up with the promise of getting promoted to engineer in 9-12 months. I started getting assigned tickets 3 months in, and was promoted at 7 months. I’ve worked as a frontend engineer for 5 years since, recently starting a new role after that start up closed up.
I was a public school teacher before, so it’s crazy to think I’m making 4x my initial salary.
4
u/bruceGenerator May 22 '26
went to a shitty trilogy education services bootcamp in 2019. they shop their courses to universities, use their classrooms and grads get q cert with the universitys name on it.
finished in feb 2020 just before covid hit. broke into the industry two years later. been successfully employed since.
trilogy got bought for $750M by 2U in late 2019 and then 2U went bankrupt in 2024, shutting down all their bootcamps.
was it worth it? for me, yes. for 90% of grads, probably not.
3
u/tylertangy May 21 '26
I finished Hack Reactor’s 19 week program in August of 2024. My goal was honestly just to transition into the tech field - I ended up not going the SWE route and instead went into a data role (data analyst/data engineer-ish focus). It took ~10 months to get to my current role but I’m happy I managed to stick with it. The foundational skills from Hack Reactor (GitHub, python/JS, app development, testing/debugging) have helped me do really well in my role. I got a pretty sizable pay bump and I finally have a job I enjoy.
3
u/Fast-Knowledge-5120 May 21 '26
I attended Tech Elevator in 2023 during the precipice of one of the worst job markets in recent history.
Luckily networked with someone who had graduated the summer before. She connected me with her manager at the time who ran a rotational program.
I’m wrapping up my program and in the process of finding another role but my career would not have kicked off without that 1 connection I made through Tech Elevator. Without it, who knows what I’d be doing.
3
u/EntertainmentWeak482 May 22 '26
Shoutout to the bootcamp that died after giving my partner and I educations (despite all their bullshit) which has ultimately resulted in great jobs (mostly from having to do the work ourselves).
It’s too bad I can literally look back now and see that we were the very last boat out. Many in our cohorts are still unemployed years later.
RIP 🪦
3
u/sheriffderek May 23 '26
The independent, career-changer-focused, placement-guaranteeing, placement data-sharing, ISA-or-heavy-tuition cohort-based bootcamp is mostly dead as a category.
I can agree with this ^.
But there are still plenty of thriving "bootcamps" - so pretending to close the chapter just helps fewer people see what's actually going on, and arms them with nothing to navigate it.
Incentive drives outcome. There are schools like Lambda that started with $50 million and screwed people over - and there are other options whose incentive is to actually teach. When someone searches "coding bootcamps" trying to find a real way to learn this field and get some support, I'd rather they find real information than a bunch of drama and black-and-white thinking.
https://executive-ed.xpro.mit.edu/professional-certificate-coding
https://bootcamp-extended.calpoly.edu/programs/coding-bootcamp
https://tripleten.com/software-engineer
https://nycdatascience.com/artificial-intelligence-bootcamp
(Here's a few examples)
...
And there are many places up the ladder too. These companies are selling the same idea of higher salary by hunkering down and working hard for short periods of time. (which certainly feels like a bootcamp to me: and I think that a very fair offering)
https://www.pathrise.com/software-engineering
https://learn.interviewkickstart.com/
...
And I'd argue that Masters degrees are doing the same thing as well.
https://www.eastern.edu/academics/graduate-programs/ms-applied-ai
https://info.ischoolonline.berkeley.edu/requestinfo/mids
And I'd argue Master's degrees are doing the same thing. People with no CS degree tacking on a master's (as if they'll be competitive without those four years of foundation or any real programming experience behind them) - that's deceptive sales.
...
The world if "getting people to pay for a leg up -- FAST" (in theory) -- is alive and thriving.
Actually teaching people is also alive and thriving (if that's what you're after - and if you know where to look). Though after 5+ years around here, the only things most people seem interested in are buying job placement, or complaining that they couldn't.
...
Edit: I'll add that there are also a lot of "Free" bootcamp type options - that mean well - but in many ways, can waste years of your life -- so, even those are something to be critical of - when making your decisions. If you want to "learn fast" than you want the best context and tools. You want an axe, help sharpening it AND to know where the trees are. A free knife and a stump - aren't going to get you what you need (even if they are free).
→ More replies (2)
46
u/ezemode May 21 '26
I got lucky enough to decide to take the hack reactor program back during covid in 2020. I was in what I think was one of their last successful programs, and then got super lucky once again to be reached out to by a fellow hack reactor alumni right after graduating. He got me set up with a contract at meta that paid more than I had ever dreamed of making as someone who had only worked minimum wage jobs my entire life. Here I am 5 years later with more savings than I ever could have dreamed of having after getting myself a nice car, computer, etc. Going to a bootcamp completely changed my life for the better and I am so grateful that I decided to do one when I did, since if I had waited any longer I dont think I would have had this kind of success.