Full-Time (12-week) Software Engineering Program

The program's structure is designed to build your skills from the ground up, starting with the fundamentals of programming and advancing to more complex concepts. I was amazed at how much I learned in such a short time - from Python programming, web development, and software engineering principles to data structures and algorithms.From day one, I was immersed in a supportive, engaging, and challenging environment that was tailored to help women and non-binary individuals break into the tech industry.What I cherish most from my time at Hackbright is the community I've become a part of. is the sense of solidarity, encouragement, and friendship among my peers.

As a recent graduate of Hackbright Academy, I can only describe my experience as amazing. I've been truly inspired by the staff, curriculum, and the community, all of which have played instrumental roles in my development as a professional software engineer.
Before joining Hackbright, the world of tech and coding seemed formidable, like a mountain too steep to climb. The thought of switching careers and learning an entirely new discipline was daunting, but with the outcomes and learning teams I feel heaps better than I would've if I was simply a CS graduate coming out of school. The career support from Outcomes was nothing short of phenomenal. They guided us on how to navigate the tech industry. They provided resources for job searching, resume building, interview preparation, and even salary negotiation. Even after graduation, the support continues, making me feel that Hackbright is commited to my long-term success.

I would also like to take a moment to appreciate the exceptional instructors (Jared & Drue). They were not only incredibly knowledgeable but were also patient, approachable, and genuinely invested in our learning. Their willingness to go the extra mile to ensure our understanding is something that I will always remember and appreciate. The one on ones with them were particularly useful and helpful as I decide what my next steps in tech may be. 

Very detailed topics, always helpful and patient teachers, from the very beginning building a great team that after 12 weeks creates a harmonious family.  This course gave me more than a change of profession or self-confidence, it gave me great friends and wonderful support on my way, for which I am very grateful.

It was an intense 12-week journey, learning both front-end and back-end technologies. As the only deaf student in the class, I faced challenges like the language barrier. I am extremely grateful for the patience, encouragement, and support from my instructors, supportive cohort mates, and everyone who took the time to communicate with me and help me make decisions throughout the project. Seeing the website I built and the code I wrote after just 12 weeks, I can hardly believe the progress I've made and the realization of my initial goals.

I had to discontinue my first sponsored cohort due to personal reasons. But HB did not give up on me the second time I applied. The trust they had on me enabled to successfully finish my cohort. Proud to have learnt from the best people.

From December 2022 to March 2023, I attended Hackbright Academy, a software engineering bootcamp designed to empower women+ in the tech industry and change the ratio. Overall, my experience was positive, but there were some things that met my expectations, others that exceeded them, and others that were not met.

Regarding the expectations that were met, I feel like I had a firehose shot at me and I definitely couldn't drink from it. It was what I expected it to be like.

However, my expectations were exceeded in some areas. At first, I was worried that I wouldn't feel tight/connected with my cohort mates, but that wasn't the case. Over time, we got pretty close and have real plans for staying connected post-course. The group at large was non-competitive, supportive, and kind. While everyone had differing levels of understanding and background with coding, those who were ahead did not appear to be impatient with those who were not at their level. Instead they were kind, patient, understanding and helpful. We all seemed to have the attitude of 'no one left behind' which was immeasurably comforting. In an often-times competitive field, I did not feel that here. (If you are seeking to avoid the 'tech bro' culture, this is the place to be!)The weekly check-ins with staff were nice to have, and our socials were fun. The love, kindness, and gentleness of the group at large, including the staff, were wonderful.
On the other hand, there were some expectations that were not met. There needs to be more consistent, guided reviews, and spaced repetition is crucial to learning. More could be done to build regular check-ups on material into the schedule/curriculum. I think this would be helpful so we don't hear about it on one lecture, do its related skills assessment that weekend (expect to carve out at least 6-12 hours of your weekend to complete!), and then forget about it, only to be expected to remember it for a white-boarding session some weeks later.
The cost of the program was also a concern for many students, who felt that the amount of independent work required did not justify the price (nearly $13,000). During project season, some felt lost, and generally, more support was needed throughout the course. Although the instructors were good, the structure was not always what students expected. I personally benefited from a full scholarship that made the cost negligible for me (I still had to survive months without income and paid $250 for the prep course). But had I not had the benefit of the scholarship and had I been relying on an ISA, I would feel similarly. That being said, if one were able to afford the cost and wanted to be in this type of environment I think it is worth it but if one cannot afford it, I would recommend researching other schools that may cost much less and may have similar community aspects. 
Anyone without a Mac will also need to figure out how to set up Windows, which can be challenging as the staff had limited knowledge to support them with environment set up. More support on weekends/non school hours would have been appreciated. Some students felt that outcomes laid it on thick about being overtly extroverted to get the job, which was not inclusive of introverts. Some students were triggered by this and felt the need to avoid masking, which affected their experience in the program.
With regards to the curriculum, when I was initially inquiring about it, it was stated that the curriculum isn't updated very frequently so I would suggest that if you are looking into Hackbright you inquire as well about the last time it was updated. It is my opinion that given the speed at which tech progresses, the curriculum needs to be adjusted frequently to keep up. The fundamentals may stay the same but one would expect regular check-ups on the relevancy of the materials for a $12,900 price tag. I think it is worth saying that the instructor team is pretty awesome in most regards. However, I would note that there are instructors who were relatively recent Hackbright grads. I personally feel this is a mistake, and that it is better to hire experienced engineers with teaching expertise and if they were a Hackbrighter they should have had at least a couple years in the field before being allowed to teach. There is a benefit though where you know they understand what you are going through and can sympathize with your struggles. Their kindness and patience and emotional support was extremely appreciated.I will come back to this and update when I have had time to job hunt and experience the job assistance from outcomes post course. ---Despite these challenges, the community at Hackbright was seen as supportive and kind, and many students were grateful to have met each other. The call to change the ratio in the tech industry was echoed, and efforts to create a more inclusive and supportive environment for all students were encouraged. There is a huge alumni network and many are responsive and kind, ready to jump on a half hour call to chat about their experience and offer some amount of mentorship, there's definitely a feeling of those who are willing to reach back behind them to help others up. I intend to be a part of this chain. Please come find me on LinkedIn if you'd like to chat more about my experience.  It should be noted that I attended the school online and not in person, there are no in person options anymore. So the form for Course Report is outdated and needs fixing. I put that I was at their SF campus just to be able to submit. 

Hackbright is like thesis week in college, but for three months. It is an intense learning environment that does not allow for too much else to be going on in your life, but if you have the capacity, ability, and support around you to make that work -- I'd recommend you make that leap! It will push you to the limits of what you thought was possible, and you will come out on the other side as a strong job candidate that can tackle any twist and turn your career will throw at you. 

I really recommend Hackbright for anyone looking to learn more about coding and Software Engineering. I learned a lot and feel like it was a great experience, in a really welcoming environment. Hackbright Alumni are also the nicest community. However, this doesn't mean you get a guaranteed job. You need to network, and put in the work to get the best out. But if you are willing to do that, then I would definitely go for it! 

My instructors were excellent.  There were some issues with the mentor program and some support services for our cohort. Career assistance was slightly wonky for our cohort (the main outcomes person left but a couple of great ladies stepped into her role and are super helpful). Some of the course content is better than others but overall a good experience where you can learn a lot in a short period of time. 

I'm writing this review as someone that has been through multiple programs.  (Dev Bootcamp (3 months), then Holberton School (1-2 years), finally here at HackBright (3 months)).  Although I enjoyed my time with each school and each was great in different ways, the sense of camaraderie and support (both educational and personal) that I experienced here felt greatly amplified compared to my previous experiences.In terms of the course material, I'm comparing this with other 3 months programs; but the fact that fundamental skills such as data structure & algorithms, big O and whiteboarding (for interviews) are taught place it ahead of other schools that just teach you how to make web apps and that's it.   The only area that I felt that could use improvements was to possibly add in at least 1 or 2 group projects (there are frequent partnered assignments, but those are usually 1 day and with only 1 other person.)  Having gone through group projects with more people for extended days, those opportunities allowed us to practice project management skills and gave a feel for what it's like working in an actual team, plus it resulted in multiple projects to put on our resume.The emphasis on building espirit de corps through weekly socials and checkins also resulted in a tighter knit group socially.  I feel much more connected to and supported by my cohort-mates as a group than I did in my previous experiences.  Lastly, I was lucky enough to be in a sponsored cohort (walmart).  So for us, the job outcome was amazing.  I've been struggling to get my foot in the door for years now (maybe age is a factor? I was close to ~40 when I completed the other programs) but this was the school that actually helped me get my first engineering job.  Hackbright changed my life, thank you! <3

Hackbright is an amazing academy that takes you from writing some of your first lines of code to building out apps and learning in-demand technologies. Becoming a student was an amazing decision and I was taught not only how to code but how to continue my education on my own. I love the ability to come back, audit classes, join seminars, and job fairs, and forever be a part of this wonderful and welcoming community. Every teacher was patient, informative, and determined to help students to reach deeper levels of understanding. I loved the homework, labs, and pair programming that led to me landing an intern position that already triples any salary I've ever made. With hard work and effort on my part and guidance from Hackbright, my life has forever changed for the better.

I came here hoping to find a quality educative experience which would get me set up for software engineering. I quit my decent paying job doing very repetitive html work to learn software engineering. I ignored my gut instincts of good sense to join this program lol.A few pros:- if you need any guidance to keep you on track with learning, it’s great to a have A program to help you with it. I know I needed a program.- we got to meet a few select companies that were “interested” in hiring Hackbright grads. Few of us were competitively ready enough for even apprentice positions.- people are niceCons:- a lot of cash to pay for dull PowerPoint slides and a handful of checked assignments. I have adhd though so it was hard to sit still for 2-3 hour segments of slides without getting to practice hands on.- the teachers did not seem to take it seriously enough, a lot of toxic positivity when i could sense the quality of material was not up to par.- the frameworks used are not what will help you get in the door of most companies. They are not modern. They act like it’s not important to have to learn a specific library but to show that you are a good learner. We all know that that is not a plight every single person can use to squeeze by to get a job.- overall they did not respect the fact that people quit their jobs to take this class, and they could barely get any of our graduates into companies. I think a few of us had to give up. We just simply were not taught in depth enough or the right things to get us into companies, which SHOULD be the ultimate goal to getting us back on our feet.I felt slightly taken advantage of, knowing this is a for profit company and that it has stripped all of my savings and I had to take out a private loan (which are the most difficult) instead of any kind of educative loan.Luckily enough, I had a connection from BEFORE the program who was able to get me into a job using a strong amount of skills I had before the program. This program isn’t competitive enough. the economy isn’t THAT desperate for entry level eager-to-learn newbie engineers expecting 80k+ comp. This program is just not it. If you’re reading this, move on!

Great curriculum, amazing instructors who go above and beyond to provide help and clarification, and amazing career counselors who went out of their way to guide me through communicating with recruiters, negotiating salary, and getting my first job

The Hackbright Academy program I attended was a full time, 12-week full stack web development bootcamp for women and people who are gender diverse. Their mission is to change the ratio within the job field and help create personalized paths to a software engineering career. Hackbright offers an online learning experience, however, still builds a community within the constraints of a screen. During the course we attended class from 10am-6pm Monday through Friday. We would split our time between lectures, pair-programming labs, lightning talks, and project time. The Hackbright instructors made sure no one fell behind by constantly checking in and making sure we were receiving the adequate support we needed. Every Friday, we would have team building time along with advice from the Outreach team on how we could prepare ourselves on being successful after the program in regards to the job search. 
Throughout the program we focused on core programming, data structures/APIs, and web technologies. The tech stack we primarily focused on was a combination of Python, Flask, CSS, HTML, React, AJAX/Jinja, Bootstrap & SQLAlchemy. 
In terms of preparing us for our job search after Hackbright, they did an amazing job. Nearing the end of the program, the academy sets up a Demo Night to show off our Independent Projects to major companies (Amazon, Walmart, Twilio, WePay, Dialoggbox). Personally, the week following graduation I was in communication with three companies and received two job offers the next Friday. 
I joined Hackbright to pivot my career with more of a technical emphasis and it did just that. Very appreciative of my time with the wonderful staff, instructors, and fellow Hackbright alums. 

Pros - If you don't know anything and don't mind not learning much for your 1k+/week program, Hackbright is the place for you.Cons- It will be very difficult for you to find a job. Outcomes will tell you your resume looks great, keep grinding and to "be prepared for a paycut" - Staff are almost all recent HB grads, not teachers or experienced SWEs. This means they are still learning and are often unable to answer questions outside of a very basic range. Our lead instructor failed out of another bootcamp, did the HB program and was unable to find a job so they hired her to be a lead instructor. That is the quality of instruction you can expect.- Hackbright will not protect your financial information. A student's full name, address, and bank information were "unintentionally" emailed to another student. I'm not sure that they notified that student, which they are required by CA law to do.- Instructors frequently did not understand their own demos. More than once admitted that they hadn't reviewed the slides prior to lecture.- Curriculum is poorly thought out, incomplete, and lacks appropriate confirmatory work.
- Slides, homework, and assessments are riddled with meaning-altering errors. When students complained, we were told "you should have seen how bad it used to be"- Help is unavailable during queue hours. Hackbright says wait times of up to 30 minutes are acceptable. Many, many students including myself waited hours or days for help that never came on multiple occasions. HB acknowledges that this was unacceptable but didn't do anything to solve it.- Staff frequently complained of being overworked, being busy with other cohorts, or being too tired to participate in scheduled queue times or to give full effort during lectures. - You will be held back by the slowest learners in your cohort during project season. No help for projects was available until after every student completed their data models, which took almost a full week.- Zero support for project demos for Windows users - Watch out if you are trans of nonbinary, you will consistently be misgendered and brushed off- Assessments are not graded in a timely fashion. We waited FIVE WEEKS for one assessment to be graded and 2+ weeks for all but one other. If you are doing something wrong, you won't know until the program ends and good luck teaching yourself at that point. Hackbright admits this has been a problem "for some time" but has done nothing to fix it.- Use old tech. Who still uses vagrant? - Instructors encouraged anyone who was ahead to use React for their projects, then refused to support the students using React, using the excuse that it is not part of the curriculum - then why did you tell us to use it??? I can teach myself a new framework with no help or resources on my own time.- Hackbright took a full month to do an "investigation" of our experience and determined that it was in line with what they promise and intend to deliver. 

I've just finished Hackbright and am disappointed. They have not transitioned well from in person to online and I think the quality has gone done considerably since they were bought by Capella education in 2016 (Capella was then bought by SEI in 2018 which may also be a factor). Personally, I regret coming to HB and wish I had chosen a different bootcamp (or just self-studied) but also acknowledge they are definitely not the worst out there. Several of us did express dissatisfaction with the program and after a "review" our experience was considered in alignment to their standards so anyone looking at bootcamps can expect to have a similar experience to mine at Hackbright. Here are my main issues so you can make an informed decision.The negatives

Not a challenging program - the mentality seemed to be relax, don't worry, don't push yourself too much which is the opposite of what I was looking for. If you have no background at all in tech and want a very supportive environment this can be good but if you want to finish a bootcamp and be somewhat competitive in the job market, this is not the program for you. Almost everything I learned in the program was through self-study. The classes were very slow and honestly, I learned more from the pre-work than the classes. Also, most staff had limited programming knowledge which meant they were unable to answers more in-depth questions. I'm lucky to have friends in tech so I had a network of people who could help me/answer my questions the staff wasn't able to but that obviously isn't the case for everyone.
Hackbright staff is spread too thin and which resulted in:
Fewer than anticipated advising sessions for some (I had 4 over the course of 12 weeks)
Multiple weeks to get feedback on our assessments (there are a total of 7 assessments. One took 4 weeks to get feedback on)
Long turn-around period to get questions answered. There is a system of asking questions to a channel and then staff helping people in the order the question was received. Best case scenario it took a few hours to get questions answers but worst case it took some people days. This was problematic when we were working on projects. Also, because of the aforementioned staff's lack of knowledge - asking questions in the channel was frequently a waste of time. 
No code reviews. At all. The entire 12 weeks of the program.

Friday check in was called "feeling circle" - I came here to learn to code and being expected to share our feelings with a group of strangers was extremely uncomfortable and weird. 
The positives
I got GREAT mentors out of the program. However, these mentors are 100% volunteer - just people who volunteer to be mentors and I just got lucky to happen to be matched with two really great people.
The network and support system the students built to help each other is great. We did learn a lot helping each other out and teaching each other the concepts out of necessity. For example, React wasn't fully taught as part of the curriculum so a group of us worked together to teach ourselves. 

Some notes: I think the experience is largely dependent on the instructor assigned to your cohort. That being said, the cohort before ours had several dissatisfied students and at least one of the other ongoing cohorts is having similar frustrations so even with different instructors, something is going wrong. Also, keep in mind that bootcamps are for-profit education which can be problematic. I knew this coming in and expected that the "change the ratio" slogan was at least part marketing but still, even with (I felt) realistic expectations, I was very disappointed. I regret wasting my money. 

I chose this bootcamp because of the comfortable atmostphere and focus on work-life balance, which other bootcamps seem to lack. I had gone through the prep program and knew the quality of instructor and the environment.

I found the curriculum to be very well thought-out and organized. My software-engineering friends were often surprised and impressed by the topics covered - "Wow, you're learning that?!". During my very first onsite interview a CEO of a tech company was looking through my capstone project and expressed his shock that I was able to learn the concepts to complete such a robust project, and complete the project itself, within such a short time span. The curriculum itself is constantly being updated and refined based on what is going on out in the field and feedback, but the great thing is that all the old lectures are available as a resource, even as an alum. I used some of these as extra resources while completing my project and while preparing for interviews.

The lecture followed by lab format was invaluable in cementing the concepts covered, and the pair-programming in labs helped us to get comfortable talking in 'tech-speak', a valuable skill for interviewing. Not to mention helping each other over stumbling blocks! I loved the back half of the program which focused more on building our projects. We would have a comp science lecture in the morning followed by open project time. The instructors were available for help during that period and were always patient and knowledgeable. I learned a great deal during this period as it was almost like having a one-on-one tutor. And when the projects were done we had the opportunity to present in front of several companies, which was excellent practice as well as an invaluable networking opportunity. 

The career support was also incredible and well-balanced. There was a career lecture once a week focusing on a new topic throughout the entire program. These included small weekly assignments (such as practicing our stories, revising our resumes, how to research companies, and updating our LinkedIn profile) to prepare us for the job hunt in a calm and methodical manner. We had two one-on-one strategy sessions with the career services staff during the program and one after graduation to figure out what types of companies might suit us best and to help us strategize how to find a job. The last two weeks were almost entirely focused on the career journey. Lectures focused on different aspects of the interview process, fieldtrips were organized to practice whiteboarding with engineers in the 'real' world and gain exposure to different environments, we even got a practice take-home coding challenge which was then reviewed with tips and tricks on tackling these problems (which severely reduced my anxiety about them), and we learned tips for applying to positions. 

Perhaps the coolest thing was the mentor program. All of us were assigned two mentors. Our mentors were able to help us with our projects, provide career advice, and be there for anything we needed. I found it helpful to talk with mine about their 'real-world' experiences in software engineering, particularly when it came to things to consider while designing a webapp. Most mentors are willing to continue the relationship beyond the program end too!

I'm so glad I chose Hackbright as my bootcamp. It was an amazing, supportive environment, my cohort-mates are amazing people I am proud to call my friends, and the quality of education is top-notch.

I wish we'd gotten to dive deeper into some of the topics and covered some others, but at the end of the day it's a 12-week bootcamp, not a 4 year comp science degree! I would not hesitate to recommend this program to anyone considering a bootcamp.

From the application process, to being accepted, to graduating, I have absolutely no complaints or crticisms. Hackbright offers support in every dimension and the curriculum is geared towards success. I felt comfortable asking questions everyday, the staff was unbelievably open/accepting, and we worked with relevant technologies that prepared us immensely for any industry. Highly suggest for anyone that wants to jumpstart their career in software engineering!

You can do impossible when you have passion and are supported by a great learning environment.

Hackbright helped me to make my dream come true.

After 12 years in Technical Recruiting and hiring hundreds of software engineers I decided to give myself a chance to become a software engineer myself. When I was looking for a software engineering bootcamp, I was super picky as I wanted to choose the best one and I ended up with Hackbright. They met all my requirements:

1. Curriculum.  - during the course, we covered most critical skills and tools required to be a software engineer, including version control, the Linux command line, relational databases, web frameworks, AJAX/JQuery, and front-end frameworks. We also covered broader essential software engineering topics like debugging, pair programming, code reviews, core computer science concepts (including runtime analysis, recursion, and advanced data structures, such as linked lists, graphs, and trees), and technical whiteboarding.

2. Practical skills - each student was working on her project. Each of us built her web-application from scratch. By doing that we went through each step of Product Life-Cycle Development - DB design, back-end, front-end, implementation, debugging, testing, UX-design. During the project time, our instructors used Agile software development approach - we had two sprints, MVP and daily scrums.

3. Learning environment - supportive, encouraging, motivational and has a lot of fun! Our instructors created an open and collaborative environment. Sometimes I didn't feel I am on a lecture; it was more like a team discussion. New topics were clearly explained and questions were patiently answered. 

4. Success stories -  I carefully reviewed the Hackbright job report. I was impressed by the program completion rate  ( 99%) and average time to land the first job after the program. Last two weeks of the program are focused on job search techniques and tools. Hackbright also gave us a great tool of how to live after Hackbright :) (sounds funny, but so relevant) - how to organize your daily routine to keep learning, practicing and job searching. For me, it took two months to land a software engineer job. 

It was challenging and fun, and a piece of my heart will always stay with this fantastic school.  I would highly recommend this program to anyone who is looking for a way to become a software engineer. 

Coming from an education background (HS science teacher) Hackbright Academy was an easy choice. When I was weighing my options for bootcamp programs, there were some I came across that threatened to kick student's out based on repeated low assessment scores. A concept that seemed very possible for me at the time. When I inquired about Hackbright's policy on low assessment scores, I was told that their approach was to initiate a conversation about what could be improved upon (whether that be more frequent advisor check-ins, modifying study habits, making better use of mentors, etc). Hackbright's student centered program made it the easy and right choice for me.

 I was so impressed with the quality of instruction throughout the course. My instructors were passionate, knowledgable, and open to feedback. Their patience for questions seemed never-ending. As for the greater Hackbright community, I was encouraged and supported throughout the 12 weeks and beyond. The career services Hackbright provides really prepared me to enter the post-Hackbright abyss, and I actually ended up landing a job through their internal job board. I would highly recommend this program to anyone wanting to transition to a career in Software Engineering.