App Academy

If it sounds too good to be true it probably is. App academy is no exception. 

Getting into app academy is not as hard as they make it seem. A few basic ruby programming problems and you are in.

Their curriculum is nothing special. It's all open source which you can find online for free or low cost. 

After quitting my job and investing a ton of time and energy, I was "asked" to leave after 9 days into the program. 

App academy's PC culture of diversity, inclusiveness, ass kissing, and bureaucracy did not click with me. They are big on pair programming which is a complete waste of time and a hindrance to learning. Facilities are filthy and men can't even get their own restroom. Every day there was some diversity, women in tech, gay pride, sensitive training type thing going on. That crap doesn't belong in the workplace. 

App academy's claim to fame is "no tuition until hired". This is complete bullshit. I paid a $5000 deposit which was inconvenient but I didn't think too hard about. I thought it would be similar to a security deposit on rent. When I was asked to leave they only gave me back $2300 when I expected my full refund. 

Based on their model, they are incentivized to take as many students as they can, cull the ones that don't work and make a ton of money. I like most people would think "no tuition until hired" means they do everything they can to get you hirable. Turns out they don't give a shit because they keep your money.

I don't mind being "asked" to leave. What I have an issue with is claiming "no tuition until hired" and then turning around and keeping my money. 

If they had refunded my amount completely they would have kept their promise and I would have been fine with that.

This is false and deceptive adverting. This is fraud. This is coercion.

The reason why they have perfect reviews on yelp is because they stick a non-disbarment clause to students who are asked to leave. 

This is illegal in California. Shows the length of what these scam artists do for money. Suppression of free speech. This review will probably get down voted until no one sees it.

I talked to a lawyer and he said since I signed the termination contract I have accepted their "refund" and there's nothing I can do. I was coerced into signing it because I would get nothing if I didn't.

App Academy has got to be the best coding bootcamp around, and I would say the best coding education period.

First of all, the TAs are some of the smartest people I've ever met and they go the extra mile to make sure you understand the material.

Second of all, the course goes at lightning speed. You're always motivated to work as hard as humanly possible because the material is fun, the supplementary videos and homework are awesome, and because of the pair programming aspect.

Third, by the end of the course you not only know how to create web apps, you know how to teach yourself practically anything. A big part of the time spent at App Academy is spent figuring out how to accomplish things, and that's one of the most important skills as a programmer.

Thanks to App Academy, I'm now doing what I love to do!

For anyone determined to make a career change to software development, I cannot recommend App Academy enough. It was incredibly strenuous, but it was totally worth the effort. You will legitimately spend about 70-80 hours a week working for three months, but you learn so much. I had around two years of intermittent experience in software development prior to the course. Most of what I learned was through Ruby on Rails tutorials and some personal Rails applications, all self-taught. App Academy had a perfect mix of CS theory and practical development to enrich my understanding of building software. This mix also provided an excellent foundation for branching-out and learning other tools than what are taught in the curriculum. I still look back at the curriculum material for reference because it is so good. My classmates were some of the smartest and nicest people that I have ever met, and the staff were extremely professional and seemed to genuinely care about our progress. 

I went to App Academy in the Cohort that graduated in March 2015. Overall, I think they did a really solid job covering the fundementals of each technology such as Ruby, Rails, SQL, JavaScript & Backbone. When I began interviewing, I did have to spend more time to learn each of these topics in greater depth, because some of the interview questions were specific to HTML, CSS, JavaScript and you just had to memorize that trivia. 

One things that is great about AA that a lot of other bootcamps do not cover is their Algorithm and Data Structures carriculum during the job search. It was super useful to learn about performance, time and space complexity. 

I ended up finding a software engineering job after gradaution so I definitely think their formula works. 

I attended App Academy back in the Spring of 2014 in New York with Jonathan Tamboer as my instructor and about 20 - 25 other student in my cohort. I attended with the hopes of just learning more about software development and become proficient in a web language, such as Ruby. App Academy delivered all that and more.

Both our instructor and TA were very helpful and attentive. Jonathan was very aware of how everyone was receiving the material and focused his attention where appropriate to ensure everyone was on the same page. I will say that the pace of course is not for everyone. It is intense and you can easily fall too far behind if you are not careful.

I ended up deciding to immediately pursue a job as a software engineer and it didn't take long to find the perfect fit. I felt App Academy prepared me well as a junior developer and also prepared me well for the job search process. I'd recommend this course to anyone looking to learn web development.