App Academy

This boot camp is definitely worth it if you are looking to learn a ton and serious about making the career switch to becoming a web developer. In 6 months, I went from writing simple algorithms like isPrime and caeser cipher in Ruby to building full stack web applications using technologies such as Ruby on Rails, MERN stack, GraphQL/Apollo, and much more. By the end of the course, you will feel like you can learn any language or framework, and look at any web application, and have a good sense on what you need to do to reproduce its features, which are very powerful skills. That being said, your mileage will vary depending on how much effort you spend practicing and truly understanding the material.

A typical day (online)  looks like this.
8am Morning Q & A on homework lectures and project
8:30am - 11:15am video lectures broken down on 15-20 min chunks followed by 10 min of q & a
11:15am - 12:30pm lunch
12-30 - 4:30pm Pair programming, you are paired with another student and together you tackle the project for the day applying everything from the lectures/hw into a project. Everyday a different project. You have access to the TA's during this time as well.
4:30pm - 5:30pm (but 6pm really)  End of day lecture / q & a 
At least 2 hours of homework (video lectures, small projects)
The weekends I usually spent 4hrs on Saturdays catching up with hw/projects and about 2-3hrs on Sundays getting ready for the next week.
You have an exam every 2.5 weeks. The week before the exam you typically spend 1-2hrs every day preparing for it and definitely about 10-12hrs during the weekend. 

- Dedicated and knowledgeable instructors. I was self-learning before a/A and having an instructor is huge, something that could have taken me days to figure out was solved with the instructor's help on a matter of minutes.
- The online experience is great, you collaborate the whole time with other students by doing pair programming and everyday you are working on a different project.
- You finish the program with 3 full stack projects and a javascript game.
- After the program you get assigned to a career coach that keeps you accountable to the number of companies you've reached out to and helps you prepare for upcoming interviews.
- You don't have to pay them until you get a job.

Before App Academy I was already moving towards another bootcamp since I was in their prep course. Unfortunately, the experience decimated me to the point where I questioned if a career move was right for me. As a last ditch effort, I did App Academy’s prep due to the guarantee. I was honestly blown away. There was an honest attempt to break down the concepts and present it in a way that anyone, even with no coding experience, could understand. From there I was sold, never looked backed and made it into the immersive program.
Daily life as a student:- Days are M-F from 8AM - 5PM PST.- There are 6 assessments, failing 2 will get you kicked out so there is a lot of pressure involved- While in immersive, you’ll mostly be pair programming working on projects- There is homework every night which needs to be completed for the following day. Some of the homework can be 4-5 hours long, so after a long day of work, you have more work- After immersive, you’ll spend most of your time working on projects while learning some new concept and materials in between
I will say for my individual experience:- My instructors were amazing. They were really chill, knowledgeable, and their support is one of the things I will always speak highly of.- All of my cohort mates are awesome. Everyone has different backgrounds, but you start to lean on each other for support, and build connections you didn’t expect.- I learned a lot, it doesn’t always feel that way. But the knowledge you gain from the begin to end is substantial, and that is a big plus.
I can’t speak for job search since I’m only beginning, but what I can say is I like my career coach. His plan and expectations make sense and I’m hopeful it’ll land a job soon.
Overall, if I went back in time, I’d still do it all over again. I had such an amazing experience and would recommend App Academy based off of that. It’s hard of course, but worth it.

I learned so much the past four months at App Academy. The structure of the program is just so good, it is adapted so you could learn so much material in such a short amount of time. However, of course there are downfalls cramming material that would be usually taught over a week at a university course in a single day. I would like to say that they do not lie when they say you will be putting in a strenuous amount of hours coding and learning. The people you meet here at App Academy are the best resources you'll garner!!! It is definitely an atmosphere, where you're frequently working hard because your with peers who are doing the same to reach the same goal. The TAs work hard to make sure you're on track, and they actually do care about your success in the course and in the future.

If you're looking for a structured program that pushes you harder than you could ever push yourself, this is it.

Pros:
- Daily projects to practice the concepts you learn
- TAs to help you along the way
- Three major projects for your portfolio towards the end of the course
- Your cohort-mates are just as motivated as you so it's a really good environment to be in

Cons:
- They move through the material really fast and it always feels like you never completely learn everything (which is expected I guess, given the amount of info taught in such a short amount of time
- There are weekly assessments - two fails result in a dismissal, which adds a lot of stress in addition to the course load
- They mean it when they say 'expect to work 80-90+ hours a week'.

Overall, i really loved my time at a/A. The TA's are amazing, and really are there to see you succeed. But keep in mind they are app academy graduates (they are all very intelligent) so if you're going to ask a question outside of the scope of the curriculum don't always expect an answer, but i promise you if they don't know they will do there best to get back to you with an answer. This is not bad though because as a software engineer you'll always have to figure stuff out on your own and thats totally ok. My only real criticism of App Academy is not allowing you to use laptops in lecture. Honestly it bothered me more than it should but it definitely took me and my attention away from lectures, as i suck at taking notes. Just imagine trying to follow along to dry code while watching someone give you a lecture Redux. The days i got away with having my laptop in lecture, i was completely focused took incredible notes in notion, and learned a bunch. The days i didn't which was most, i didn't pay attention, i slacked off, and made up for it during pair programming and at night, which was super annoying. If you cant tell already it really bothered me.

When it comes to the curriculum, there are parts I definitely disagree with but overall they jam pack you with more than you'll ever be able to grasp all at once. Which is excellent. From high level algorithms to LRU Cache, and hashing functions, to understanding the foundations of a MVC framework. They definitely need to teach hooks in React though, and get away from only teaching class Components. It's out of date, compile rate is way slower and the industry is staying away from class Components, unless its dealing with error handling. They need to teach less ruby and more React. Ruby is a really beautiful but also a really easy language. The amount of time they focus on it is probably better spent elsewhere.

Job Support so far is alright, everything seems to out of order though. Not sure where to go or what to do most times. The lectures are way too long and could be shortened by 2/3, or a simple email.

Im being very critical right now, but thats because these were the things i wish i knew before i went into App Academy. Do i regret joining? Hell No!!
Did i meet some amazing people that ill be friends with forever? Yes!!!! Did i learn a lot? YES!! Can they improve? Yes! are they the best bootcamp youll get. Also YES!

They call it a bootcamp for a reason: App Academy is tough, but you've got this. 

I started a/A with a background in the arts. My experience in coding was pretty much limited to a few Arduino loops and some sine wave generation I had learned once, in a class in college, 10 years ago. 16 weeks later, just as they said I would, I have the skills to build fully functional and stylish web applications, with knowledge of roughly a dozen or so languages and APIs. It was great! That said, as I've mentioned, it was tough; mentally, physically and emotionally, just all around exhausting. 

If you are considering a/A, definitely think it over, don't just jump into it.  If you have family who will be around/helping during your time in the program, talk it through with them as well because it can be hard for them too. You might not get to see them as much as you'd think because the days run long. And you will most likely have a few bad days and it's good to let them know that's a possibility. Keep your communication open. 

Despite the toughness and frustrations that come with a program like this it is worth it. And a/A has a fabulous staff who really does have your back. They encourage and prop you up when you are down from day one to the end. 15 weeks in I had a major breakthrough and I sent a message to one of my main counselors saying "It's the first time in 15 weeks that I've felt like I've got this". Their response was "regardless of how you felt in the past 14 weeks, you've always got it!" I can't thank them enough, the technical help they provided was great, the compassion was priceless. 

If you are interested in coding and you need a place to start App Academy is a great place for it. 

What you get is what you put into it. I definitely learned a lot at App Academy, and going in with a month of programming knowledge, over the 16 weeks of this course I've learned much more than I ever imagined. However, the experience is extremely draining - mentally, physically, and emotionally. Be prepared to spend 10-12 hour days studying/working/commuting because that is what a coding bootcamp is. 

Pros: I learned a lot from the curriculum and the daily pair programming. TAs were very friendly, understanding, and willing to help. My classmates were warm, hard-working, and bright and I am happy to call many of them friends. You will come out of the program with 3 projects, a good understanding of the job market at an entry level but most importantly you will learn HOW to learn to code and find resources and work through problems on your own because there is so much to learn, especially starting from scratch. 

Cons: Lectures seemed very shallow and time-consuming and not the most helpful beyond a surface level overview. TA to student ratio was not the best and so at times it took a while for a question to be answered. Job search curriculum is generic and arbitrary deadlines are annoying to deal with when working on several other projects at the same time. Struggling through projects is difficult as you are not taught everything you need to know but also rewarding when you are able to learn and solve problems on the fly.

App Academy was a great experience for me. The teaching staff were very knowledgable and were quick to answer questions. The program really does take 60 - 80 hours a week to get the full experience, it is very hard work but well worth it in the end. The support they provide to help you as you learn new languages and frameworks to building new projects to showcase abilities and eventually guide you through the job search has been very solid. Overall a positive experience, but if you can't handle stressful deadlines and costly tests I would opt for a more relaxed and fleshed out program.