CodingNomads

I attended the 2018 Java bootcamp in Playa del Carmen, Mexico which included 4 weeks remote work preparation, 8 weeks on site in Mexico and a following 4 weeks remote work on the final project. I had a great time on the course! Playa del Carmen had a very relaxed vibe and it was easy to walk everywhere which was great! I thought the teaching was great and Roi was happy to explain anything we had questions about throughout the course. 

I found being away from home and learning remotely really made me motivated and focused on learning which is something I had struggled with when trying to learn independently. Roi had had experience in the software industry and could answer questions and provide advice on good practise used in the industry which is unlikely  to be something I would have learned on my own. Roi was also keen to set us extra challenges and teach us things outside of the current curriculum when it was clear we understood the curriculum well, this led to us creating our own Android apps which was great fun and something I had always wanted to play around with.

I found the experience of working at the the coworking space really enjoyable, we met lots of new people with interesting backgrounds and stories which is something I wasn't expecting! The facilities were great there and the coworking space often had events we joined to meet other digital nomads.  

I found the work/play balance was much better than I expected, I was expecting to just stay in the same city for the whole 8 weeks but we managed to arrange a trip to Mexico City to see some of the Day of the Dead celebrations as well as trips to Tulum and Merida to see the cities and visit some Mayan ruins which were amazing! Playa has lots of things to do and see nearby and I expect I will go back there in the future to see some of the sights I missed! 

Overall, I would recommend CodingNomads to anyone who is looking to jump into the  world of software development, as this type of learning experience will give you the practical skills to start making your own applications from scratch, which I feel is really empowering and motivating to start making projects of your own! That combined with the experience of living in a new country and meeting new and interesting people from around the world makes this a really rewarding experience that I would do again in a heartbeat!

I had been looking for a course like this in Barcelona for a while, so I was very excited to learn about the CodingNomads Python/Django course! From day 1 we dove deep into Python, the pace was fast but never did I feel that I or anyone else in the class was left behind. The days were intense, but the whole group was just a bunch of awesome and supportive people, so the days flew by fast, way too fast! Our instructors Martin and Caden were both one of a kind - smart, fun and approachable, adding even more to the experience. Would totally do another one! :)

Having never coded before this was a personal challenge for myself to jump into something which i have previously not been comfortable with. Mixing the learning with travel experiences allowed me to still have a good time and explore new places.  People on the course and the instructors were great fun and helped to make the experience as unique and valuable as it was.

Having the groundwork in place has now helped with my job as an accountant and come up with new innovative ways in which the business can stay on top of the every evolving tech environment. I t has given me a great framework in coding should i choose to further develop this skill.

Highly recommend   

The Coding Nomads Team:

I attended the Java bootcamp in Bali and the entire experience was amazing. The Coding Nomads team was great. The instructors teaching styles and how they ran the course really impressed me. It was a great blend of structure but also freedom to choose some of your own routes if you wanted. They were very good at taking the temperature of the class as a whole and individuals, as well as very proactive at spending more time on a topic or having extra time with people if they needed more one on one guidance regardless of time of day. If we were all digging in to a challenge/exercise from the day before we often had the freedom to spend more time on it instead of moving on to something else. Also they were just generally awesome people in there own right. People that I can confidently call friends going forward. I am and will continue to be in continued contact with them, be it for advice, mentoring, networking, etc.

 

Course and Content:

Overall, I thought the amount of content and technologies that were covered was on point. I have a different perspective than the others in the course as I had a position lined up for me with my current company. I transferred roles from software test engineer to Java developer. One of the reasons that I was granted the opportunity was that my manager saw the course content and outline and was very impressed with how it aligned closely with the technologies they used. I chose to pursue Coding Nomads mostly because either the other available bootcamps were way too expensive and/or were more frontend style technologies mostly for web or app development and not Java/backend rooted. Saying, there was also opportunities to dig into more frontend work and technologies, if you enjoy that (some people did in fact).

 

Location:

Obviously, Bali is an amazing location for many reasons. You might think that there would be too many distractions or it doesn’t seem like a serious place. It works though. Getting away from time and the normal routine really seemed to help me to focus in on the opportunity and challenges without the other distractions. There was a really nice blend of working hard, and often long hours, with taking time to enjoy Bali. The CN team was great at offering suggestions and also organising group adventures during the off time. Some of the most amazing times I had with everyone there. The coworking space we based out of was Outpost in Ubud. It was a great place to hold the course. Great amenities (events, pool access, etc) and people. You also got a glimpse of the remote working lifestyle that other professionals were living at Outpost. 

 

Beyond the Bootcamp:

I am now applying my coding knowledge at work and I feel that the course prepared me very well. I definitely need to build up my experience in general and improve which takes time, but the major hurdles have mostly been getting up to speed on the practices and methods of software engineering that my work uses and applies for specific domain knowledge. That is something that would seem inevitable regardless.

 

I really cant say enough about the bootcamp itself, the Coding Nomads team, and overall experience and adventure. Its a total package. 

 

This is a review for the CodingNomads cohort taking place in Playa Del Carmen, Mexico between September 23rd, 2017 through January 7th, 2018. The program consisted of 8 weeks on-site learning at a co-working space in the center of Playa Del Carmen, as well as 5 additional weeks of full-time remote work, where we are still currently working on our final projects. Overall, I think that this boot camp was a great investment in my both my time and money. I highly encourage anyone that is serious about learning Java to consider attending for the following reasons:   1.) The technologies you learn.    Most coding boot camps are centered around learning web-development, CodingNomads differs in that the course is structured around java, which is the most used back-end language in the world. During the course, you go from learning the java fundamentals all the way up to be able to able to write complex data structures and algorithms. You will also learn spring, a popular Java framework that allows you to create secure web applications, create your own Restful API services, be able to integrate your code with relational databases as well as much more. During the course, you also learn how to use the command line, git, SQL for managing databases, and many services on AWS, including EC2 which allows you to deploy your code on remote servers. Most importantly you will learn to think and solve problems like a developer.    2.) The Instructor.   Ryan is extremely knowledgeable with over a decade of experience working as a professional developer. With his recent real-world experience, he is able to organize the course so that you learn the technologies and best practices currently being used. Ryan is really good at breaking down complex topics so that they can be easily explained. Above all, he is extremely generous with his time. On several occasions, he has spent over 12 hours in class helping students, and he routinely offers time on Sunday’s for students to review the material.    3.) Getting away from distractions.   The concept of traveling to a foreign country to learn computer programming might sound like a pretty strange idea, however, for me it provided the perfect learning environment. Traveling really helped me step away from all the distractions of everyday life, so that I could solely devote my time to learning as much as possible. During the course, you are almost exclusively surrounded by like-minded people who are also trying to learn how to code, which I found was something that was extremely beneficial and something that not every boot camp can offer. The co-working space we used was a short walk from my apartment and Playa del Carmen provided nearly all the everyday comforts of the United States.    4.) The price.   I think that you will be hard-pressed to find a better deal on a boot camp than CodingNomads. The base price for the course was significantly cheaper than all the other boot camps that I researched, with the added benefit of a decreased cost of living from being in a foreign country. Additionally, the cohort I was in was very small, so I was able to get lots of individual attention, something that you might not find in some of the larger more expensive boot camps.

This was an amazing experience! I learned to code while I was in paradise on a small island in Thailand. While I was researching bootcamps, CodingNomads was one of the first ones I discovered and I kept coming back to it as I was researching others. It was the clear choice due to its curriculum (the fact that it was gonna be in an exotic destination was a bonus, of course), all other bootcamps focused more on front-end web development technologies, where core concepts in software development are never taught. The ones that did focus more on core software development were too expensive, sometimes more than twice as much as this one. Ryan (the instructor) was a great teacher and obviously has had a lot of experience in the field working as a software engineer in San Francisco for a very long time. The one thing I would strongly advise candidates that decide to join this course is to read the first 5-6 chapters of Java: A Beginner's Guide (the official guide by the developer of the Java language, Oracle) before arriving at the destination. It shouldn't take more than a week or two, but will make your learning experience much more effective.
Also, Ryan, Kim (the business manager and his wife), and all the others from the course were awesome! We had a great time together!

Having the opportunity to learn Java, SQL and AWS, traveling to a new place, meeting new people and paying less than in most bootcamp is something you can't miss. The CodingNomads bootcamp is very well organized and teach what you will need to be a successful junior software engineer. Ryan, the instructor has a lot of experience in software engineer and really love to teach so you can be sure that you will learn even when things get really difficult because Ryan will kindly explain things as much as is needed, you will be studying in your free time, you will be doing a lot of homework and most important you will be coding. It takes a lot of work but you can be sure it will be worthy. I don't have enough words to express my gratitude towards Ryan and Kim. They are successful young people, they have a lot of knowledge and are willing to share that with everyone. If you are looking for an amazing affordable bootcamp to learn to code, you should do this one with CodingNomads.

So I went to a coding bootcamp…

It was awesome!

CodingNomads delivered on so much more than I thought possible.

Here are the reasons to attend:

-Ryan (the instructor) and Kim (admin and wife) are great people and care about your success.

-Ryan is a real life software engineer with lots of experience, not an intern, not recently graduated. He knows his stuff, and he’s there with you every day.

-You learn Java, SQL, and AWS. These are core technologies that are in demand! Don’t take my word for it, Google it. --> most used programming language, most used database language, most used cloud platform.

-This course is less expensive than most.

-You get to travel to an awesome location with other people that are doing the exact same thing!

-Travelling to a new country (or at least away from where you live) gives you all the opportunity to focus on what you’re there to do.

Other things to note:

-Expect to work hard, programming isn't easy for most

-Learning new things and getting good at them takes time and grit, this applies to the hiring process as well. Expect a challenge

-Travelling is fun, but class takes up a lot of time. If you want to be employable afterwards, keep your priorities in mind.

This isn’t the right place for a life story or the answers to all the questions you most likely have, but I’d be happy to share. CodingNomads has my email and can put you touch. And if you’re interested in a coding bootcamp at all, you should really reach out to Ryan and Kim. They’re super genuine people and will definitely help fill in a lot of the details.

 

I was lucky enough to have my company sponsor this bootcamp, but I was worried about finding the time outside of work to make progress. My mentor did an amazing job of tailing the course to my needs and interests. I had some prior experience in DS + ML, so I moved through the online courses pretty quickly. My mentor then went above and beyond to bring new and challenging topics to our weekly meetings to keep me engaged, interested, and educated. He also gave great career tips and advice, despite me not actively looking for work.  This is the most effective way I've learned anything since college!