Telegraph Academy

this review is for telegraph prep (not to be confused with telegraph academy's 12 week immersive). telegraph prep is a 4 week course that teaches beginning and intermediate javascript fundamentals. the exercises given to us after each lecture were all very challenging. i struggled at times, but the staff, all hack reactor staff and alums, were always helpful. any time i asked for help, they were all more than happy to guide me in the right direction. programming can be intimidating, but they teach it in a way that makes sense to people without cs degrees and tech backgrounds.

week 3 and 4 especially helped prepare me for the hack reactor/telegraph technical interview because i struggled understanding closures and callbacks before i took the course. after week 3, i had a much better understanding of how higher order functions worked. week 4 was spent working on our capstone project which involves making a game in which we had to use TONS of callbacks. 

if you're willing to work hard, you'll get a lot out of it because they've structured it for everyone to succeed. don't be afraid to ask for help and be willing to challenge yourself. thanks to preston, albrey, bianca and everyone else who put together such a great course and for all of the free coffee and snacks!! 

While I only took weeks 3 and 4, I found Telegraph Prep to be an excellent preparation for all of my coding interviews. I was not very proficient with higher order functions, callbacks, or the underscore library before the course, but I feel very good at all of those post-TP. The instructors were awesome, the curriculum covered exactly what I expected, and the entire atmosphere was fun and conducive to learning. Also, the capstone project was excellent practice in solidifying skills learned in the course. I do have to say that I attended in person and do not know how the livestream version is. But, from my experience, I would highly recommend TP to anyone wanting to become more proficient in functional JS.

This a review for the Telegraph prep course, which is the 4-week long course designed to take beginner JavaScript coders to bootcamp ready coders. NOTE: This course assumes you have completed codecademy JavaScript course and does not teach you JavaScript from 0.

Before Telegraph prep, I had taken the Hack Reactor weekend courses, which were amazing and intense, but I learned even more at my four weeks at Telegraph prep since the classes were spaced out and given that we had daily programming challenges assigned. The prep curriculum covers objects, arrays, data structures, ,looping, functions, and functional programming for the most part. Below is a rough schedule of what's covered, and it's likely to change over time, since Telegraph Academy constantly iterates upon feedback.

Week 1

Monday: Objects 
Tuesday: Arrays
Wednesday: Functions
Thursday: Functions 2
Sunday: Study Day 

Week 2

Monday: Arrays + Objects (review)  
Tuesday: Functions + Functions 2 (review)  
Wednesday: Algorithms  
Thursday: Algorithms  
Sunday: Study Day

Week 3
Tuesday: Scopes 
Wednesday: Closures 
Thursday: Callbacks/Higher Order Functions 
Friday: Underscore.js functional programming
Sunday: Optional Study Day

Week 4 Putting it All Together 
Monday: Capstone Project
Tuesday: Capstone Project
Wednesday: Capstone Project
Thursday: Capstone Project
Sunday: Optional Study Day

Prior to taking the 4-week course, I had a been self-teaching myself for about 3 months on and off. I interviewed at Hack Reactor in Feb 2015 and didn't get in. After I finished the prep course, I interviewed with Telegraph Academy and I was interviewed by the same person who interviewed me at Hack Reactor! This time I felt very prepared and passed the interview though.  All of this to say that, Telegraph Academy does not skip corners and they hold themselves to the same high standards as Hack Reactor.

To the person who left a the first bad review, I had a completely opposite experience from you. Before coming to the prep course, you don't need to comeplete any coderbyte problems - I didn't - but they wouldn't hurt. I thought the slides were great. If you don't understand something, it's up to you to let the instructors know that you need help. If your nervous don't be - everyone is here to learn. When I didn't understand something I would ask if another example problem could be provided. I will say that on somedays we did have guest lecturers who weren't so great, but everyone was courteous, open to questions, and very open minded.

Frankly, you get what you put into this course . You need to WORK HARD, ask questions, study outside of class CONSISTENTLY, keep failing quickly, learning from your missteps and getting up again. Also Telegraph prep is the most diverse coding space I have ever been to, which is freaking amazing. I had classmates from all walks of life and backgrounds, so my experience was also enhanced by my peers.

I attended the Telegraph Academy prep school last month.

-. Bunch confusing slides about Object, Array and Function syntax. They give you the answer (console.log), but less explanation of why? Then they moved to another page. On and on and on....fas!

-. The mentor thinks that you are an expert on JS basic, since you have to do the JS path from Codecademy before you go there. In fact, you should do the Coderbyte (easy challenge) and understand it clearly before you go to this prep school.

-. There's no app building session (I am not expecting it either anyway), pure Javascript syntaxes. So that make it worse to me.  It's like walking in the dark. I have more understanding by learning from google or, asking other people who are a working programmer outside the session. Then I can understand those slides.

-. Students were NOT that friendly. I didn't go there to make a friend. But, you have to do some works as a pair.  Some of the students won't share you the answer when you don't understand. Just like there was a competition (Maybe they thought it was a race to get a trophy or a Job). Like they were afraid if somebody will take their chance away to be the next Mark Zuckerberg.

-. One of their TA's, did not know there is a method called .push in Js. He said "Think about this: is it possible to push a table that not exist or has been defined before?". Omg, that method was taught by the mentor like 30 minutes ago. It confused me, big time. He was trying to convince me of something that he doesn't know. Why don't just say: "I am sorry, I don't know". And "Shut-Up".

-. Most ( Did I said most? ) of the mentors were very NICE (They were nice, tho). They might be good in JS, but they were NOT good enough explaining. They are not teachers (I assume, most of them were students from Hack Reactor). In my experience, it was only one time that I have a good mentor who understand how to teach. And I don't think he graduated from HR.

-. The learning situation has made me afraid to ask a question and feel stupid. It's very hard to ask questions when you are nervous. Like I don't deserve to understand JS.

-. I just feel that place is like a poser, instead of a coder's. Wait, If somebody get a greatjob as coder, why does he or she is still have time running a course?

I am done bitching. It did not work for me. What a waste of time and money.

P.S.: One more thing, it's very very very ( Did I triple it? ) hard to communicate with them. Maybe because they are too smart and too busy. If you critize this comment, that means you work for them. This is my experience, you should tell your own experience. You have no right to tell me if what I feel and think is right or wrong.

Ok, so this review is for the prep course. I must say I have came a longggggggggg way. I can now read Javascript and understad what is going on in which I could not do before prep. JS was like Mandarin to me. I do come from a tech background with no coding experience except for CodeAcademy and CodeAvengers. The founders Albrey and Bianca are super supportive and really care. The environment is more familial than just a coding sweatshop. Everyone collaborates and have fun while coding. They really push you to be the best YOU and there is no competition as we all help one another get to an understanding of the material. The teachers assistants are so amazing. The way that they help you narrow down how to get to the answer by not giving you the answer is frustratingly beautiful. You will have a lot of "duh" moments along with "ah-ha" moments. I can honestly say that the prep course will prepare you for any technical interview however, it is also about what you put into it. It is intense and gives you a glimpse of what the 3 month immersive program is like. Through the prep course we have actually built apps which is something I am very proud of. I highly recommend this prep course to anyone. They offer the course every month as well as an online streaming course for those who are not near the East Bay. I suggest before attending or applying for any bootcamp, do the entire Code Academy JS track, Code Avengers and Codeschool unless you will struggle. The prep course skips the basics so you must be prepared. I do not regret investing in the course at all. I met a lot of people who I have bonded with and I am officially apart of a community who cares about my success as a software engineer. Telegraph Academy is a beast and what the program offers is supreme. I would say check it out and go for it. Oh yeah Preston is freaking one of the best instructors ever!!!

Telegraph Academy provides an amazing student-to-teacher ratio, so each student gets lots of individual attention and support. They have great curriculum they share with Hack Reactor, and excellent instructors. Everyone believes passionately in Telegraph Academy's mission to get more people from underrepresented group (women, people of color, queer, etc) into the tech industry, which creates a strong send of community.

If I could do it over I would have just attended Hack Reactor. I'll start by saying that I am now an employed software engineer. However, this a review of the school and not my own personal outcomes. The cost of attendance is the same as hack reactor, but this equal cost does not equate to equal quality. Since it labels itself as the premier coding bootcamp for people of color and underrepresented groups, it seems as though it also lowers the standards of admission if you fit into one of those profiles. As it stands, the job placement rate is abysmal and the salaries of the few that do have jobs are considerably less than Hack Reactor graduates. I don't know a single graduate who commanded a six figure salary that was also a minority or member of the lgbtq community. All the people who have written highly rated reviews either drink the kool aid or ended up employed by the school, and have all quit once they were no longer jaded by the false sense of community being around people belonging to other under represented with the same prospects of becoming a software engineer. With the exception of Marc, there isn't a single instructor present who has had any experience in the field that they are teaching outside of a few month to month contract gigs. Just another copycat bootcamp trying to target a new demographic. Don't forget that this is a for-profit business, forget the happy-go-lucky attitude and mission of diversifying tech. They want your $20,000 and I could have spent mine wiser.

TLDR

Cost is equal to Hack Reactor, educational quality is not

Weak job placement and salaries

Inexperienced instructors

Predatory business model