UCF Boot Camps

I attended the Web Development Full Stack program 12 week program from May-Aug 2017

Every instructor that I had the pleasure of working with at the UCF Bootcamp Bob, Justin, Josh and Ricky were passionate, patient, funny and knowledgeable individuals who helped grow my coding skills throughout the program. The culture that Bob instill onto the students is something that I cannot put into words. No, literally I cannot.. you just have to experience Bob’s teaching style for yourself.

It is quite clear that UCF does not just hire anyone to be an instructor. They are not only knowledgeable but also can effectively communicate and empathetic with the students. They take feedback seriously. They are quick to adjust if something is not working.

I also appreciated the fact that their responses to my questions allowed me to discover the answer on my own but with careful guidance. It wasn’t just about googling the answer it was about asking our classmates for help and learn together.

From building my resume to strategically structuring my LinkedIn profile, to mock interviews, to negotiating, to handling interview anxieties, my instructors and career services were there every step of the way. 

There is a interview to get in but they just want to make sure you’re a functioning human being with an actual work ethic and desire to learn.

It really is hard work and day to day you will leave each day exhausted but recharged the next morning. 

You get what you put into it.

Thank you Bob, Justin, Josh, Ricky and Alexis.

WARNING:  Quite lengthy review

This bootcamp is the best educational experience I've had.  The curriculum is designed to give you a taste of all the facets of full stack web development.  It's extremely fast-paced and not for the faint of heart.  You definitely need to do a lot of learning outside of the classroom.  You are taught the basics of each technology and then it's up to you to use the tools available to explore it further.  At the end of the course, you know which technology(ies) you are most comfortable and interested in and it's up to YOU to continue to explore them.

Teaching staff

The instructors, Bob and Lisa were great.  Each were different in their teaching style.  One was fast-paced and will answer your question with "Google it" or "Ask your classmate".  The idea is to teach you how use research the answer to your problem rather than run to the "boss" for the answer.  Although this approach is frustrating for the student, it teaches you to go to your "boss" as a very last resort.  The other one is slower-paced, a bit more hands-on and will spend the time to help you find the answer.  While this approach is great for the student in need, it can take up class time needed to move on to the next topic.  In the end, both covered the material for the topic of the day.

TA - teaching assistants

I believe that the TAs are probably the most important.  While it is the teacher's job is to introduce you to the technologies, it's the TAs job is to help and guide you in using them.  I was thankful for the very talented TAs we had - Ronny, John, Dwight, and for a short while Justin.  Each have their own expertise and you soon discover whom to ask what.  Actually, the TAs seemed much more dedicated than the teachers.  Use the TAs to your full advantage.

Curriculum

The curriculum is designed to introduce you to the techonogies most used today.  I was very impressed with the order of the topics.  Each technology taught built upon the previous one.  In a million year, I would never have been able to put it all together and learn it on my own and understand how each technology builds or works with the other.  One little complaint I might have is that too many weeks were spent on javascript and not enough on more complex topics like Laraval, PHP, React.  Not to mention, we didn't even get to touch on Angular which was in the curriculum.

Job Assistance

Throughout the entire course, Amber constantly reached out to us to help with our resumes.  Amber is the Career Director.  Even two months after graduation, Amber is still reaching out to us with resume assistance and posts job openings constantly.  Take advantage of this and use her as much as you can.

Suggestions

Making suggestions is about making it a better experience and eliminating the complaints.  The reality is that there's no way to satisfy 100% of the people 100% of the time. Here are some of the complaints I heard firsthand:

• I have zero programming experience or knowledge.  I don't understand Javascript.

• The teachers are going too fast.

• This is boring.  I already know this.  They need to get to the stuff I don't know.

• I finished the course and still can't get a job.  They promised that I would have offers left and right.

There are many more but this is a gist of it.  My suggestions:

• Design a more rigorous process in choosing students.  Yes, I know the bootcamp wants everyone's money but satisfied customers are important and will bring more long-term revenue.  Rather than just a 15-minute phone interivew with a silly scenario about coffee and sugar, it might be better to have a written test.  This test can be designed to determine who has the mindset of a programmer.  Maybe you should require that they at least have some knowledge of programming logic.  There was a lot of time wasted with Javascript because people couldn't understand a "for loop".
• Design a full disclosure and have each prospective student initial each bullet point and sign it.  This disclosure should cover all the qualms and make it clear what will be expected from the course and the student.  One of the things might be that the student is aware that they need some kind of programming knowledge.  Also, make it clear that no one is guaranteed a job.  Full disclosure can go a long way.

I recommend this bootcamp to everyone who has a passion for technology, has some knowledge of programming, wants to get introduced to new technology and is eager and willing to take that knowledge and run with it.  Good luck to you all!!!

I recently graduated the UCF Coding Boot Camp just this past May and I must say that it is a challenge. Material came in waves and it's basically learning something new every single day. The way I described it to friends when they asked was, "You know how in college, there are prerequisite intro classes you have to take and pass for a few semesters in your freshman and sophomore years before you go onto the core classes in your junior and senior year? This is basically all the core hard classes almost every day," However, because it is challenging, it is very rewarding. 

The instructional staff of Bob, Josh, and Justin were very engaging and they'll do what they can to help students understand and succeed. Ricky is also very helpful if any student needs extra help, he'll help them get in touch with central tutoring to combat the material that may seem extra difficult. One of their goals is to teach you how to learn this specific material. 

Off the top of the head, the material includes HTML, CSS, Bootstrap, JavaScript, jQuery, Github, Node, MongoDB, Mongoose, MySQL, PHP, React, Json Packages, APIs, and Laravel. 

There are many ways to succeed and you have to remember that everyone from your fellow classmates to the instructional staff wants to see you succeed so no matter how much you feel like you might be drowning in the material, reach out because there is always support around. You don't feel like you're left there on an island by yourself. 

You will get out of it as much as you put into it. Even though the material was tough, I personally like the aspect of self reliance. The instructional staff will you put you in a position where you might have to find things on your own. They're not doing that to be bad guys. They're doing it so that you yourself can understand why something is right or why something is wrong. If you were just given the answer, it'd rob you of that moment when you do discover the appropriate answer. I don't want to say "right" answer because with a lot of the material, there are more than one way to solve something and it just depends on how you. Even after the class is over, it is up to you to look for and apply for your next career as well as continuing to work at the material to get even better. They will introduce the material and give you the tools and it is up to you to use them. You have to be the one to put most of the hours in and if you do, you will have a way better chance to succeed. There's only so much support that they can give you to where you have to do the rest.

The full time program is three months, but those three months blew by. There is so much work to be done and material to be learned that it'll go by quick. I'll never forget it. I'll have life long friends because of this program. It is certainly an awesome experience. 

I had a great experience at the bootcamp. I found the staff to be very knowledgeable of the curriculum provided as well as vested in having the students learn how to do things properly.

I already had a job in a related field before the bootcamp however had I not I feel that I would have been prepared to take on an entry level web developer position after this course.

You definitely get what you put in to a course like this and I felt the cost was justified. Give it a shot if you really want to get involved with becoming a developer. 

I came into the program with no coding experience.  I was unable to program even the simpliest website.  As a  graduate of UCF Coding Bootcamp, I am now able produce complicated full stack websites.  The educational staff is top-notch.  Bob, Josh, Justin, and Ricky, are very knowledgable and helpful.  They did an excellent job of teaching the material and assisting students to futher their understanding of complex concepts. They also teach you how to learn and how to think of the solution yoursellf.  I think that is one of the most valuable lessons teachers can give students.  

The course material covered a lot of different languages, libraries, and databases.  We were immersed in HTML, CSS, JavaScript,JQuery, MySQL, MongoDB, React, and Express, just to name a few.  

The UCF Coding Bootcamp is challenging, especially for those coming in with no experience.  Like any life changing undertakings, it is a lot of hard work.  If you are willing to put in the work and learn the skills needed for the next phase of your life, you will be greatly rewarded.  

While you are learning these new skills, the career services staff is helping you to market yourself and improve your online presence.  Jessica and Alexis provided great insight and suggestions.  

Overall, I think this is a great program.  I recommend it to anyone looking to learn news skils or change the direction of their professional life.

If you're ready to change your life and work REALLY hard, UCF Coding Bootcamp is for you.  I attended an Orlando part-time cohort for 6 months - and it was intense (but awesome!).  The curriculum is fast-paced and non-stop.  

My instructor (Bob) was very intelligent and great at explaining concepts and applications in a way we could follow and apply to in-class activities and homework.  While his pace could be very fast and his Boston accent was horrible (just kidding), I felt that he really prepared our class for the fast-paced nature of the industry, and he shared with us knowledge beyond the level of the curriculum - about code, frameworks and languages, software and technologies that could propel us forward as developers, and real-world application of the tools we were learning.  Our TA's (John, Ronny, & Justin) were excellent and made themselves available regularly outside of class (almost weekly held study group open and available for everyone). Sometimes the pace of in-class instruction can be very fast, and in order to get the entirety of the lesson the instructor(s) had to keep moving, and the TAs would always stop and assist on the side if you truly couldn't keep following along, as well as being consistently ready and willing to assist via Slack (messaging app) outside of class hours.  

As the class came to an close, I felt that we would have benefited from the curriculum being a bit more balanced.  Of course, with most students coming into the course with no prior coding knowledge, we required sufficient time to devote to the basics (HTML, CSS, Javascript), but I felt that we would have benefited from spending more time on the higher-level frameworks (React, PHP/Laravel) - as these are the skills truly necessary to land a Junior Developer role.  That being said, I was lucky enough to land a great job as a PHP developer before the class came to a close.  I didn't use much of the post-course career services, but they are very active, offering weekly webinars, and are consistently availble to assist my fellow classmates in landing a job (as of today we are just over 1 month outside of graduation).  All in all, there is no way I could have absorbed the amount of knowledge I did through this course in 6 months, especially if I was trying to learn on my own.  This course was life changing for me - I've completely transformed my career and found what I believe my brain is supposed to be doing.

TLDR; Take the course, but only if you're ready to work intensely hard.

 Coming from someone who didn't have any tech experience prior to the course, I would recommend this program to those who are passionate about the industry and willing to work hard to achieve their goals. I will say the curriculum certainly demands your full attention if you are new to the tech environment. I worked countless hours to grasp particular concepts and absolutely exceeded my own expectations in reference to my capabilities and what I anticipated the course to provide. My particular instructor was extremely knowledable and dedicated to our cohorts learning process. I had guidance when I needed it and was able to teach myself how to learn without having to approach others to help me with a solution. At my demo day at the end of the course I prepared my best and recieved plenty of attention from the employers who attended which precipitated into several interviews. Career services was also able to line up an interview for me which lead to an internship right when the course ended. Overall this was one of the best experiences I've had in my lifetime and I've also made some lifelong friends in the process. Thank you UCF Coding Bootcamp for jump starting my new career!

I graduated from the first full-time course at the UCF Coding Bootcamp, and it was the best decision of my life. Everyone says you get out of it what you put in, and that couldn't be more true. This course is designed for people like me who came in with no experience, all the way up to computer science graduates. It teaches you the fundamentals that you need to become a web developer, and it gives you the resources and skills you need to keep learning. 

Being the first full-time cohort had its cons, the holidays we had took us a little off course, and so did group projects. But the instructional staff didn’t let that hold them back. They constantly did their best to make sure we learned everything we needed to, and took all of our feedback. They took weekly reviews on BootcampSpot seriously, and made changes that made sure everyone got the most out of this experience.

The best part of this bootcamp was definitely the instructional staff. I had what I call the "dream team" aka Bob, Josh, Justin, and Ricky. They genuinely cared about each one of us. Josh would to stay after and help us out, whether it was going back over fundamentals, or going over homework solutions. Justin is an amazing example of a hard worker. He graduated the bootcamp right before mine, and you could tell how much he loved coding. He’s a Javascript and git master, which was super helpful to have. Bob was the best instructor I could’ve got. Going through an intense bootcamp like this, it was so refreshing to have someone like him not only teach us, but be supportive and care. Learning new coding languages is hard, but his teaching style is the best Ive ever experienced. Him and his humor truly made my bootcamp experience.

Another amazing part of the bootcamp was Central Support. In the full-time bootcamp, we got 2 tutoring sessions a week. Jared was an amazing tutor, and having that extra support was incredible. Central Support also gives you the opportunity to become a tutor, which I did a few days after I graduated! The opportunities you get with this bootcamp are second to none!

I got an offer letter to join a company 2 weeks after I graduated, and am so grateful to everyone that helped me make this happen. I would definitely do it again!

As a recent graduate, I'm very pleased and confident I've acquired marketable skills. I'm currently working with my career counselor who is helping me connect with recruiters and potential employers. My pre-class expectations were threefold: 1) to be presented with a curriculum that would teach me how to code a web server to deliver interactive content; 2) to access professional developers as instructors who could teach coding, troubleshoot code, and describe real-world professional web development practices and experience; and 3) to leverage tuition financing and career services through the UCF organization. The experience exceeded my expectations on all counts. For my final project, using a CRNA skeleton, I deployed a MERN stack web application that includes browser and mobile (native) elements. The course starts with web fundamentals, so it's conceivable a student could begin with zero prior experience, but I had some non-professional programming experience and found it quite challenging. It was like having a second full time job. To maximize success, you must read documentation and write code every day from day one, and ask for help when you need it. Was it perfect? Nothing is, but the product is as described, and the people were responsive to any issues that arose. The classroom staff -- instructors, TA's, success manager and career counselor -- all very accessible and clearly worked hard to deliver a quality product. Upper level managers visited classes fairly frequently. Again, I'm very pleased with my decision to enroll.

I entered the UCF Coding Bootcamp with what I would say a beginner to intermediate level of coding experience focusing around languages of C/C++/Java and a hint HTML/CSS. I stumbled on the course advertisement online while looking for resources to learn/teach myself JavaScript at home. After some research on Coding Boot camps in general, I decided to go make the leap and apply to UCFs Bootcamp. Upon applying I was given a brief questionnaire that tested problem solving and linear thinking abilities along with a phone interview that covered personality and background and some general questions on why I was interested in attending. I like that the camp took the time to interview and sort their applicants to make sure they were taking in people in they wanted.

This reflected in class well as fellow class mates came from all types of professional backgrounds and reasons to be attending. But all shared a drive to be there and seemed genuinely interested in becoming a full stack web developer, either it be for a total career change or just general interest and to expand their current skillset. The camp is organized to force collaboration threw slack chats and in the classroom. This was honestly tough for a shy person like myself but goes with the culture they create and you fall into it willing or not, but most definitely for the better.

The pace of the course is relatively fast but will ebb and flow based on how the class is absorbing the content, allowing classmates that are confused on a topic to get help from classmates or TA’s around them that are getting the concepts. This cycles threw out the course and a reason to be social and connect/help others and creates the group learning environment. I attended the Orlando West Valencia Campus and had what I thought to be an amazing Instructor and Ta’s. If you sign up for this course I advise you to take it with Bob, Dwight or John. Bob was my instructor for this I could not have been happier with him or the TA’s Dwight and John. Whom were not only great personalities to have in the class but where always willing to help out and knew their stuff.

The course encourages group work on the weekly assignments given to help grasp the content. The course has 2 main group projects, of which our group stayed together for each and was really enjoyable, but you are free to shuffle groups as you please, within a max group size constraint. For projects, you are given a list of technologies you must use and are free to decide on what to create as a team and then present them in a combined two class meeting on Saturdays. This makes the projects great and there were some amazing ideas/apps that came from both classes and allowed us to use what we just learned the 2-3 weeks prior to create something of our own and not just crank out “homework” assignments. The group project aspect was probably my favorite feature of the camp.

There is a big final project which leads to the end of the course and “Demo Day”. This project can be done in a group or alone. Most chose to take on this project alone as presenting on Demo Day is a great opportunity the camp creates in which you present your final project to prospecting employers or other tech industry professionals and can lead to some great connections and job opportunities. Our demo day I think had about 94 attending employers.

            Post-graduation support was great. You are assigned a career advisor to help you land a job. Zach, who was mine, literally handed me I think 2 interviews of which I did absolutely nothing for, all I did was set the time to go in. The continued support and feedback you get from their advisory team is invaluable in my eyes.

I was offered and accepted a job for a local company here in Orlando who is not in the camps network and have been happily titled a "Jr. PHP Developer" for a couple weeks now and using the full stack day to day.  I am also doing contract work for a company here in Orlando the camp put me in direct connection with. I cannot thank the UCF Coding Bootcamp and staff enough for their help and support for making a dream of mine come true.

                Tldr: Took the camp,was a blast, learned a lot, you get out what you put into it, this isn’t the matrix you cannot just plug in and 5 minutes later you are Fully Stacked, Bobs the man, TA's where awesome, landed a job, happy with my investment, 10/10 would do it again.

Prior to enrolling in the UCF Web Dev Boot Camp, I had read a couple of reviews here on Course Report that helped me with the decision to sign up. Now that I’ve completed the course, here are my thoughts.

I was in the September 2016 cohort that finished up a couple of months ago. The program is 24 weeks of instruction, but mine took longer chronologically because of winter break and a few other holidays in the middle. My particular class met Mon/Wed 6:30-9:30pm, then we joined up with a concurrently running cohort for a combined Sat 10am-2pm session. A new topic was introduced weekly that we would slowly build on over the course of the 3 classes. The instructor would lecture for a while, then we would be given activities to complete to reinforce the learning. There was also a weekly major homework assignment, with the idea being to use it to build out our portfolio. In addition there were also three major projects along the way in which we had freedom to come up with an idea, plan it out, execute it, then finally present it formally - all to practice what we might face in our future careers.

For anyone thinking about signing up, I would say make absolutely sure you’re willing to put in some hard work, and some long hours. They tell you that you should plan to put in 15-20 hours outside of class, and I would say that’s more like a minimum. I found I was often putting in closer to 20-30 hours between going over class material, re-doing class activities, completing homework, researching more deeply, and so on. The pace is also relentless. You can’t ease up because if you decide to mentally check out for a week, it’s extremely difficult to catch up again. However, life happens, people get sick, etc., so they tried to account for that by recording the class lectures and offering 1-on-1 sessions with the instructors to get caught up again.

The instructor we started with, Sean, was excellent. He really knew how to break down difficult concepts, and despite clearly being very knowledgeable and experienced, was able to speak at the level of those of us with no prior experience. Half way through the course we had a change of instructors which was a bit disruptive, but the new instructor, Bob, was also excellent. The other person I want to really give kudos to was the student success manager, Ricky, who was beyond awesome. He was always there to help out anytime any issues came up, whether personal, or class related. There were also a couple of TAs around in each class, and they were always ready to help too as needed.

The one place where the program did trip up was when it came to Career Services. We were told there would be many speakers from the industry who would be brought in to talk, that we’d be introduced to employer partners, that we would go on tours to potential employers, that there would be personalized coaching for facing interviews later, etc. The person in charge of career services for our cohort got promoted to a different position soon after we began, and they never had a proper replacement through the running of the boot camp. For this reason, while we did get some cursory help, it wasn’t quite what was promised. (I know this was unique to my cohort because I’m now working as a part time teaching assistant in the subsequent cohort, and can see they’re getting far superior career guidance already.) However, after course completion, they do have another career services division that takes over, and I’m now working with them to find a good position. They’ve helped fine tune my LinkedIn profile, clean up my GitHub repositories, critiqued my portfolio site, and more. As with the class work, for this career work phase I still have to put in my efforts too by reviewing job listings, applying, going to meetups to network, etc.

Overall, my experience was a good one. If I had to do it over, yes, I would still sign up. As others have said in their reviews, you get out of it what you put into it. They provide you the tools, and the instruction, and the support, but you have to do the work. If you’re willing to, I see no reason why anyone can’t be successful.

I came into this program with some self taught web development experience and was making some decent headway going that route. I had always been skeptical of programming bootcamps, this place changed my mind. If you asked me 6 months ago if I could build what I am able to build now, I would have told you are crazy.

You will get out what you put into this course, I definietly had alot more time than other students in my class, but the staff was extermely accommodating to that fact even when I asked questions on topics we hadn't covered it. 

If your brand new to web development or someone looking to improve their skills and hesitating signing up for this course, my suggestion to you is ask yourself, are you willing to put in the time? If so, sign up!

I started the UCF Coding Bootcamp with little to no prior coding experience. The application process is a little intimidating. It's not just "you can pay, you're in". You have to go through a phone interview where they assess your cognitive skills. You also take an assessment online. 

Each class has 30 students with 1 teacher and 2 TAs. You meet two days a week (either Monday and Wednesday or Tuesday and Thursday) and you also have a Saturday morning class in which you join another 30 student class. Since you are spending 3 days a week with your classmates, you very quickly become family.

The Bootcamp encourages tight knit relationships - providing your class with a slack channel, requiring two group projects, and giving you some of the coolest TAs to bounce ideas off of and receive feedback from.

As far as the teachers go, each teacher has their own teaching style, with everyone following the same lesson plan, class activities, and homework assignments. Whats awesome about the boot camp is they film the classes from both MW and Tu/Th, so if you find you arent understanding something, you can easily watch the same lesson again, taught by a different person.

Overall, other than coding - the Boot Camp emphasizes the lifestyle of a coder. We got to take field trips to technology companies and see what their day to day was like. Most Saturdays we had guest speakers - most of them being influential people in the Orlando Tech Industry, who might potentially be future employers. We were encouraged to go to MeetUps, do Google Hangouts, and put ourselves into the job market.

As far as finding a job, the Boot Camp helps you with your resume, linkedIn profile, GitHub Repo, and portfolio. As a part of your graduation, they host a Demo Day, where you show off a final project of your choice to potential employers.

Upon finishing, they help get you job interviews with their employer partners, in exchange for applying to at least 10 jobs a week. Before I graduated, I was already offered 2 freelance positions, and look forward to seeing where the future takes me! 

If you are considering a Full Stack Web Development course, and want to be surrounded by serious, like-minded people who care about your goals and career path, definitely do this boot camp!