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> I imagine that they got that $4,000 number from all the people who attended the program, received zero practical skills to get jobs, went on to further traini

by beej71 3y ago

> I imagine that they got that $4,000 number from all the people who attended the program, received zero practical skills to get jobs, went on to further training But to be clear, that's not where they said they got the $4000 number. It would be one of those things that'd be nice to correctly know. Do ISAs come with a hidden $4000 fee? The answer: no. Did they have to pay $4000 more because of additional training? No. Did the ISAs last 8 years? No. (At least not for any of the years I was there.) > Given the ISAs disappeared from the marketplaces that resold them to hedge funds, that sounds like exactly what happened. I have no knowledge of their final disposition, whether or not the purchasers realized gains on the ISAs. I know other companies like App Academy and Launch School have had successes with ISAs. For me, this is the real pisser of all this. I think done right it's a workable, useful model, but it got dragged through the mud here, and now we're left with the same old bullshit loans that are fucking the country over. I don't care about Lambda, but I really wish ISAs had been worked on to greater effect globally and hadn't gotten this tarnished image. > A few people on the internet getting the details wrong doesn't invalidate that. Of course not. But it also doesn't make the wrong details right, or something you should believe, which is what this subthread is all about. How can we be expected to make any learned decisions about these sorts of financing instruments if we're throwing bad information in with the good?

cglee 3y ago
I'm the founder of Launch School and I have been thinking about ISAs, coding bootcamps, and software ed for over a decade. I've tried to insert my thoughts here and there, for example: - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30782967 - https://x.com/cglee/status/1232512904953335808 Always happy to chat about ISAs and how to best deploy them. Or, find better alternatives.
- beej71 3y ago
  Thanks for replying! The reviews of Launch School are impressive. I think you're dead on with that first link. I've heard of some schools that did not apply an effective filter up front, despite instructor pleas, and suffered for it greatly with lowered job placement, ultimately failing with the ISA model. I feel there's a class of students for whom ISAs are perfect, and, just like you said, a class of students for whom they are ineffective. The ones where the ISA works and standard school is out of reach have incredible success stories. I found something similar when I taught a nearly free C++ class. I put a really simple test on the front with a refundable $20 fee (if you took the course). Everyone who ultimately took the class was really motivated. $20 was all it took to filter. $5 might have even worked since I speculate the effect is psychological, not economical. The second link is good food for thought, some stuff I hadn't considered. If the ISAs are sold cheaply enough, you really don't need much student success to get a return. IIRC, in Lambda's case, the ISA sales were stopped while the company was still young (having gotten another round) [caveat: I didn't have much visibility into this side of things], and anecdotally I think they had some of their biggest successes early on, but I agree with your points on this. One thing that really impressed me about Lambda was how diverse in every respect the student body was, people from just every walk of life. Waaay more so than I'd seen at any university. I credit the ISA for making this possible. One of my missions in life is to enable people to get the training they want to get. ISAs were wonderful in that regard.
  - cglee 3y ago
    I think you have to be careful about looking at the diverse student body as "giving them an opportunity". For example, predatory for-profit universities specifically target low-income minority populations not to serve them but because they make for easy prey[1]. I'm not saying Lambda or any particular bootcamp is in this category, just that having a diverse student body isn't a feature unless you know for a fact that you're helping 100% of the students.[2] Education has a couple of unique attributes that makes it difficult to assess: 1. the value cannot be perceived until much later after the service is rendered 2. alternatives are mutually exclusive; eg, people usually just attend one university or coding bootcamp, not all of them (or even two of them) This is in contrast to, say, a restaurant where diners can immediately determine if they like the food and can compare it with competitors (because they dine at all the restaurants). Those two attributes make it very easy to lead with hype and marketing and vulnerable people are particularly susceptible to it. imo it's not appropriate to deploy the standard startup playbook in edu, especially if you find yourself attracting vulnerable students. Ok, now combine that with ISAs, which has some positive qualities but are not as incentive aligning as marketed. And then if you sell the ISA in bundles, then it becomes even less incentive aligning. Well, I guess it's now aligning with investors and loan brokers. But it's certainly not aligning more with student outcomes. It all makes for a very delicate situation where you have vulnerable students biting on the ISA bait. I know it seems like I'm just complaining but I've been thinking about these problems for a long time and I come with solutions. Or, particularly, a solution: imo the best thing an edu institution can do is allow students to leave easily. Why do we never think of restaurants as predatory? The idea is ludicrous to even consider. There are of course terrible restaurants but we can just not dine there again and eat elsewhere. There are lots of restaurants around. And here's the issue: there are also lots of edu institutions around but every single one of them deploy the marketing->entrapment playbook.[3] How does marketing work when you have a bad school? Because of the time-lapse between value received and service rendered. The ISA is easily abused in this environment because it's both the marketing and the trap. Anyway, I'm just riffing here... btw, huge fan of your books and work! Despite what I wrote above, I knew Lambda was making an honest attempt at their curriculum when they hired you. [1] https://failstatemovie.com/ [2] imo, edu institutions need to be judged on how they treat their most vulnerable students, unlike startups who are judged on their best wins (https://twitter.com/cglee/status/1781129096250179640) [3] https://medium.com/launch-school/educational-entrapment-f5cc0472051e
- gorkemcetin 3y ago
  I am the founder of BlueWave Labs - we accept junior developers and UI/UX designers to give them Canadian experience by building open source products, to help them land their full time IT jobs and would love to talk to anyone who has put some thought on bootcamps. BWL is a bit different from bootcamps but the main idea is the same: to help people land full time jobs.
  - cglee 3y ago
    How far along are you? I like what Recurse Center is doing, for example.

by beej71 3y ago

cglee 3y ago

I'm the founder of Launch School and I have been thinking about ISAs, coding bootcamps, and software ed for over a decade. I've tried to insert my thoughts here and there, for example: - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30782967 - https://x.com/cglee/status/1232512904953335808 Always happy to chat about ISAs and how to best deploy them. Or, find better alternatives.

beej71 3y ago
Thanks for replying! The reviews of Launch School are impressive. I think you're dead on with that first link. I've heard of some schools that did not apply an effective filter up front, despite instructor pleas, and suffered for it greatly with lowered job placement, ultimately failing with the ISA model. I feel there's a class of students for whom ISAs are perfect, and, just like you said, a class of students for whom they are ineffective. The ones where the ISA works and standard school is out of reach have incredible success stories. I found something similar when I taught a nearly free C++ class. I put a really simple test on the front with a refundable $20 fee (if you took the course). Everyone who ultimately took the class was really motivated. $20 was all it took to filter. $5 might have even worked since I speculate the effect is psychological, not economical. The second link is good food for thought, some stuff I hadn't considered. If the ISAs are sold cheaply enough, you really don't need much student success to get a return. IIRC, in Lambda's case, the ISA sales were stopped while the company was still young (having gotten another round) [caveat: I didn't have much visibility into this side of things], and anecdotally I think they had some of their biggest successes early on, but I agree with your points on this. One thing that really impressed me about Lambda was how diverse in every respect the student body was, people from just every walk of life. Waaay more so than I'd seen at any university. I credit the ISA for making this possible. One of my missions in life is to enable people to get the training they want to get. ISAs were wonderful in that regard.
- cglee 3y ago
  I think you have to be careful about looking at the diverse student body as "giving them an opportunity". For example, predatory for-profit universities specifically target low-income minority populations not to serve them but because they make for easy prey[1]. I'm not saying Lambda or any particular bootcamp is in this category, just that having a diverse student body isn't a feature unless you know for a fact that you're helping 100% of the students.[2] Education has a couple of unique attributes that makes it difficult to assess: 1. the value cannot be perceived until much later after the service is rendered 2. alternatives are mutually exclusive; eg, people usually just attend one university or coding bootcamp, not all of them (or even two of them) This is in contrast to, say, a restaurant where diners can immediately determine if they like the food and can compare it with competitors (because they dine at all the restaurants). Those two attributes make it very easy to lead with hype and marketing and vulnerable people are particularly susceptible to it. imo it's not appropriate to deploy the standard startup playbook in edu, especially if you find yourself attracting vulnerable students. Ok, now combine that with ISAs, which has some positive qualities but are not as incentive aligning as marketed. And then if you sell the ISA in bundles, then it becomes even less incentive aligning. Well, I guess it's now aligning with investors and loan brokers. But it's certainly not aligning more with student outcomes. It all makes for a very delicate situation where you have vulnerable students biting on the ISA bait. I know it seems like I'm just complaining but I've been thinking about these problems for a long time and I come with solutions. Or, particularly, a solution: imo the best thing an edu institution can do is allow students to leave easily. Why do we never think of restaurants as predatory? The idea is ludicrous to even consider. There are of course terrible restaurants but we can just not dine there again and eat elsewhere. There are lots of restaurants around. And here's the issue: there are also lots of edu institutions around but every single one of them deploy the marketing->entrapment playbook.[3] How does marketing work when you have a bad school? Because of the time-lapse between value received and service rendered. The ISA is easily abused in this environment because it's both the marketing and the trap. Anyway, I'm just riffing here... btw, huge fan of your books and work! Despite what I wrote above, I knew Lambda was making an honest attempt at their curriculum when they hired you. [1] https://failstatemovie.com/ [2] imo, edu institutions need to be judged on how they treat their most vulnerable students, unlike startups who are judged on their best wins (https://twitter.com/cglee/status/1781129096250179640) [3] https://medium.com/launch-school/educational-entrapment-f5cc0472051e
gorkemcetin 3y ago
I am the founder of BlueWave Labs - we accept junior developers and UI/UX designers to give them Canadian experience by building open source products, to help them land their full time IT jobs and would love to talk to anyone who has put some thought on bootcamps. BWL is a bit different from bootcamps but the main idea is the same: to help people land full time jobs.
- cglee 3y ago
  How far along are you? I like what Recurse Center is doing, for example.