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California Orders Coding Bootcamps To Stop Enrollment And Issue Refunds

56 points by msolujic 13y ago

eekfuh 13y ago
The experience we've had with hiring people from these bootcamps has been about 50/50. 50% of the people are completely unable to engineer and instead just know a language. 50% of them are hard workers and eventually learn how to be an engineer. 100% of them ask for outrageous salaries for not actually having any professional experience. I think the bootcamps spend a decent amount of their time setting high expectations and how to ask for a large amount of money.
- sillysaurus2 13y ago
  100% of them ask for outrageous salaries So what's an outrageous salary for a new programmer these days? (Also, what area are you in?)
  - danso 13y ago
    Schools within the big expensive areas (NYC, SF) seem to boast an average salary of around $75+K...this is for graduates who may have not done any programming before they started the session. And then there are the intensive programs that say they can get you $100K when you graduate. But these involve students who have already programmed (either through school or professionally) but in another language. IMO, a seasoned Python or Java developer who spends 10 weeks intensively learning Rails/iOS (and going beyond the curriculum, if the curriculum is also aimed at beginners) is probably worth $100K in the NY/SF area. http://www.airforcetimes.com/article/20130426/NEWS/304260032 http://www.airforcetimes.com/article/20130426/NEWS/304260032 http://www.businessinsider.com/flatiron-school-coding-program-2013-4 http://www.businessinsider.com/flatiron-school-coding-progra... http://www.quora.com/Kush-Patel-1/answers/Flatiron-School http://www.quora.com/Kush-Patel-1/answers/Flatiron-School
    - wwweston 13y ago
      > a seasoned Python or Java developer who spends 10 weeks intensively learning Rails/iOS (and going beyond the curriculum, if the curriculum is also aimed at beginners) is probably worth $100K in the NY/SF area. That's it? Man, I'm suddenly feeling better about my higher salary in relatively less expensive LA.
      - Iftheshoefits 13y ago
        I think that's a bit low. I'm a seasoned programmer with no CS degree, but an advanced degree "in a related field", live and work in the Bay Area (not SF) and my salary is closer to the mid-$100's per year. A Rails "developer" might be worth just $100k, but that's because there are so many hipster/naive fresh graduates in the area willing to work for (relative) peanuts on social web app fluff.
    - aiiane 13y ago
      $75k is about what the typical new college graduate with no industry experience gets as a salary for any major CS company in the bay area. For a program that does 9-6 PM 5 days a week for 10 weeks, that's ~8 hours (not including lunch) x 5 days x 10 weeks = 400 total hours. That's about the equivalent class time to 8 semester-long CS courses.
      - _delirium 13y ago
        Realistically, in terms of what they actually cover and what projects students have produced by the end of them, these programs are the equivalent of about 3 semester-long CS courses, in the best case. At best they are equivalent to around 10-15% of a degree.
        doktrin 13y ago
        > these programs are the equivalent of about 3 semester-long CS courses I currently study at a top-5 CS school and previously attended a bootcamp. This comparison feels awkward to me, because they have neither equivalent structures nor goals. The aims of most bootcamps, if I am to generalize, is to teach a relatively specific skillset applicable to industry. The most reasonable comparison would then be CS / ECE courses that aim to do the same (e.g. java & j2ee, web application development, java for android, etc.). In this particular respect I would consider a bootcamp to be the equivalent of at least 4-5 "CS" courses, if not more. For one thing, the student teacher ratio is almost orders of magnitude better, and the material is often more relevant to current industry needs. I would also go as far as to say the quality of instructors at "bootcamps" teaching this material (at least, the one I attended) is superior. On the other hand, there are more than a few individual semester long courses that are easily as grueling as a bootcamp. The courses I'm thinking of are traditional CS & ECE fare : compiler design & OS being prime examples. These are topics the bootcamp I attended (and, I assume all bootcamps) barely touch on, if at all - and all individually require almost as many hours as an entire 3 month bootcamp [1]. However, effort is pretty much also the only metric that can be used to compare the latter with "bootcamps". Since there is virtually 0 overlap [2] in material, it really is a matter of apples and oranges. [1] For anyone but the exceedingly gifted, these courses require a minimum of 50 hrs a week. [2] this lack of overlap also extends to classes on data structures & algorithms. This is material that's only taught obliquely (albeit somewhat effectively) at coding camps.
  - eekfuh 13y ago
    So we've had a couple ask for $130k that went to HackReactor. Found it interesting that they both asked for the exact same number. We also had a couple from 2 different Chicago bootcamps asking for nearly 100k. I do not live in Silicon Valley or NYC or Chicago. I live in Utah. Average household income is under $60k.
    - doktrin 13y ago
      That's exceedingly high. Did they have prior work experience in tech?
      - dkuntz2 13y ago
        Based on eekfuh's first comment, no.
    - deleted 13y ago
      [deleted]
    - Crito 13y ago
      Average household income is a poor way to look at it, since tech jobs typically command much more than the average household income, even/especially in SF. (Average household income is 72k there). Obviously they are different markets though, so I think your point stands.
- wwweston 13y ago
  > 100% of them ask for outrageous salaries for not actually having any professional experience. I think the bootcamps spend a decent amount of their time setting high expectations and how to ask for a large amount of money. Yep. That's a higher percentage than what I'd expect, but it still seems pretty natural. Bootcamps literally sell the idea. This, incidentally, is part of the reason why there's regulation.
- jonnathanson 13y ago
  It's the "get high-paying jobs on graduation" aspect of these programs that's never quite gelled for me. I can think of very few jobs I'd be solidly qualified for after a few months of training, no matter how intense the training. Engineering seems no different, and maybe even harder than most. People should be enrolling in bootcamps to learn the basics, not to get some sort of shortcut to a theoretically sexy job -- the true sexiness of which is entirely unknown unless and until they've actually tried it. If these programs were/are feeding internships, awesome. That's a different story. And on that note, I see no reason why big tech companies can't create their own coding academies, or partner with bootcamps on more structured working internships and externships. The bootcamp --> full-time job connection doesn't make a ton of sense. But bootcamp --> internship --> job makes more sense. There are a lot of smart, hard-working people out there who, for one reason or another, just never got a deep exposure to computers in childhood, high school, or college. (Reliable childhood access to a decent-quality computer, much less programming resources, is not as common as we might expect.) Giving them a shot at learning is a noble and justifiable endeavor. Not all of them will enjoy it, and not all of them will make it through. But a lot of them might. They need to be going into it with the right expectations, though.
  - enraged_camel 13y ago
    >>And on that note, I see no reason why big tech companies can't create their own coding academies, or partner with bootcamps on more structured working internships and externships. You mean actually train people? Don't be ridiculous. Why do that when you can just fire and replace? /s
  - busterarm 13y ago
    Legal internships require you to be in a degree program, so it's not a good path for those of us who are older and looking for a career change. I have the aptitude and experience to do well in an internship, if I could get one. Having to go from bootcamp to internship would cut off the only structured path available to land a programming job, short of going back into a degree program which is both undesirable and financially not feasible. I'm in a bootcamp right now that I don't entirely need, but I'm building up my GitHub account and looking at following up with something like thoughtbot's Apprentice.io or (if I'm crazy lucky) getting into ThoughtWorks' junior developer program rather than trying to get a job with a large salary. I want to learn the ropes in this industry by consulting. Edit: Also, if anyone reading this is looking to hire someone junior (and degreeless) and is committed to training, we should talk. Relocation is not a problem and neither is making an extended commitment on my end (as far as time and/or compensation). I do have a tech background, just not in dev. (Sorry, I gotta hustle! :D)
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
nullc 13y ago
How dare you teach someone and get paid for your time without asking permission from the state of California first! 0_o Why doesn't civil law provide adequate protection for people against sham schools? Has anyone complained about these organizations?
- pmorici 13y ago
  There was another article about this posted a couple days ago. Essentially the reasons the law exists in CA is because there were recent high profile civil judgments in the state against similar schools targeting other fields. Suing someone is a major PITA and takes a year or more really not practical in a lot of situations. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7147664 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7147664
  - jdreaver 13y ago
    So then let's fix the legal system, not ban a perfectly reasonable enterprise.
    - dragonwriter 13y ago
      No one is talking about banning a perfectly reasonable enterprise. Talk about strawmen.
      - jdreaver 13y ago
        What? That's the whole point of the article.
        dragonwriter 13y ago
        No, its not. No one is talking about banning "hacker schools". Schools that have chosen to operate without state-mandated licenses are being told they need to get the license to continue operating. The enterprise isn't being banned.
- 13y ago
snitko 13y ago
Ah, yes, teaching coding without a licence can lead to some unprecedented consequences. Like what if some crypto-anarchist after learning how to code invents a decentralized currency and undermines the banking system. This shall not happen, we must regulate things, or innocent people will get hurt. Speaking seriously, here's how regulation works in a nutshell. A company that wants to prevent/eliminate competition approaches a legislator (through lobbyist, of course) and offers a bribe, say $100k. That legislator then passes a regulatory law that requires around $1m of taxpayers money to be spent on regulation. The company then makes $10m thanks to that new law. The legislator made money, the company made money, the public thinks it is protected. A perfect crime.
- _delirium 13y ago
  I don't think the actual anarchists, crypto- or otherwise, have been hassled (at least, not for this reason). There are free coding clinics at a number of anarchist infoshops and anarchist-inflected hackerspaces, and afaik none has received a complaint.
  - snitko 13y ago
    I wasn't being completely serious, but whenever I hear government trying to get its dirty hands to something not yet regulated, it disgusts me. Regulation robs consumers and prevents innovation and competition, while making politicians rich. That's all there is to it. The side-effect of protecting consumers is unreliable and questionable in 99% of cases.
    - _delirium 13y ago
      I guess I have a more in-between view, in that I'm sympathetic to the anarchists (with reservations), but less sympathetic to the profiteers, many of whom are simply hucksters. I think the trick with government is directing more of its energies against the hucksters than the good guys. Tricky to do, but then also tricky to the do with market forces, which often reward fraud and parasitism. Not always, of course! But I also can't really buy into "government is always oppressing the innovators", since the innovators are often innovating more in the realm of how to separate people from their money...
jfarmer 13y ago
For the diligent, these are the requirements these bootcamps are being asked to comply with (warning, legalese ahead): http://www.bppe.ca.gov/enforcement/institution_minreq.shtml http://www.bppe.ca.gov/enforcement/institution_minreq.shtml
seanhandley 13y ago
Ridiculous. Any tech company worth its salt will do technical evaluations of candidates, regardless of their education. So what advantage does state regulation give, besides putting money in officials' pockets?
- sethish 13y ago
  Stopping people from being ripped off. I am waiting to see if there were registered complains about these schools.
  - derwiki 13y ago
    I realize you're not saying anything about the effectiveness, but regulation hasn't seemed to stop diploma mills.
    - saraid216 13y ago
      You realize that there's an ongoing crusade against diploma mills, right?
      - derwiki 13y ago
        I do. I'd rather fix that before we try to "fix" dev bootcamps.
        saraid216 13y ago
        Is it your contention that we should never try to solve one crime if another one is ongoing?
  - sethish 13y ago
    Update from usatoday http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2014/01/31/california-computer-boot-camps-cited/5078521/ http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2014/01/31/california-com... " > He added, however, that the stern language in the cease-and-desist letters was designed primarily to get the operators' attention and that it was unlikely the bureau would be moving to shut them down as long as they made a good-faith effort to come into compliance. > "We are trying to get them to become licensed," Heimerich said, adding that the agency has not received any complaints about the boot camps and learned about them from a staff investigator who saw them mentioned on a technology blog. "So if they are doing that, they fall to the bottom or close to the bottom of our enforcement priorities because there are many more serious threats to student consumers."
hawkharris 13y ago
The field of programming might evolve similarly to the the field of law as time goes on. A lawyer friend told me his field used to be more accessible to everyday people. Anyone could study cases and even learn enough to represent themselves and members of their communities. Law schools and licensing boards were developed to protect the lawyers' wages and prestige, and to insulate them from outside competition. The regulatory hoops did increase lawyers' salaries, but they also made it impossible for most people to afford legal services. Costly law school requirements prohibited women and ethnic minorities (e.g. Irish people) from entering the field. Programming is a young field. If the history of similar industries is any indication, it won't stay this open and loosely regulated forever. And incidents like the one in California demonstrate that the tides are changing...
- snitko 13y ago
  And this is why regulation is always harmful for the consumer.
  - choult 13y ago
    Why is our drinking water so dirty? Oh yeah. It isn't. Regulation can solve many more ills than it can cause.
    - snitko 13y ago
      I wonder what is so magical about government that only it can determine whether something is safe or not. I'm pretty sure private consumer protection companies would do a much better job for less money.
      - nav1 13y ago
        How would a private consumer protection company enforce anything?
        snitko 13y ago
pmorici 13y ago
There was some prior discussion about this on HN a couple days ago, fills in a couple more of the details. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7147664 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7147664
msoad 13y ago
My wife applied to one of those "Coding Academies" to learn basic web development. They had a phone screening interview and they asked my wife to write HTML and CSS code! Then later they replied that she is no qualified for the course. While their website had no indication that you need to know any programming language or specific computer related background, they rejected my wife. I was suspicious that this might be a racist discrimination so I look around to see who regulates them. Guess who? No one! I'm glad that they are facing mandatory regulation. Also I think the way they try to teach computer science is wrong. You can't be a good Rails developer in 6 months if you don't know basic computer science. My wife no is going to San Jose state university and leaning boring Operation System basics and Assembly. But that's the right way of starting you career in computer science world.
- Crito 13y ago
  > "They had a phone screening interview and they asked my wife to write HTML and CSS code! Then later they replied that she is no qualified for the course. While their website had no indication that you need to know any programming language or specific computer related background, they rejected my wife. I was suspicious that this might be a racist discrimination so I look around to see who regulates them. Guess who? No one!" Barely more charitable explanation: rejecting people who are not already familiar with the subject matter might be how they 'manage' such high success rates.
  - doktrin 13y ago
    I think that's a given. I don't think any school has ever claimed to take someone from 0 to developer in 3 months. That's unrealistic. There's obviously a baseline below which any short, high intensity training course isn't viable. A similar analogue would be baseline fitness levels expected out of candidates at, well, real bootcamps. If you can't jog more than a block or do 1 pushup, chances of making it through are relatively slim.
    - Crito 13y ago
      Yeah, on second thought the "barely" in "barely more charitable" is going to far. Universities definitely do the same thing (though to the credit of universities, they are up front (or even brag) about having stringent admission standards). Your standard university CS department has no problem accepting freshman who have never even heard of HTML, but they are also operating on a different timescale. In universities it is reasonable to spend a few months getting freshman up onto their feet. When the entire program is a few months, you have to operate differently.
rholdy 13y ago
This is too bad. As a graduate of a similar bootcamp program who is currently working as a Jr. Developer it makes me really sad to see this kind of interference from the Government. As with everything else in life, situations that sound "too good to be true" usually are, and consumers need to exercise due diligence before giving people money they aren't comfortable losing. I hope the schools are able to work this out because my Bootcamp absolutely changed my life.
rubiquity 13y ago
Oh, no! Not a $50,000 fine! It's not like they are raking in $400k every 3-4 months. If they want to really hurt them they should fine the school $50k every time they use the word "cohort."
- omgitstom 13y ago
  Yea, I thought the same when seeing the fine.
tarr11 13y ago
Does anyone know what the qualifying criteria is here? I'm teaching coding to kids after school in California, no idea if this applies to me.
- ssully 13y ago
  I don't know what your business is, but I doubt you are charging as much as these hack camps or claiming that your students will get huge salaries after they are done with your service. You should be fine.
- aiiane 13y ago
  If you're not charging them for the service, you probably don't need to care.
crazy1van 13y ago
Once we get some union teachers in there, I'm sure these schools will be tip top!
austenallred 13y ago
It looks like this is the registration form the bootcamps would need to fill out (plus a $3500 fee): http://www.bppe.ca.gov/forms_pubs/renewal_nonaccredited.pdf http://www.bppe.ca.gov/forms_pubs/renewal_nonaccredited.pdf It seems like it's basically a whole lot of bureaucracy the schools would need to go through to ensure that they're not selling snake oil, haven't been involved in felonies, etc. Nothing too absurd, but an unnecessary hassle. Perhaps I'm too much of a free-market loving, meritocratic startup junkie, but all of this seems completely unnecessary. If "colleges" like University of Phoenix et. al can make it through this process, it isn't really going to rule anything out. It introduces a lot of record keeping, forces some self-regulatory procedures, and implements other things that will only slow down the classes. Are coding bootcamps perfect? By no means. Trying to pack a basic understanding of programming into a three-month course is by no means an easy task (and debatably an impossible one). That having been said, it gets the fundamentals in place so that someone can start to learn on the job, and the demand so highly outweighs the supply that I've seen recruiters and startup founders literally lining up to talk to people who have been coding for three months. It says something when the people that annoy programmers the most are recruiters - people trying to give them a job. You don't see recruiters being hated by people with English degrees. Sure, a coding bootcamp is no CS degree from Stanford; I don't think anyone would pretend like it is. But it gets you into the coding world as quickly as you can, and the more programmers the better. The people I've seen go through bootcamps would not claim to be the best programmers in the world, but they get their foot in the door and start getting paid to learn. The companies hopefully realize that's who they're hiring, and make their hiring decisions accordingly. I can't see any need for this type of regulation whatsoever. There's a need (or at least a market), people are willing to pay, they seem to be able to find jobs, and employers are becoming smart with regard to how to properly find/hire/train programmers coming out of bootcamps. Regulation like this, while possibly well-meaning, will only slow things down.
- Crito 13y ago
  Yeah, I have two basic takeaways from all of this: 1) These bootcamps are complaining about basically nothing. As you said, even the 'University of Phoenix' is able to operate... 2) The people making points about how these programs are predatory and need to be regulated are really not going to get what they want from this regulation. As you said, even the 'University of Phoenix' is able to operate...
sirmarksalot 13y ago
I'm conflicted. On the one hand, it seems like a Randian dystopia, with the government stepping in to prevent you from telling somebody else how to do something. Want to tutor your cousin? Fill out 80 pages of paperwork, register as a school, submit to time-consuming performance reviews and curriculum evaluations. On the other hand, the law is addressing a real problem, and as the article points out, these schools are charging top dollar, and making some very big promises. If nobody is calling them on it, or if somebody is, but they wield no authority, then we have a problem. I'm not a libertarian, and I have no problem addressing these things on a case-by-case basis. The problem I see is that the law seems to be very broad, and could be applied arbitrarily to private study sessions just as well as the diploma-mill-minus-the-diploma situation we're seeing here. I think the law needs to be more targeted towards the problematic aspects of these schools, like grandiose claims in their advertising. If the standard truth-in-advertising laws are too toothless to apply here, then inspections are in order. But they should only apply to schools that make the kinds of claims that triggered the crackdown in the first place.
incision 13y ago
What's old is new again. Bootcamps remind me an awful lot of the certification mills of 15 years ago. It's the same 2 months or so and $10K or so with the suggestion that a well-paying job is waiting on the other side, just swap out MCSE / CCNA for Ruby / CSS. I'm sure the cert mills launched some great admins, but I know from experience that they shoveled through plenty of people who had no real aptitude or enthusiasm diluting the field and completely devaluing those skills. It took years and surely a number of painful interviews for those people to filter back out. It's hard not to expect that bootcamps will play out the same way.
elgabogringo 13y ago
The Goverment hates competition.
dmunoz 13y ago
How much of the short duration of these bootcamps is teaching to the test that is the modern software developer interview? I have a really hard time imagining that somebody coming out of a 8-12 week program, even with some prior experience, properly understands the depth and breadth of material that should be necessary to get through a technical interview. It seems like most of them are focused on hacking applications, and not necessarily the fundamentals of data structures, algorithms, software architecture and design, working in a team, etc. I think it's great that these bootcamps are options, but have long been suspicious that the statistics they like to share are only indicative of either who they decide to admit, or who they decide to let graduate. For instance, how many people who make it through these bootcamps have a strong technical background, perhaps even a computer science degree, and only need the short time to dive deeply into modern web application design and implementation?

56 points by msolujic 13y ago

The experience we've had with hiring people from these bootcamps has been about 50/50. 50% of the people are completely unable to engineer and instead just know a language. 50% of them are hard workers and eventually learn how to be an engineer. 100% of them ask for outrageous salaries for not actually having any professional experience. I think the bootcamps spend a decent amount of their time setting high expectations and how to ask for a large amount of money.

sillysaurus2 13y ago
100% of them ask for outrageous salaries So what's an outrageous salary for a new programmer these days? (Also, what area are you in?)
- danso 13y ago
  Schools within the big expensive areas (NYC, SF) seem to boast an average salary of around $75+K...this is for graduates who may have not done any programming before they started the session. And then there are the intensive programs that say they can get you $100K when you graduate. But these involve students who have already programmed (either through school or professionally) but in another language. IMO, a seasoned Python or Java developer who spends 10 weeks intensively learning Rails/iOS (and going beyond the curriculum, if the curriculum is also aimed at beginners) is probably worth $100K in the NY/SF area. http://www.airforcetimes.com/article/20130426/NEWS/304260032 http://www.airforcetimes.com/article/20130426/NEWS/304260032 http://www.businessinsider.com/flatiron-school-coding-program-2013-4 http://www.businessinsider.com/flatiron-school-coding-progra... http://www.quora.com/Kush-Patel-1/answers/Flatiron-School http://www.quora.com/Kush-Patel-1/answers/Flatiron-School
  - wwweston 13y ago
    > a seasoned Python or Java developer who spends 10 weeks intensively learning Rails/iOS (and going beyond the curriculum, if the curriculum is also aimed at beginners) is probably worth $100K in the NY/SF area. That's it? Man, I'm suddenly feeling better about my higher salary in relatively less expensive LA.
    - Iftheshoefits 13y ago
      I think that's a bit low. I'm a seasoned programmer with no CS degree, but an advanced degree "in a related field", live and work in the Bay Area (not SF) and my salary is closer to the mid-$100's per year. A Rails "developer" might be worth just $100k, but that's because there are so many hipster/naive fresh graduates in the area willing to work for (relative) peanuts on social web app fluff.
  - aiiane 13y ago
    $75k is about what the typical new college graduate with no industry experience gets as a salary for any major CS company in the bay area. For a program that does 9-6 PM 5 days a week for 10 weeks, that's ~8 hours (not including lunch) x 5 days x 10 weeks = 400 total hours. That's about the equivalent class time to 8 semester-long CS courses.
    - _delirium 13y ago
      Realistically, in terms of what they actually cover and what projects students have produced by the end of them, these programs are the equivalent of about 3 semester-long CS courses, in the best case. At best they are equivalent to around 10-15% of a degree.
      - doktrin 13y ago
        > these programs are the equivalent of about 3 semester-long CS courses I currently study at a top-5 CS school and previously attended a bootcamp. This comparison feels awkward to me, because they have neither equivalent structures nor goals. The aims of most bootcamps, if I am to generalize, is to teach a relatively specific skillset applicable to industry. The most reasonable comparison would then be CS / ECE courses that aim to do the same (e.g. java & j2ee, web application development, java for android, etc.). In this particular respect I would consider a bootcamp to be the equivalent of at least 4-5 "CS" courses, if not more. For one thing, the student teacher ratio is almost orders of magnitude better, and the material is often more relevant to current industry needs. I would also go as far as to say the quality of instructors at "bootcamps" teaching this material (at least, the one I attended) is superior. On the other hand, there are more than a few individual semester long courses that are easily as grueling as a bootcamp. The courses I'm thinking of are traditional CS & ECE fare : compiler design & OS being prime examples. These are topics the bootcamp I attended (and, I assume all bootcamps) barely touch on, if at all - and all individually require almost as many hours as an entire 3 month bootcamp [1]. However, effort is pretty much also the only metric that can be used to compare the latter with "bootcamps". Since there is virtually 0 overlap [2] in material, it really is a matter of apples and oranges. [1] For anyone but the exceedingly gifted, these courses require a minimum of 50 hrs a week. [2] this lack of overlap also extends to classes on data structures & algorithms. This is material that's only taught obliquely (albeit somewhat effectively) at coding camps.
- eekfuh 13y ago
  So we've had a couple ask for $130k that went to HackReactor. Found it interesting that they both asked for the exact same number. We also had a couple from 2 different Chicago bootcamps asking for nearly 100k. I do not live in Silicon Valley or NYC or Chicago. I live in Utah. Average household income is under $60k.
  - doktrin 13y ago
    That's exceedingly high. Did they have prior work experience in tech?
    - dkuntz2 13y ago
      Based on eekfuh's first comment, no.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
  - Crito 13y ago
    Average household income is a poor way to look at it, since tech jobs typically command much more than the average household income, even/especially in SF. (Average household income is 72k there). Obviously they are different markets though, so I think your point stands.
wwweston 13y ago
> 100% of them ask for outrageous salaries for not actually having any professional experience. I think the bootcamps spend a decent amount of their time setting high expectations and how to ask for a large amount of money. Yep. That's a higher percentage than what I'd expect, but it still seems pretty natural. Bootcamps literally sell the idea. This, incidentally, is part of the reason why there's regulation.
jonnathanson 13y ago
It's the "get high-paying jobs on graduation" aspect of these programs that's never quite gelled for me. I can think of very few jobs I'd be solidly qualified for after a few months of training, no matter how intense the training. Engineering seems no different, and maybe even harder than most. People should be enrolling in bootcamps to learn the basics, not to get some sort of shortcut to a theoretically sexy job -- the true sexiness of which is entirely unknown unless and until they've actually tried it. If these programs were/are feeding internships, awesome. That's a different story. And on that note, I see no reason why big tech companies can't create their own coding academies, or partner with bootcamps on more structured working internships and externships. The bootcamp --> full-time job connection doesn't make a ton of sense. But bootcamp --> internship --> job makes more sense. There are a lot of smart, hard-working people out there who, for one reason or another, just never got a deep exposure to computers in childhood, high school, or college. (Reliable childhood access to a decent-quality computer, much less programming resources, is not as common as we might expect.) Giving them a shot at learning is a noble and justifiable endeavor. Not all of them will enjoy it, and not all of them will make it through. But a lot of them might. They need to be going into it with the right expectations, though.
- enraged_camel 13y ago
  >>And on that note, I see no reason why big tech companies can't create their own coding academies, or partner with bootcamps on more structured working internships and externships. You mean actually train people? Don't be ridiculous. Why do that when you can just fire and replace? /s
- busterarm 13y ago
  Legal internships require you to be in a degree program, so it's not a good path for those of us who are older and looking for a career change. I have the aptitude and experience to do well in an internship, if I could get one. Having to go from bootcamp to internship would cut off the only structured path available to land a programming job, short of going back into a degree program which is both undesirable and financially not feasible. I'm in a bootcamp right now that I don't entirely need, but I'm building up my GitHub account and looking at following up with something like thoughtbot's Apprentice.io or (if I'm crazy lucky) getting into ThoughtWorks' junior developer program rather than trying to get a job with a large salary. I want to learn the ropes in this industry by consulting. Edit: Also, if anyone reading this is looking to hire someone junior (and degreeless) and is committed to training, we should talk. Relocation is not a problem and neither is making an extended commitment on my end (as far as time and/or compensation). I do have a tech background, just not in dev. (Sorry, I gotta hustle! :D)
deleted 13y ago
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nullc 13y ago

How dare you teach someone and get paid for your time without asking permission from the state of California first! 0_o Why doesn't civil law provide adequate protection for people against sham schools? Has anyone complained about these organizations?

pmorici 13y ago
There was another article about this posted a couple days ago. Essentially the reasons the law exists in CA is because there were recent high profile civil judgments in the state against similar schools targeting other fields. Suing someone is a major PITA and takes a year or more really not practical in a lot of situations. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7147664 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7147664
- jdreaver 13y ago
  So then let's fix the legal system, not ban a perfectly reasonable enterprise.
  - dragonwriter 13y ago
    No one is talking about banning a perfectly reasonable enterprise. Talk about strawmen.
    - jdreaver 13y ago
      What? That's the whole point of the article.
      - dragonwriter 13y ago
        No, its not. No one is talking about banning "hacker schools". Schools that have chosen to operate without state-mandated licenses are being told they need to get the license to continue operating. The enterprise isn't being banned.
13y ago

snitko 13y ago

Ah, yes, teaching coding without a licence can lead to some unprecedented consequences. Like what if some crypto-anarchist after learning how to code invents a decentralized currency and undermines the banking system. This shall not happen, we must regulate things, or innocent people will get hurt. Speaking seriously, here's how regulation works in a nutshell. A company that wants to prevent/eliminate competition approaches a legislator (through lobbyist, of course) and offers a bribe, say $100k. That legislator then passes a regulatory law that requires around $1m of taxpayers money to be spent on regulation. The company then makes $10m thanks to that new law. The legislator made money, the company made money, the public thinks it is protected. A perfect crime.

_delirium 13y ago
I don't think the actual anarchists, crypto- or otherwise, have been hassled (at least, not for this reason). There are free coding clinics at a number of anarchist infoshops and anarchist-inflected hackerspaces, and afaik none has received a complaint.
- snitko 13y ago
  I wasn't being completely serious, but whenever I hear government trying to get its dirty hands to something not yet regulated, it disgusts me. Regulation robs consumers and prevents innovation and competition, while making politicians rich. That's all there is to it. The side-effect of protecting consumers is unreliable and questionable in 99% of cases.
  - _delirium 13y ago
    I guess I have a more in-between view, in that I'm sympathetic to the anarchists (with reservations), but less sympathetic to the profiteers, many of whom are simply hucksters. I think the trick with government is directing more of its energies against the hucksters than the good guys. Tricky to do, but then also tricky to the do with market forces, which often reward fraud and parasitism. Not always, of course! But I also can't really buy into "government is always oppressing the innovators", since the innovators are often innovating more in the realm of how to separate people from their money...

jfarmer 13y ago

For the diligent, these are the requirements these bootcamps are being asked to comply with (warning, legalese ahead): http://www.bppe.ca.gov/enforcement/institution_minreq.shtml http://www.bppe.ca.gov/enforcement/institution_minreq.shtml

seanhandley 13y ago

Ridiculous. Any tech company worth its salt will do technical evaluations of candidates, regardless of their education. So what advantage does state regulation give, besides putting money in officials' pockets?

sethish 13y ago
Stopping people from being ripped off. I am waiting to see if there were registered complains about these schools.
- derwiki 13y ago
  I realize you're not saying anything about the effectiveness, but regulation hasn't seemed to stop diploma mills.
  - saraid216 13y ago
    You realize that there's an ongoing crusade against diploma mills, right?
    - derwiki 13y ago
      I do. I'd rather fix that before we try to "fix" dev bootcamps.
      - saraid216 13y ago
        Is it your contention that we should never try to solve one crime if another one is ongoing?
- sethish 13y ago
  Update from usatoday http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2014/01/31/california-computer-boot-camps-cited/5078521/ http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2014/01/31/california-com... " > He added, however, that the stern language in the cease-and-desist letters was designed primarily to get the operators' attention and that it was unlikely the bureau would be moving to shut them down as long as they made a good-faith effort to come into compliance. > "We are trying to get them to become licensed," Heimerich said, adding that the agency has not received any complaints about the boot camps and learned about them from a staff investigator who saw them mentioned on a technology blog. "So if they are doing that, they fall to the bottom or close to the bottom of our enforcement priorities because there are many more serious threats to student consumers."

hawkharris 13y ago

The field of programming might evolve similarly to the the field of law as time goes on. A lawyer friend told me his field used to be more accessible to everyday people. Anyone could study cases and even learn enough to represent themselves and members of their communities. Law schools and licensing boards were developed to protect the lawyers' wages and prestige, and to insulate them from outside competition. The regulatory hoops did increase lawyers' salaries, but they also made it impossible for most people to afford legal services. Costly law school requirements prohibited women and ethnic minorities (e.g. Irish people) from entering the field. Programming is a young field. If the history of similar industries is any indication, it won't stay this open and loosely regulated forever. And incidents like the one in California demonstrate that the tides are changing...

snitko 13y ago
And this is why regulation is always harmful for the consumer.
- choult 13y ago
  Why is our drinking water so dirty? Oh yeah. It isn't. Regulation can solve many more ills than it can cause.
  - snitko 13y ago
    I wonder what is so magical about government that only it can determine whether something is safe or not. I'm pretty sure private consumer protection companies would do a much better job for less money.
    - nav1 13y ago
      How would a private consumer protection company enforce anything?
      - snitko 13y ago

pmorici 13y ago

There was some prior discussion about this on HN a couple days ago, fills in a couple more of the details. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7147664 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7147664

msoad 13y ago

My wife applied to one of those "Coding Academies" to learn basic web development. They had a phone screening interview and they asked my wife to write HTML and CSS code! Then later they replied that she is no qualified for the course. While their website had no indication that you need to know any programming language or specific computer related background, they rejected my wife. I was suspicious that this might be a racist discrimination so I look around to see who regulates them. Guess who? No one! I'm glad that they are facing mandatory regulation. Also I think the way they try to teach computer science is wrong. You can't be a good Rails developer in 6 months if you don't know basic computer science. My wife no is going to San Jose state university and leaning boring Operation System basics and Assembly. But that's the right way of starting you career in computer science world.

Crito 13y ago
> "They had a phone screening interview and they asked my wife to write HTML and CSS code! Then later they replied that she is no qualified for the course. While their website had no indication that you need to know any programming language or specific computer related background, they rejected my wife. I was suspicious that this might be a racist discrimination so I look around to see who regulates them. Guess who? No one!" Barely more charitable explanation: rejecting people who are not already familiar with the subject matter might be how they 'manage' such high success rates.
- doktrin 13y ago
  I think that's a given. I don't think any school has ever claimed to take someone from 0 to developer in 3 months. That's unrealistic. There's obviously a baseline below which any short, high intensity training course isn't viable. A similar analogue would be baseline fitness levels expected out of candidates at, well, real bootcamps. If you can't jog more than a block or do 1 pushup, chances of making it through are relatively slim.
  - Crito 13y ago
    Yeah, on second thought the "barely" in "barely more charitable" is going to far. Universities definitely do the same thing (though to the credit of universities, they are up front (or even brag) about having stringent admission standards). Your standard university CS department has no problem accepting freshman who have never even heard of HTML, but they are also operating on a different timescale. In universities it is reasonable to spend a few months getting freshman up onto their feet. When the entire program is a few months, you have to operate differently.

rholdy 13y ago

This is too bad. As a graduate of a similar bootcamp program who is currently working as a Jr. Developer it makes me really sad to see this kind of interference from the Government. As with everything else in life, situations that sound "too good to be true" usually are, and consumers need to exercise due diligence before giving people money they aren't comfortable losing. I hope the schools are able to work this out because my Bootcamp absolutely changed my life.

rubiquity 13y ago

Oh, no! Not a $50,000 fine! It's not like they are raking in $400k every 3-4 months. If they want to really hurt them they should fine the school $50k every time they use the word "cohort."

omgitstom 13y ago
Yea, I thought the same when seeing the fine.

tarr11 13y ago

Does anyone know what the qualifying criteria is here? I'm teaching coding to kids after school in California, no idea if this applies to me.

ssully 13y ago
I don't know what your business is, but I doubt you are charging as much as these hack camps or claiming that your students will get huge salaries after they are done with your service. You should be fine.
aiiane 13y ago
If you're not charging them for the service, you probably don't need to care.

crazy1van 13y ago

Once we get some union teachers in there, I'm sure these schools will be tip top!

austenallred 13y ago

It looks like this is the registration form the bootcamps would need to fill out (plus a $3500 fee): http://www.bppe.ca.gov/forms_pubs/renewal_nonaccredited.pdf http://www.bppe.ca.gov/forms_pubs/renewal_nonaccredited.pdf It seems like it's basically a whole lot of bureaucracy the schools would need to go through to ensure that they're not selling snake oil, haven't been involved in felonies, etc. Nothing too absurd, but an unnecessary hassle. Perhaps I'm too much of a free-market loving, meritocratic startup junkie, but all of this seems completely unnecessary. If "colleges" like University of Phoenix et. al can make it through this process, it isn't really going to rule anything out. It introduces a lot of record keeping, forces some self-regulatory procedures, and implements other things that will only slow down the classes. Are coding bootcamps perfect? By no means. Trying to pack a basic understanding of programming into a three-month course is by no means an easy task (and debatably an impossible one). That having been said, it gets the fundamentals in place so that someone can start to learn on the job, and the demand so highly outweighs the supply that I've seen recruiters and startup founders literally lining up to talk to people who have been coding for three months. It says something when the people that annoy programmers the most are recruiters - people trying to give them a job. You don't see recruiters being hated by people with English degrees. Sure, a coding bootcamp is no CS degree from Stanford; I don't think anyone would pretend like it is. But it gets you into the coding world as quickly as you can, and the more programmers the better. The people I've seen go through bootcamps would not claim to be the best programmers in the world, but they get their foot in the door and start getting paid to learn. The companies hopefully realize that's who they're hiring, and make their hiring decisions accordingly. I can't see any need for this type of regulation whatsoever. There's a need (or at least a market), people are willing to pay, they seem to be able to find jobs, and employers are becoming smart with regard to how to properly find/hire/train programmers coming out of bootcamps. Regulation like this, while possibly well-meaning, will only slow things down.

Crito 13y ago
Yeah, I have two basic takeaways from all of this: 1) These bootcamps are complaining about basically nothing. As you said, even the 'University of Phoenix' is able to operate... 2) The people making points about how these programs are predatory and need to be regulated are really not going to get what they want from this regulation. As you said, even the 'University of Phoenix' is able to operate...

sirmarksalot 13y ago

I'm conflicted. On the one hand, it seems like a Randian dystopia, with the government stepping in to prevent you from telling somebody else how to do something. Want to tutor your cousin? Fill out 80 pages of paperwork, register as a school, submit to time-consuming performance reviews and curriculum evaluations. On the other hand, the law is addressing a real problem, and as the article points out, these schools are charging top dollar, and making some very big promises. If nobody is calling them on it, or if somebody is, but they wield no authority, then we have a problem. I'm not a libertarian, and I have no problem addressing these things on a case-by-case basis. The problem I see is that the law seems to be very broad, and could be applied arbitrarily to private study sessions just as well as the diploma-mill-minus-the-diploma situation we're seeing here. I think the law needs to be more targeted towards the problematic aspects of these schools, like grandiose claims in their advertising. If the standard truth-in-advertising laws are too toothless to apply here, then inspections are in order. But they should only apply to schools that make the kinds of claims that triggered the crackdown in the first place.

incision 13y ago

What's old is new again. Bootcamps remind me an awful lot of the certification mills of 15 years ago. It's the same 2 months or so and $10K or so with the suggestion that a well-paying job is waiting on the other side, just swap out MCSE / CCNA for Ruby / CSS. I'm sure the cert mills launched some great admins, but I know from experience that they shoveled through plenty of people who had no real aptitude or enthusiasm diluting the field and completely devaluing those skills. It took years and surely a number of painful interviews for those people to filter back out. It's hard not to expect that bootcamps will play out the same way.

elgabogringo 13y ago

The Goverment hates competition.

dmunoz 13y ago

How much of the short duration of these bootcamps is teaching to the test that is the modern software developer interview? I have a really hard time imagining that somebody coming out of a 8-12 week program, even with some prior experience, properly understands the depth and breadth of material that should be necessary to get through a technical interview. It seems like most of them are focused on hacking applications, and not necessarily the fundamentals of data structures, algorithms, software architecture and design, working in a team, etc. I think it's great that these bootcamps are options, but have long been suspicious that the statistics they like to share are only indicative of either who they decide to admit, or who they decide to let graduate. For instance, how many people who make it through these bootcamps have a strong technical background, perhaps even a computer science degree, and only need the short time to dive deeply into modern web application design and implementation?