Bloc

Bloc is a bridge to becoming a software developer. I'm about halfway through the software track, and it has been great so far. I ask hard questions, and get back helpful answers quickly. Working with a software engineer helps you see the big picture and is well worth the investment. I had thought about going back to get a degree, but I already have one and it is near useless. Also, I haven't had any colleges back the degree with a job guarntee like Bloc does. You can find what you are looking for in Bloc. Feel free to reach out to me directly with any questions. @Matt24Ray       

My experience at Bloc has been fantastic. One of the real highlights with the experience is how you work with your mentor. In my case we've discussed my goals (learning and career) and my mentor has tweaked and adjusted the assignments to help me reach those goals. 

Having someone to ask questions, give helpful and constructive critiques and to be there to push you has been great. Through that experience I've been amazed at how my thought process and approach to UI/UX has changed in such a short period of time. 

Bloc also has an amazing amount of great resources to tap into in the different lessons. Those resources have been instrumental in me understanding the theory and principles behind successful UI/UX design. It's been great to be able to study these resources and then immediately apply what you've learned to an assignment. The hands-on, assignment based learning has been a refreshing way to learn these complicated topics and theories. 

I'm taking the Software Engineering Track at Bloc and have had a great experience so far! They begin by teaching you the fundamentals of HTML, CSS, and the Ruby programming language (which, I should note, seems like a good choice as a starting language for new developers because it's less convoluted than many alternatives). I'm now working in a Ruby on Rails developer environment building my first project, a public Wiki forum. There are several steps left- more projects, tons to learn about JavaScript, frontend development, and software engineering fundamentals, and of course the job hunt- but it's gotten off to a great start.

Programming is tough no matter how you try to learn it, but Bloc has done a very good job of starting off slow and gradually removing the handholding. They pair you with a mentor who you meet with one to three times a week so they can check in on your progress and answer questions for you. My mentor asked me right off the bat what my goals were with learning to become a developer, and since I told him my goal is to launch a career in the field, he's given me lots of tips about applying for jobs, building a developer portfolio, making a presentable LinkedIn account, getting involved in local Meetups, the list goes on.

I was originally going to take lessons at Galvanize, which has a brick-and-mortar location in Fort Collins, CO (where I'm from), but found out that they require students to devote 40 hours a week to their work, which, unfortunately, I don't have the time to do because I have a job. Fortunately, Bloc gives students three different "paces" to work at, so you can decide whether you want to commit an average of 15, 25, or 40 hours/week to your work. I have 2 part-time jobs right now, but have been able to keep up with the 25 hours/week schedule pretty well overall. In other words, you can absolutely learn at Bloc without quitting your day job!

Bloc is a bit of an investment, but they also guarantee your money back if you complete the course and still can't find a job in the industry. My current income is about $30,000/year, and they guarantee a job that at least doubles that, so to me it was a no-brainer.

The only minor complaint I have with the course is that it gives you the options to install Ruby locally (if you have a Mac or Linux machine) or to develop in Cloud9 online regardless of what computer you're using. I decided to use Cloud9 per my mentor's suggestion even though I have a Mac, but in several places in the course, the code Bloc gives me has to be altered slightly to be compatible with Cloud9. This has led to a handful of frustrating moments when my code would have been working perfectly if I'd been working locally on my computer, but didn't because running your app "locally" on Cloud9 is slightly different. For this I'm taking one star off of my "curriculum" score.

However, I should reiterate that even if you do use Cloud9 with Bloc, this is a very minor problem- it's popped up maybe three times in two months' worth of programming. Still, I'd like to mention that so Bloc can make an even better experience for future students!

If you're in a situation similar to mine- you can't quit your day job, you would love to pursue a new career in software development, you're willing to commit yourself to the work every day, and you love technology and the idea of building cool products for people to take advantage of, I would absolutely recommend Bloc to you. Give it a look at bloc.io, and if you'd like to ask me more about my experience, contact me at danrice.me. I'd be happy to answer any questions you have and can also get you a $500 discount off the course you choose!

- Currently about a third way through the Part Time Web Developer Track and loving it so far! The best part by far is the quality received from the one-on-on mentors. My mentor and I meet over Skype twice a week and he continuously allows me to put my own twist to the curriculum to fit my own career goals and provides plenty of material and insights that go beyond the curriculum. He also always responds to my messages asking for help within hours if not sooner. 

- I had a little introductory experience with programming going into this program so I was able to breeze through some of the earlier material but definitely picked up a bunch of new skills on the way. That being said, the quizzes and projects will challenge you and is reflective of the intensive yet organized and informative curriculum structure. Both good and bad; Bloc has been making minor tweaks to the curriculum while I was going through the program which led to some confusion but the new changes definitely show that the curriculum stays relevant.

Tl;dr

• Pros
  • The one on one time with a mentor, the quality cirriculum, and overall learning environment, it's totally worth it.
  • The mentor is the most important part and definitely the biggest piece to the puzzle
  • The students and community at Bloc is amazing.
• Cons
  • Not much about deployments or managing external servers is covered.
  • It's expensive, but as stated, the amount of community, mentors, and resources at your disposal make it worth it.

I found blog through a few YouTube videos while I was searching for coding resources. I read reviews and saw great things, but then I saw the price and it genuinely discouraged me from trying it. I then kept searching for the things that bootcamp grads were lacking, so I could somehow fix that while going through another bootcamp like Viking Code School or App Academy. The thing I did keep seeing was that there was an apprenhension towards hiring bootcamp grads because of their lack of computer science concepts, and indepth knowledge of under the hood systems like Active Record for example. In trying to find a code school that remedied this, I came back around to Bloc, and after much consideration and planning, I began their Software Engineering Track on a 48 week pace.

The student advisory team at Bloc was extremely helpful, and they didn't sound like salesman like at a few of the other bootcamps I called. They were very open to hear my thoughts concerns and feelings and did not pressure me to make a decision for them. That was the first great experience.

The second was my mentor. He's been absolutely critical in my success so far. I get 3 sessions with him a week for my pace, and he's also able to answer emails on days we don't chat. He's not so much a teacher as much as a mentor to help guide me through the process of learning, cause while you're at Bloc, it can feel like your a small cup being poured into by a massive waterfall, you can only catch so much. He's extremely effective at imparting thought processes for complex problems and knowledge retention.

The cirriculum is great thus far, but the cirriculum isn't easy to get through. It's rigorous and the challenges are difficult. Pushing through some of them is hard, and the checkpoints don't always give you a way to find out the solution for the challenge, so you're on your own... sort of. You have your mentor, who can answer questions, but also you have the other students.

The community of students is great. We all help each other out and everyone is extremely generous. Mentors are also active in the Slack community so there's always someone willing to help. I've pair programmed with students to help them, and some have pair programmed with me to help me out. It's fantastic and you learn a lot about communicating complex topics effectively while here.

I've built a couple projects thus far, the most notable are two Alexa Skills that are in the Amazon AlexaSkill store and one of them has a 5 star review, which, coming from a non-coding background just 3 months ago, is pretty satisfying and is a very encourage measure of results from Bloc.

There are a couple downsides, it's very intense. If you're not willing to sacrifice time and extra stuff, you won't be able to make it through, especially at a fast pace. It's extremely frustrating sometimes and I've lost a lot of sleep over some issues, but I suppose that's a personal flaw. The price can also be seen as a negative, however, after my mentor encouraged me to reflect on how far I'd come, just this small section has been worth the money. 

My biggest complaint so far is just maybe that there are tools that could be introduced in a few of the modules. Deployment is a big one. I'm the kind of person that just consumes every bit of info on a topic that I can, and Deployment is a huge topic that isn't covered at all in at least the backend portion of the track. That being said, I'm at least able to understand most resources because of the way Bloc has to me to progressively learn.

While I'm not graduating for a while, I've begun my career search. They don't just pile on leads, or tell you about events or job fairs to attend, they give you active topics to research to accomplish your goals and ways to frame your learning around what you want to do and what industry you want to go into. It's a very interesting approach, but it's paying off as I'm meeting better people and better understanding the industry and where I wish to work.

I would definitely recommend Bloc to a friend. Their approach is working for me as I've jumped miles ahead then where I'd be if I had taught myself over the past few months. 

I needed an online school with a proven track record that could replace getting a traditional 2nd Bachelor's degree. The Software Engineering track is doing exactly that. The mentor sessions quickly fill in the inevitable gaps that come from solo learning. The solo learning ensures that I am learning at my pace and never feel rushed or held back! The curriculum is always being tweaked and the team responds immediately to any requests or concerns. Private school is expensive, but I can already see that the time and money invested will be quickly made back with a good job.  Bloc has been a great fit.  

**Quick note about this review: I wrote quite a bit about myself. If you do not care for this and just want the points about Bloc feel free to skip down to the eighth paragraph (entitled Bloc Review) (Yikes, did I really write that much?).

#### Background

The reason I wrote so much about me is that while doing my own research I found that the most helpful reviews were the ones of this nature. If someone wrote, "Bloc is great. It fit my lifestyle" well that may be true... but I'm left with questions such as, "What is their lifestyle? Is it similar to my life situation? Are they working full-time? Part-time? Are they able to spend time away from the computer?" My hope in providing this context is to provide possible similarities and connection points that may help you decide which direction you wish to go. Making decisions like these can be stressful, I know, I just made mine recently! Just remember that it's never, ever too late to start something new or change directions once you do (Whew, that takes a lot of the pressure off, doesn't it?).

Currently I am enrolled in Bloc's Full Stack Web-Developer track (I believe it's now called the Part-Time Web Developer Track) and am about 1/3 of the way through the program. I'm having the time of my life.

I have always loved the idea of coding, but for various reasons never decided to give it my full attention. Very recently I took deeper look at it while taking an online classes and it sparked such an interest I decided to make a career switch and go for it. 

Having gone through periods of attempting to learn C++ through Stanford lectures on YouTube and programming books, basic HTML via online tutorials, Codecademy for various languages, self-paced courses from Udemy for web development, and an online course for Python, I never found a path that _gave me direction_. I learned things from them, but it all felt very basic and narrow (hurray, I can make a very specific set of games using Python using a specific browser-based tool made to run Python code). I was never given any context as to where and when I could use these skills. Yes, I understand a large part of being a developer is honing the skill of being able to self-teach and come up with solutions, but everyone learns a little differently and personally I need to be given a little direction and context in order to build a solid foundation to be free upon. During my time going through the self-paced, online web dev course from Udemy, I learned many great skills through it, but I always had this nagging feeling of, "is this going to get me where I want to go?" This is when I looked into programming bootcamps.

I was extremely hesitant at first. I talked to many, many people and read many, many sources and articles about the pros and cons of bootcamp versus traditional college. I'm 24 and graduated with a BA in Psychology (Why not computer science? Because... well, I don't know. Life changes.) not too long ago and recently paid off my loans, so the idea of going back for another X amount of years and acquiring more debt wasn't too appealing. Also it meant potentially moving and probably classroom/commute time, so it was either that or finding something solely internet-based. For this reason I wanted the bootcamp to be the better of the two options (though in my head I still felt like college is the "official" way to go). After more discussions with various individuals and hiring managers it sounded like the majority of companies are more concerned with what you can do than how many years you've been to school for (save for a few exceptions regarding higher positions and specializes roles). Sweet. Bootcamp is a go.
 
Now... Which one? Well, that was actually a really easy decision. Not only was Bloc mentioned to me by a friend, but after comparison it seemed like a no-brainer (for my situation). The other bootcamps were extremely expensive, required in-person classes, which meant moving to extremely expensive places regarding housing- this is separate from the tuition cost (Bloc is very affordable, by the way), and were for many, many, many hours per week; this meant that I wouldn't be able to work and that my brain would be overloaded. I know what a "bootcamp" is and I know there is value in being able to persevere through it. However, I know myself and my beliefs. I know that I would get burnt out being in a classroom staring at a computer for 70 hours a week. I know that I often solidify information in my head and things start to click when I take breaks. For my own happiness and sanity I believe in balance for all things. Yes, I'm positive I could have succeeded doing an insane amount of hours per week, but why do that when I can work part-time to keep a steady flow of income, have a day or two here and there to still visit with friends and relax over dinner, and still be on my way to becoming a web developer? Bloc makes this possible? How? Well, I'm glad you asked. Let me tell you!

#### Bloc Review

Bloc is truly phenomenal in that it provides everything I wanted, had been looking for, and need. I like being shown exactly what I need to do: They have a set curriculum you go through that takes you step-by-step through what you need to know and do for building web applications. However, I also learn better by struggling through it myself: Each checkpoint has an assignment that you work through on your own and builds off of what you learned. It doesn't stop at just the lessons though. They teach you the necessary and usable resources. Whereas my Python class taught me Python and only that (what if I wanted to use a different GUI than the simple one they provided? Too bad. So sad. Go search for that other GUI on your own that you don't even know the name of.), Bloc integrates Git/GitHub for version control, Heroku for deployment of your projects and websites, various Ruby/Rails gems, and so much more while simultaneously mentioning and encouraging you to find your own resources to use; to be creative. What if the curriculum doesn't go over it? Ask your mentor! 

Yes, you get a mentor. You even get to choose who you want (don't worry, you can switch if it's not working out)! As so many people have said this is invaluable. What does having a mentor do? Well, for me having a mentor means accountability! Some days I'm on fire and others... I just want to watch Netflix all day. Knowing I have a meeting with my mentor, personally, keeps me motivated and on-track out of respect for not wanting to waste his time. I'm also relieved at the idea of having someone extremely experienced (Bloc has a high standard for their mentors) looking over my code _and_ practices. Someone who is working in the field and knows what is and is not expected. It's also a great opportunity to ask questions that you may have from your checkpoint or assignment and dive deeper into a particular area. Also, they're just fun. I really enjoy my meetings with Matt.

Bloc is online and at your own pace. Ten hours a week? Forty hours a week? Yes. It's whatever you choose and whatever works for you. This is perfect for me. I'm currently at 25-30 hours a week. It means that, as I said earlier, I am able to balance having a part-time job, being out and away from the computer for a bit, and also continue on my path to becoming a web developer. I get the best of all worlds. Also did I mention that it's _entirely_ online? Which means, save for meetings with your mentor (which you can work out a time that works best for both of you), you can do it wherever, whenever. I've had days where my focus has been completely shot and I completed nothing I should have, and still others where I didn't move for the entire day because I was on a roll. This also makes it easy to fit your life. Bloc accounts for life. They allow you to "freeze" your program for a while if you have a family emergency, are sick, or just need a vacation. This extends your estimated finish date without shorting you any meetings with your mentor or putting you behind. They also let you change paces if you decide you want to put on more hours or take on fewer. Even if you do pick a pace, you're free to rush ahead as well. It's up to you.

Direction and career services. As I mentioned earlier one of my biggest struggles with typical online courses or other resources was the isolated learning. I had no path and no direction with them. Once I completed whatever I was going through I only felt slightly accomplished as the knowledge I had slowly died out due to inuse. Bloc has career services (even a tuition guarantee if you take the Software Engineer Track- which you can 'upgrade' to if you're already in the Web Dev track, which I really appreciate) that help you out after you're done. I can't speak too much to this as I'm currently in the program and have not yet taken full advantage of it, but I plan to! They have extensive resources that include teaching you how to build your resume and portfolio, how to present them once you have them, what to expect in interviews, and so much more. They also are constantly hosting webinars and other talks about web development, careers, and again -so much more- that they welcome you to attend.

It's for everyone. Another of my concerns was if I would succeed with what I had, which was very little programming knowledge. I felt very intimidated and outmatched by going into a bootcamp. Spoiler alert; you'll be just fine. I'm roughly three months into the program and have learned far more than I could have ever thought possible in such short amount of time! Regardless of your background, given that you are attentive to your work, you will succeed.

#### Conclusion and My Experience

My time at Bloc has been absolutely incredible. It has been challenging, fun, rewarding, and I have not regretted my decision in the least to go with the program and track that I chose. My goal of being a web developer and having a programming job as a career has seemed much more obtainable and realistic since joining Bloc and looking back I can see the progress I have made in such a short amount of time. The other students have been extremely encouraging and going through this with the Bloc community has truly made my experience great.

Okay. That's quite a bit. If you stuck with me; congratulations, I'm impressed and thanks for reading! I hope it helped you. If not, well, I don't blame you! It's a lot to read. I know there's quite a about Bloc that I missed and resources that I didn't expound upon (like their awesome Slack community- super awesome and helpful, full of students going through the same track as you. Heck, we may even cross paths if you join!), but as you've already discovered for yourself the Bloc employees and advisors themselves are invaluable! They are extremely pleasant to talk with and love answering your questions. My student advisor, Andy, was incredible and always replied to my emails and questions within mere hours, helping me make my decision and informing me of helpful tools and resources.

Bloc provides so many options, opportunities, and (yes, this word yet again) resources, both for those considering their program and those currently enrolled; use them all!

I started Bloc in the summer of 2015 on the Full Stack Web Dev Track. The aim of my studies was to change my career from the boring day to day accounting world into something exciting that gets me thinking out of the box on a daily basis. I wanted a career that allowed me to push the boundaries, create and conquer. A little bit about me and my background of tech ... Well it's pretty simple, I have never worked in IT and my IT skills were probably the same as your average high school grad. Needless to say my knowledge of development was extremely little to none, so as you can imagine changing a career is daunting enough but changing your career into the complete unknown is extremely scary!

I started by doing allot of research, I was desperate to get out of my routine and current situation so I was plugging away trying to find a course asap. I came across many many online boot camps and even tons of free online resources all of which I discovered would have been useless without the help and guidance from a mentor that has years of industry experience. Something I have learned from programming is its not a subject or career that you can pick up on or simply learn and regurgitate text book style which is where Bloc has been abslutely amazing!!! The guidance and mentorship I have recieved from hours of online collaboration and Skype share sessions with an industry proffesional is something I have gained massively from! It's learning you can't put a price tag on as it is a life skill used in the real world as a programmer. From the very beggining working with Bloc has been like living in a 5* resort. The team make you feel welcome from the minute you start, always availale to help out with any information needed. For someone who was at the time completely new to the sector I was seriously looked after. The other great benefit of studying with Bloc is the flexibilty of weekly meetups. As I am still working full time in a demanding job I sometimes have a week or two where there was no way I was going to be getting any studies done which I thought was going to be an issue as I would be cutting into study time and losing out on money invested into the course BUT the great team at Bloc were as always eager to help and simply advised me that I have the freedom of "freezing" my account for a while and when I was ready I could resume as per normal. 

All I can say is, I have no regrets and cant believe you can change your career with such ease and I wish I had done it sooner.  
 

I joined the Bloc Bootcamp program in November 2015 to restart my software development career. While I started my career in software development, my path has included time as an IT leader and most recently, client-facing IT project manager. I’ve enjoyed the twists and turns of my career, but found I  missed the opportunity to solve problems creatively, using software.  It was hacking I was missing.

Early in my career, a friend said something to me that has stuck: ”Always keep your toolbox close at hand”. It meant, if you are in a technical role, keep learning new languages and technologies. I tried to stay current through the years but it became more difficult with the demands of managing projects, resources, and clients. So when I decided to leave my position last year (due to personal family matters), I remembered that piece of advice and realized it was time to add some more tools to my toolbox.

Coming from a application development background, I knew I was interested in web development, specifically Ruby and JavaScript. Talking to friends and doing online research, I discovered online coding bootcamps. Given my personal situation, this was the perfect path for me to update my skills - working at my own pace, in my own space.  

But deciding to go with an online boot camp is one thing. Deciding WHICH boot camp is a whole other story! Course Report helped with my search. I originally  narrowed it down to Firehose, BLOC, Code Academy, and Dev Bootcamp. I wanted more guidance than a self-pace­­­­d program like Code Academy. I liked Firehose, with their focus on back-end skills and team development. I knew from my own experience how critical these skills are to becoming a well-rounded developer.

In the end, the marketing and promotion quality of Bloc won me over.  During a intro to Bloc webinar, one of the instructors said to me, “what is the point of certification? That does not mean much; what counts is building a portfolio of projects on a source repository like Github and showing that to a potential employer.  That is a much better way to demonstrate your skills.” With their commitment to education, one-on-one mentoring, and ability to help me build my portfolio, I was sold.    

I started the Bloc full-stack course in November 2015 and will be finishing in July 2016.  I started with the Ruby on Rails (RoR) track that was followed by the front-end portion. Jon Linowes led me through my Ruby training and John O’Connor through the front-end portion.

I am thrilled  with the experiences and knowledge that both these mentors provided. They work with this technology every day and have many many years of experience. They were also a great source of information beyond just “how does this work” or “why isn’t it working”.  We discussed things like, “how is this really used in business”, “how did you select that tool”, and so on.  

Jon provided solid corrective guidance through code walkthroughs and helped me when I really got stuck. He had a rich set of experience to draw from to answer my questions. I enjoyed his style and in the end he turned me into a real fan of Ruby.

John was a great cheerleader. He made me feel confident in what I was learning and always had suggestions, expertise, and tips to improve my projects. He would often challenge me to add something else make it more fun (albeit more difficult!)  He knew I would gain so much by getting stuck and ultimately figuring it out on my own or working together as a team.

If you are looking for a mentor, I highly recommend Jon and John.

Bloc’s online tutorials were excellent. Many times, I could have sworn something was wrong with the tutorial and came to realize I missed something. I believe these tutorials have improved over the past few years after speaking with previous graduates.

Each track started with the basics of the lessons, followed by a complete walk-through of how to build an online application. For RoR it was a Reddit clone and Javascript was an online music player. Much of this training was typing in code into your local development platform and running your tests from there. Next up, you pick several projects they recommend to develop with some general guidance. Creating a capstone project is part of the curriculum, as well as job preparation tutorials. The Bloc mentors conduct mock technical interviews which helped me get comfortable with using tools like CodePen or JSBin to write sample code on demand during a video interview session.

I highly recommend Bloc if you can afford it. It’s pricey, and takes a strong commitment and effort on your part...but it is totally worth it.  

Here’s my short list of pros and cons:

Pros

·      Online and self-paced within a selected track

·      Can freeze the program if your schedule changes

·      One-on-one mentoring sessions with a person you choose

·      Interactive code reviews using technologies like Screenhero

·      Gradual build of complexity

·      Focus on building a portfolio of your projects

·      Ability to build a capstone project of your own

·      Proven track record and many reviews online

Cons

·      Not cheap

·      The full stack course can be overwhelming as you go deeper into the program if you don’t have a foundation of knowledge and/or background in development

·      No paired-programming or sense of working with other student developers but they do have a great development community with learning and connecting with other Bloc attendees

Bloc is one of a few, in my opinion, coding bootcamps that offer a fully online program.  When you're working full-time AND trying to change careers, this is the only way to go.  I've researched several programs and found that this program had the best price to content available.

I opted for the full-stack, Ruby, course.  I was able to take it part-time - 36 weeks vs 12 weeks.  This was huge.  working full-time, meant just a couple hours during the week nights and 10-12 hours on the weekend.  My pace was slow, but being able to take my time, helped me to grasp and remember more concepts than if I was in a full-time 12-week course.  The course, was not watered down either.  I do a good amount of programming (VB/SQL) in my current job, but this was no easy task.  I was learning a new technology stack, current development concepts, test driven development, and building real-world programs from scratch.

After I completed the Full-Stack Ruby program, I went on to enroll in their Software Engineering Track.  This adds Front-end Development (HTML, CSS, Javascript), Databases and Algorithms, and  Open Source Apprenticeships.  The idea is to give students the same computer science education that is offered at a four year university in less than half the time.

I'm about halfway through the program.  It really has enriched my life.

My mentors are good.  I think I could've used more help, but I don't know if that was on purpose.  It did force me to rely on help from my peers and coding forums and Google searches for the answers I needed.  My current mentor has been Awesome!  He has been extremely encouraging and on top of making sure I have steady progress.  I've completed 90% of the Front-end course under him, and because I'm ahead of schedule, for my capstone project, he added me to his team on a start-up concept he is working on.  It's like a internship where I'm learning more frameworks such as (Meteor, Blaze, MongoDB, responsive web design, etc.)

If you are looking for a good online coding bootcamp, you simply won't be disappointed with Bloc.  The content is comprehensive.  They want you to learn and to succeed.