BrainStation

I'd like to preface this review by stating that I was asked by one of the founders of Wyncode, Juha, to write a review. I planned on writing one anyway prior to his request, but I wanted to wait out the post-graduation 90 day job placement period before doing so to give Wyncode a fair chance. As of writing this, it’s been exactly 100 days since I’ve graduated. This review is fully honest, transparent, and objective. I’m not holding anything back.

Also, this review is based on my own personal experience... and like anything else, your mileage may vary. That said, I’m not going to preach the clichéd "what you put into it is what you get out" hustle statement because that should be common sense. I can't think of anything in life in which that does not apply to.

As some of the reviews below reflect, our cohort had difficulties. We had a new instructor who was apparently hired right before the cohort began. It was obvious that he hadn't had enough time to learn the curriculum, and that becomes detrimental when you are learning at the speed of a coding bootcamp. We also had an awesome daytime TA take another job a few weeks in, and she wasn’t replaced, which made it tougher to get help when we really needed it. Finally, Fort Lauderdale’s former classroom was a dump. The chairs were great, but everything else sucked. It was covered in dust because the walls were unsealed concrete block, it was directly next to train tracks which caused constant (and often extended) disruption, the internet connection dropped daily, and coming and going at night was shady to say the least.

So why a five star experience? Because nothing in life is perfect, but what I got out of Wyncode was more valuable than anything advertised. 

I learned how to learn.

When things broke, and when we didn’t have enough TAs, we had to fend for ourselves. While that might seem like a negative, it really opened my eyes to what I’m capable of. In nine weeks I went from knowing basic Web 1.0 HTML and CSS to creating fully-responsive web applications. I’m proud of that accomplishment, and Wyncode gave me the resources to get there. 

Yes, there are a ton of free and inexpensive online courses to learn development. But they don’t give you the benefit of working with others to generate ideas and problem solve. The true benefit of Wyncode is the people you meet and work with daily, and the insight you gain from working together. I was forced to get out of my jaded, introverted comfort zone. I spent crazy hours and weekends with a great bunch of people. Most importantly, l learned how to learn quickly. Learning quickly wouldn’t have been possible for me had I tried to go it alone. 

To my knowledge and experience, all of the other problems I addressed have been corrected. I visited the new classroom. It’s not directly next to the train, and it’s very nice inside. I sat and listened to the new instructor for about 30 minutes and he seemed to be doing a great job. I didn’t hear any complaints in the Fort Lauderdale Slack channel about the internet connection following my cohort.

I found a really cool job with a start-up two weeks ago. Wynwork, the post-graduation job search sessions that are held weekly, gave me the motivation to get that job. Someone below mentioned that Wynwork is like group therapy sessions for the unemployed. I agree 100%, but I certainly don’t see that as a negative. Being able to hear the struggles and successes my peers were going through and know that I wasn’t alone pushed me to get where I am today. 

Also, Juha and Johanna are awesome people, and really do care. They were swift in addressing the issues I personally had, and the way they handled those issues came from the heart. They hire great, positive people from an industry that can be cold and closed off. They’ve built a great program, and they know what they’re doing.

Would I do it all over again if I had the chance? Hell yes. I see myself as a different person after Wyncode. Wyncode not only taught me how to code, it gave me some very important life skills, and I’m forever grateful for the change that I went through. Prior to Wyncode I’d never in a million years let my cynical brain say anything like that. Nothing in life is perfect, but learning what you’re really capable of is invaluable.

From the very first day the Wyncode "Family" accepted me for who I was and was constantly encouraging me to always be learning and growing. Wyncode taught me that some days we make massive strides, and other days’ mere inches but as along as our efforts are channeled in the right direction you'll always be better then you were the day before. Wyncode not only provided me with the knowledge to be a Web Developer but they provided me with a "family" I know I can always rely on. The support they offer their students and alumni is overwhelming: technical support, after class/week-end teacher assistants, and even weekly "job search" workshops. It is truly amazing how much one can learn in a collaborative environment surrounded by like minded individuals all reaching for similar goals. I will be honest it is intensive, you will be studying/practicing at LEAST 10 hours a day 5 days a week not including weekend projects and homework assignments. You WILL get frustrated but like I said the support is there you just have to be willing to put in the effort. Some of the draw backs of Wyncode is that it is only 9 weeks long and the amount of time spend learning JavaScript is not nearly as much as the time learning Ruby, but that is on purpose. See Wyncode teaches you that once you have learned one programming language you tend to be able to learn other languages a lot faster and I would 100% agree with that. So although it would definitely be great to have more time spent between the two programming languages it is not necessarily needed. Overall going to Wyncode has been one of the best experiences of my life and I wouldn't trade the people and connections I've made for anything! If you are considering attending Wyncode please attend a pitch day event or stop in one day and see what it is like I am sure you will be impressed! (Special shout out to: Juha and Jo, Ed, Jose, Joe C, Henry, and Bianca... Amazing group of people!)

Yes, it's possible to follow the self-study route and learn Ruby on Rails, HTML, CSS and JavaScript. However, the coding bootcamp route has definitely paid off for me. My previous experiences with PHP took me ages to learn with self-study and I did not understand how to use the correct tools for the job, nor how to write 'DRY' code (modular non-repetitive code).

The nine-week course I completed at the Ft. Lauderdale campus (at the FAT village art district) offers a well-rounded study of all of the web technologies and tools to create a functional web application. The course also stresses mobile-first development, so your web pages can operate in many ways like a mobile app. The curriculum is not perfect, but the instructors are intelligent and the TA's are always helpful.

While a large portion of class time consists of lectures, there are also other learning formats such as socrative, hackathons, class coding and group coding. Self-study is also important while in the bootcamp, as the projects are quite time consuming, regardless of experience level. Expect to spend many hours working to get the most out of the program.

Though I had previous coding experience, most of the others in the cohort did not. There is no expectation of programming knowledge, but the program moves very quickly. Be sure to complete all pre-work to gain understanding before the course begins.

Two other reasons I chose Wyncode were that you are given a membership at the coworking space...this provides a helpful environment with less distractions (as focus is key when working on a tedious thing such as computer code). Though placement is not a guarantee, there are access to hiring partners, networking events, and Wynterviews (group interviews).

I graduated from BrainStation's Web Development Immsersive Class in June 2016 and found the experience to be comprehensive and enjoyable. In 10 weeks, students are taught how to build a functional web application from beginning to end. Many students have no previous experience in web development and are still able to follow the course's quick pace, although it would certainly be beneficial. The course is structured in a way that students are presented with new topics in a meaningful order that allows a thorough understanding of how the different parts of a web application are connected. Although there is no formal job assistance, the staff at BrainStation is very active in helping students achieve their goals. I would certainly recommend this course and would advise prospective students to have clearly defined goals heading into the course as well as a realistic expectaion of the amount of work that is required to achieve loftier goals.

Before coming to Wyncode, I graduated from school with a degree in both Finance and Marketing. After graduation, I spent a year in Madrid teaching primary school. I have yet to mention coding in my background, because January 11th, the first day of cohort 8, was the first day I ever touched or had even seen code. I will admit, the first week I was pissed, frustrated, upset, etc. but that was only because doing this course and learning this material, I had to adapt to a new way of processing and thinking.

Fortunately, the great instructors and ta's at Wyncode really helped me through this. I felt at ease, if not overtly comfortable, asking whatever questions I had, no matter how stupid they were. All due to the atmosphere that this program has created. If I had not elected Wyncode and went with another program, I strongly believe I would not nearly be at the level I am at now. 

To be blunt, previous to Wyncode, I envisioned this career as one that is completely isolated and done while hidden in a cavernous basement pounding down bags of Dorito's and liters of Mountain Dew but this could not be further from the truth. Yeah, after Wyncode you'll be able to create things you never thought imaginable, but to me, that was only a small part of the overall experience. The intangibles of creating a network in this exciting new space and the people I met both students and in the tech community, I value just as much. 

And because this is such an honest review, there were many others in my class who were better coders than I was. With that being said, I still have a job as a developer. It's easy to ridicule this program for their job placement services if you are naive and expect Wyncode to magically gift you with a job upon pitch night. That's not going to happen. I worked to get my job but I am aware and thankful that if it were not for Wyncode and what I learned there, I would not be in the position I am now. The jobs are there for you if you work to find them. 

I took the full time immersive web development course winter 2016. It was one of the best decisions I made. Before I began the course I planned on taking online bootcamps so I studied a bit of Javascript on my own and had a solid basic understanding of the language. But I decided on Brainstation because of the curriculum. They teach the JS frameworks throughout which makes it a bit easier than having to learn Ruby AND JS for example. 

I knew I liked programming but I didn't know what to study on my own, hence why I decided to take the course. Suffice to say, I got maximum value out of the course and have to really applaud the instructors and organizers, they put tremendous effort into ensuring you come out of the course with an arsenal of skills. There was always extra projects / challenges to tackle if you finished early or ahead of schedule and the instructors and TAs are tireless in helping out. Fantastic atmosphere, fantastic learning space as well. If you are planning on getting into this field, Brainstation is a no brainer. But I do suggest you familiarize yourself with some material beforehand, spend as much time as you can learning JS and doing practice problems as it will let you focus on utilizing the tools you know to build things instead of learning to use the tools. 

The course is paced well for any type of learner, slow or fast. You will build projects for every major topic and thats where the magic happens. The more ambitious your attempt, the more value you will get out of the course. The projects are also managed by the staff to mimic real world environments, ie. agile development with sprint plans etc. Job prep is also included in the tail end of the course. You will get a sense of what is required for interviews, the importance of an online presence, personal projects and contributions etc. We were also interviewed by the parent company's technical director as a practice exercise. I was lucky enough to land a second interview and an internship position sometime after the course. 

I did however spend all my weekends working on course material and trying to build different things based on what we learned thus far. In the final 2 weeks where the entirety of the course was focused on individual final projects, I spent over 9hrs a day working on my web app. Brainstation won't guarantee any % of graduates landing jobs but if you invest a signifcant amount of time and effort into creating a small portfolio while you are doing the course, you will have a very good chance of being hired for a junior role somewhere in the city, I am confident of that. Brainstation provided a platform to dive deep into this field and extract maximum value and knowledge in a relative short span. Although I come from a technical background and have a slight inclination to technical topics, I believe anyone willing to put 100% energy into this can come out of it with as much value or more than I have. Excellent staff, excellent support, excellent course material. 

For more than half a year I had been trying to learn how to code online. 

There are dozens of pretty decent resources out there, and I knew people who managed to get certificates and start coding after all. But, unfortunately, for me it was extremely hard to A. find time and B. has someone to monitor my progress to assure the commitment. That’s when I knew I needed something drastic: I needed a bootcamp.

Once I narrowed down the geographic factor to Florida, it was very easy for me to choose Wyncode. Not only because of the positive reviews online, but mostly because I knew they were here first and had an established presence and connections that I needed to begin my new career afterwards.

If you are considering a bootcamp right now, I suggest, you go to one of the Wyncode open houses and see for yourself: lots of reviews here mention great team and assistance, so I won’t say more; but another thing that was mostly important for me was that Wyncode teaches you variety of skills apart from programming, which can be crucial for finding a tech-job. They teach you how to work in a team and take on different roles: scrum, front-end, back-end. You will have a huge network of developers, business owners and just tech-writers, if you take advantage of Wyncode’s regular events and meet-ups. Wyncoders are also extremely friendly and there is a special bond among most of them regardless the Cohort.

I was lucky to experience myself and witness the personal involvement of the whole team including the co-founders Juha and Jo in finding jobs for graduates after the course. That was very important for me: to find a job and enter the tech-world.

Studying is not easy. In fact, it’s pretty demanding. If you want to maximize results: be ready to devote all your life for at least 2 month to the program, otherwise, it can be very difficult to catch up and super easy to fall-off and get discouraged. Apart from the course itself, you will have to find your own ways to learn and explore to stay on top of the game. But it will be so much easier, once you go through Wyncode, to navigate what and where you need to research. You will learn to learn, they say at school. And for a programmer, product/project manager, tech writer, business founder or whoever you decide to be afterwards (the possibilities are vast): there is never an end to learning.

One more thing, if you have an app idea, and want to create a successful start-up, Wyncode is the perfect place to go. They always support each and every start-up that comes out of the classroom. It is their pride and honour to be as helpful as possible and match you up with the right people.

I do not work for Wyncode and was NOT paid for writing the review. I just went. Studied. Struggled. Survived. And loved it.

Prior to my experience at Wyncode, I was a Pre-Medical Student. After spending the majority of my upper level academic life studying the natural sciences, I decided it was time for a change as I was no longer happy with my academic direction. I was fortunate enough to find Wyncode. This enticed me to take a complete chance and change the path I was on. However, everyone chooses to take this jump for different reasons, I wanted to be able to have some sort of creative outlet in what was to be my career. 

Wyncode is 9 weeks of bliss and difficulty. This experience will push you to the limit, specifically if you have no programming experience prior to Wyncode. These 9 weeks will force you to walk a contrasting line. You will have moments of complete happiness when you are able to understand, conceptualize, and implement new ideas and practices. However, you will have moments of absolute frustration, anger, and anxiety when you approach tasks and objectives that don't make sense at the time. 

This difficulty is normal, coding/programming is difficult. It isnt meant to be easy, you will need to give everything you have to this program to be successful and get what you want out of it. You will be given new concepts to build on everyday, you will hear terms that you have never heard of, and you will be explained ways to implement all of this in ways that will require practice to develop fluidity. For the 9 weeks, you will have to put certaine routines on hold, you will have to remove yourself from the familiar comfort zone you were previously residing in. You will have to change your mindset, you will need to ask everything of yourself. 

With that said, I believe Wyncode to be a great and a beautiful place to learn this unique skill. Wyncode provides the environment and staff to make sure that this transition and learning curve are taken on as smoothly as possible. Wyncode's Miami campus employs a gentleman by the name of Ed Toro. He could be one of the most well versed educators in his craft. His true value lives in his patience and his desire to see every person who walks in those doors understand and learn. When Ed is not available, Wyncode schedules teaching assistants everyday, even on weekends. These are individules that will spend more than just 5 minutes with a student. They don't get tired of multiple questions and they want to see you succeed. They are there every weekend for projects and for every syntax error along the way. Every individual deserves some sort of recognition on this post, every instructor/teaching assistant who stays after hours for the greater good of the cohort, each one that answers a slack message at 1 AM, these are the people you will be fortunate enough to learn from and grow with.

Wyncode's curriculum is heavily based around Ruby and its most well known framework, Rails. You will spend a better part of 4 to 5 weeks on this subject matter. There will be one week in between Ruby and Rails that will be dedicated to HTML and CSS. Following this area of the curriculum you will encounter JavaScript. I appreciated the curriculum as a whole for building some sort of infrastructure for my programming life but I do believe more attention should be placed on JavaScript. Wyncode's curriculum currently and going forward will not make you a senior developer or a intermediate developer. Your knowledge will be very limited as it is only 9 weeks, but Wyncode TEACHES YOU HOW TO LEARN. This will be the most valuable lesson you will learn. 

When it comes to job assistance, the first thing that gets noted is that people will assist you. Rita will go in the trenches for you, she will put you in positions to get the job, but you must GET the job for yourself. IT WILL NOT BE EASY. NO ONE IS GOING TO HAND YOU OR GET YOU A JOB. YOU WILL HAVE TO DO IT YOURSELF. This should not be a shock, Rita will tell you this, Jo and Juha will tell you this, every Wyncoder prior to you will tell you this. If you don't grind, it will be noticed. If you don't work hard it will be noticed. Push yourself to get a job with intensity. 

I would recommend this experience to anyone who has the desire to learn how to program/code. It will be worth it at the finish. 

If you have any questions feel free to ask me at my email rodneyeperez@gmail.com.

Some background:

I came into this course with no previous experience in coding. I was a history major in college. I did not go to any pitch days and didn't know what I was getting into. I joined because I wanted a career and life change. Wyncode will require your full undivided attention.

Course:

You learn Ruby, HTML/CSS, then you move on to Rails, learn javascript, and learn concepts of test driven development. You also learn Agile and other Lean startup practices

Instructor:

My instructor was Auston Bunson. I'll say I wish all my college professors were as dedicated to making sure everyone learned as he was. He was open to feedback and worked hard to make sure you were a proficient coder. He is a brilliant guy and if you were a job you’d be very lucky to have him as a senior. I know a lot of people would say he goes too quickly or isn’t a good teach but I’ll go ahead and challenge them by saying that they were probably not very good students. Did they ask questions, did they do all the assignments, did Auston ever turn anyone away from asking their question? I think you will find that they tried to cut some corners.

Job Placement:

Getting a job isn't easy. In any field, it is hard. You have to interview you have to do coding challenges. Wyncode does try to make it easy as possible though. They host tech events for you to make people, introduce you to people hiring, give you practice interviews. They do as much as they can. I don't see any college going this far. Rita tries to prepare as much as possible. My own personal experience is that I wouldn’t have a job in this field without Wyncode introducing me to my future boss at pitch day.

My Thoughts:

Anyone that comes in with the mentality that this course is going to teach them everything or make it easy to do anything is not going to benifit in my opinion. You have to put in the work and really dedicate yourself to being a self learner and self starter. Wyncode gives you so much to get where you want to go a lot faster. If it came with no classes but just the Wyncode community it would be worth it. They are willing to answer any questions at any time of day help you with anything and are just great people. I would recommend this course over any amount of college. These people actually care if you succeed or not.

If you have any questions feel free to ask me at my email rodneyeperez@gmail.com.

I have been thinking about and preparing to post an honest and objective review for the past few days now.  Then I saw what someone kindly wrote 4/21/16 and I realized I couldn't have said it better myself.

Be thankfully for their detailed and lengthy review because it gives you a very good idea of how the program is in its entirety.  I am glad I did Wyncode overall, the miami beach location and people were great but do I think it is worth 10,000?  No.  The "wyncode fam" is warm and welcoming and I really enjoy some of the friendships I made there, but in the nicest way possible, I joined wyncode to learn to code.. not to make friends. They need to have proprietary corriculum to work off of in class.. not some external resources they "suggest"

But I will stop there because below it is stated perfectly.