Chegg Skills

I've been studying with Thinkful for around 2 months now, and I'm really enjoying it and learning a lot. I had more coding experience, I think, than many students coming in, which allowed me to sail through early lessons very quickly. Within a couple weeks, though, I was learning lots of new stuff. The curriculum is good, but there are other good curricula out there, often cheaper. The real game-changers for me were two things:

1) The capstone projects (you'll do three of them in the bootcamp), where you come up with your own independent ideas outside the curriculum and build it. These become portfolio pieces that you can be proud of, and show off to prospective employers. It makes a huge 

2) The mentors. My mentor, TJ, has been amazing. In addition to just helping me understand issues I struggle with, and helping me get back on track when I get stuck, it's also a big help to have someone to hold me accountable for working every day. He has also become a friend over time. This one-on-one attention helps Thinkful escape the problems with many other online programs, that you're on your own and can easily run out of steam or motivation alone. There's also a Slack (group chat) team, where you can engage with other students and staff.  All mentors are not equal, though, and because the system is so dependent on that one-on-one attention, the experience could be very different with a different mentor. Keep in mind that you can request a new mentor at any time and for any reason, if the one you're originally assigned to doesn't meet your expectations. I recommend that new students take advantage of this option, until you find the mentor who's right for you.

Another aspect that was a deciding factor for me was Thinkful's job guarantee. They have a 94% placement rate for graduates into full-time jobs in their field of study. That's pretty impressive! Though not 100%, it's high enough that Thinkful is willing to refund your money, if you're in the 6% that don't find jobs in the end, so it's low-risk. The program will quickly pay for itself if you do find a full-time web developer job, of course, as it's a well-paid field. That 93% is for students who graduate within the expected 6 months, who find a full-time job in the field within 6 months after graduating. I've had an initial meeting with one of Thinkful's career counselors, soon after starting the program, and they gave me some good advice for moving forward. I can't really evaluate that part of the program yet, though, as I haven't gotten to the point where that's a primary focus, or seriously started looking for a job.

A couple caveats about the job guarantee: it applies only if you complete the course within 6 months, and if you live in an area where tech jobs are available. If you mention the job guarantee in your initial meeting to talk about Thinkful (which you can do for free, and without commitment), they'll explain this to you and tell you whether your area qualifies, but I think most metro areas are good. If you live out in the sticks, don't count on their guarantee. The trickier part is graduating within 6 months. I noticed that their graduation rates are considerably lower than their job placement rates (among graduates.) If you do graduate, but not within 6 months, you're still pretty likely to find a job but they won't guarantee it. And if that's an important aspect to you, plan on treating the expected 20-25 hours per week as a bare minimum, and going well beyond it whenever you can.

After spending a couple months in this program, I highly recommend it. I've come a long way since I started.

For anyone considering taking a programming bootcamp, you'll find Thinkful's among the best, and most challanging programs online period!

The one thing I appreciated the most about their programs are the 1-1 mentors you'll be assigned to as soon as you sign up to one of their bootcamps, like my mentor Morgan, who'll help you break down evrery challange, problem, or obstacle, until you're able to solve it on your own, or he'll walk you through the solution, and answer any questions you may have. He'll will also assess your progress and suggest other useful tools or references that will help you get a better understanding of whatever area you're struggling with!

And if you still need some more help, their daily held Q&A sessions and their active coding community on Slack, are always available to help out with any coding problems, and to give you any advice or feedback that you may need!

Before enrolling at Thinkful, I had done a pretty thorough investigation of programs that would best meet my needs. With only about a month of coding experience, only about 20 hours to spare a week with coding after working and a four month old baby girl, you can say I needed a pretty flexible program to meet my needs. I also wanted a program that would intentionally invest in me as a student and not just stick a video or book in front of my face and expect me to learn. I was for sure that intentionality and an online program wouldn't mix, until I came across Thinkful. Thinkful uses a mentor-mentee model that capitalizes on some of the perks of being in person and learning, and combines it with the flexiblity of learning online at your pace. I'm about a month in, and I've seen my mentor over a dozen times through live video chat and numerous other program mentors (Program Mentors and Career Mentors). My mentor, Aleksandar Grbic, has been incredible. From working with my crazy schedule to being available for me at a moments notice. Not once have I felt like I'm alone on this journey. The resources Thinkful and Aleks have provided me with have been above and beyond to make sure I succeed. No program is perfect, but this is about as close as you'll come to finding an intentional, flexible, and resource packed program to make sure you get a job.

I couldn't be more happy with the experience that I am having with this course. Being that I am in a situation where I need to keep my current job because of financial obligations and a limited budget, Thinkful flex-bootcamp was the exact solution that I was looking for. By face value, Thinkful flex-bootcamp seemed too good to be true, especially with their job placement gaurantee. But with the tools and their community helped me to be 4 weeks ahead of schedule. Please don't get me wrong, the course work itself is very demanding of my time and with having a full-time job does not make it easy. It requires a lot of drive, dedication, and self motivation to learn a large amount of information in a short time frame. Thinkful does help in guiding you and motivating you through the course work. 

Thinkfuls course does a good job taking you step by step, from the basics to more advanced skills, in a orderly and reasonable fasion. I am a huge advocate for the project based learning which Thinkful is all about. They have you learn by making projects and using tools that are very common for programmers to use. When you get stuck on an issue they have a slack channel, Q&A sessions, workshops, and personnel mentorship.

Personally, I think the gold nugget of this program is having the personnel mentor sessions to help you with the exact problems that you are having with your project. My mentor has helped me through many issues, especially with the larger concepts. We spend however long we would like on one issue, or cover mutiple issues. Basically whatever you need to cover I know I have my mentor to clarify my issues with my project and get feedback from my work. And if I need help with an issue right away they have their slack channel that has a community of mentors ready to help you out. 

I am very happy so far with what I have experience in this flex-bootcamp. The course work and community help is great. I am currently on the backend course work of Node.js and hopefully start my fullstack project soon. I cannot say anything about their job placement program yet but maybe when the time comes I can update you all on that part of the program. 

I recommend this program for people who are in my situation financially and professionally. But please be prepared to dedicate a lot of time outside of work (including weekends) if you want to graduate within the 6 month time frame for the flex-bootcamp. There is a lot of material that needs to be covered and a lot of research and readings that are required. If you are highly motivated to learn the material then you should be in good shape in taking this course. 

I'm a seasoned software developer/architect/consultant with over 20 years experience under my belt, and I'm a satisfied (returning) Thinkful customer. Technology moves at the speed of light; Thinkful courses keeps me both current and marketable. I don't have time to scrub the internet looking for resources to help me learn a particular language, platform or technology. Thinkful courses are exactly what I've been looking for; they are expertly outlined, lessons are segmented into managable, bite-sized pieces, professional, insightful mentors who take your learning style and experience (of the lack thereof) into account. Thinkful just works for me. Did I mention the Thinkful Staff is incredible too? Whatever you're at, Thinkful will meet you there, and help you reach your technological goals. Higly recommend.

Thinkful has been an excellent experience that continually reminds me how valuable a $300/mo investment can become if you have a great curriculum and good mentors. I dabbled in very (VERY!) basic HTML before coming to Thinkful but after almost 2 months of doing the Front End Web Dev course, I feel much more confident in my HTML/CSS skills.

My mentor, Morgan, has been extremely helpful in our sessions. What I most appreciate about his approach is the time he takes to clean up my code. Especially at the beginning I would "finish" my assignments (in that everything looked up to specs) but my code was messy or the solutions implemented were fragile and unreliable. Morgan is able to carefully tread that line between approving my solution but also helping me understand why a different approach could have been better, and making sure that I understand what clean code looks like. 

Overall, I have been extremely impressed with Thinkful. I will likely take more courses (.AngularJS and Front End on Rails) once I finish Front End Web Dev. Keep up the good work, Thinkful!

Thinkful is totally worth your time and money. It is the most efficient and professionally designed online course that I've participated in. I would highlight several differentiating points:

1) 1-1 mentorship makes a big difference. I have a fantastic mentor Victor who helps me not only with code, but also advises on many latest industry tips and tools. Having a good mentor makes 50% of your success. 

2) Good structure and course design. This bootcamp gives you very close to reality tasks and you can always review them with your mentor. No need to follow strict solutions by the textbook - you can always be creative and invent something on your own and test it.

3) Mock interviews. That's another great thing about Thinkful - you can always practice how it will feel like in the real interviews and understand what are your strong points and what things you can improve. Now I have better understanding about job market and what people would look for in hiring process.

4) Support and community. I just can't describe how responsive, flexible and open everybody is here. Program manager Derek, Ariana and Noel from support team - everybody can answer my questions or even adjust my schedule anytime. And also student community can be very helpful to ask questions and to keep motivation high.

5) Flexibility and smooth career transition. For me it was extremely important to have access to the course from any place in the world without sacrificing my full-time job. I don't know other bootcamps that can offer such flexibility.

After struggling with self-study coding courses Thinkful became a true breakthrough and made me believe that I can build things and find answers on my own. It's worth it!

I did a lot of research when it came to looking to a UX Design course. I was looking for a program that would offer hands-on projects and mentoring. I got both of those with Thinkful's UX Design course. The way the course was set-up was very organized and straightforward. There was a lot of reading materials which were very relevant and intersting. My mentor was absolutely amazing. Initially, I was a little worried about doing a course and getting placed with a mentor. However, they matched me so well with my mentor. She had a lot of experience, was passionate, and made a career switch as I was planning to do. Overall, this course has prepared me to use the skills I gained and to further practice. I would have loved to spend even more time in the course and soak up information. I know the course will get better and better as time goes on.