Chegg Skills

I am 6 weeks into the Web Development Career Path Course, and I'm very pleased with my experience thus far. The coursework is challenging at times, but meeting with my mentor 3 times per week, and checking the Slack student thread have helped me during the times where I get "stuck."

I haven't really gotten to see the full extent of the job assistance component of the program, but I recently had my first "mock technical interview" (I think there's 1 per month as part of the course). The mock technical interview was the perfect way to test/gauge my progress in the course, and also helped familiarize myself with the technical interview process that will come later on down the road.

If there's one suggestion I would make to improve the course, it would be to include some supplemental video resources/tutorials. Some of the concepts can be heavy on technical lingo, and thus pretty complex (especially for those new to programming), so having videos could help reinforce/explain those concepts. 

Thinkful's Programming in Python course has been a reliable way to move from advanced-beginner to intermediate and to start building a portfolio. After learning the basics of Python through courses from sites like Treehouse, Coursera, and Udemy, I was interested in moving into more advanced work, but unsure how. Thinkful has provided the mentorship and curriculum I needed to improve my style and start writing code I'm proud to show others. The program is flexible enough that I've found that I can make progress while still holding down a fulltime job. At the same time, the weekly mentor sessions (and the high price) have been motivation enough to put in all the time I can and make continual progress. My favorite part of the course has been the freedom it allows in project design: having everything evaluated by a mentor (as opposed to an algorithm) allows you quite a lot of flexibility in implementation. I've also been very impressed by my mentor and their feedback on my work. My least favorite part has been the cost. I'd recommend Thinkful to anyone who had spent long enough thinking about Python to have dreamt up a project or two that they would love to build but still didn't have the skills and felt they had 10-15 hours a week to spend making it.

I took the Thinkful full-stack Ruby on Rails program in Q4 of 2014. I had gotten about as far as I could manage with independent study, and I needed options for getting unstuck that were faster than StackOverflow. Between the Slack channel, "office hours" and weekly meetings with my "mentor" (really more of a tutorial relationship) I was able to level up pretty significantly. I was also able to get through the 3-month program in one month since I had already learned most of it on my own.

They have you use your own environment and your own GitHub, which is an advantage over dedicated environments because I didn't lose access to it afterwards. I also still had access to the materials for reference later (at least, last time I checked). This is really helpful, because eventually you have to look something up and it's much easier to review material than trying track down whatever you're trying to remember in a new resource. 

My only complaint is that a large percentage of their Ruby students drop out early, so I didn't have much in the way of a cohort and the materials were often out of date. But it's an economical way to level up for an industrious / self-motivated learner, and the logical next step when books / tutorials have not been enough. 

I had a quick look at Thinkful last year, and then moved on, thinking that they were a bit "light-weight", but boy, was I wrong!

The "Web Development Career Path" with the job guarantee made me realize that Thinkful had a stake in my success, which meant that they would teach me what I needed to learn, in order find a job after graduation.

I am so glad that I decided to join up with the "Web Development Career Path" this year, because now I can see that their course-ware is as challenging as it needs to be, given that they want to prepare me for a job.

I see my mentor 3 times per week. He is a highly experienced developer who not only mentors aspiring developers, but also owns a web development business, which means that I get real world guidance, and invaluable insight into the industry, as it really is.

I've come across many developer courses, but I think that Thinkful has a good balance of course-ware, workshops, daily question and answer sessions, and great mentor assistance. They might need more workshops for beginner topics, which I had already been familiar with, before signing up.

I am almost a month into the course, and have found that most of the lessons are text-based, but very short and to the point, with coding challenges throughout, and a project at the end of each unit. I would have liked to see more of the content presented via video, since it would make the information more easily "digestible", thus a faster learning experience.

I have not participated much in their Slack community, but it seems to be very busy, so I'll eventually do that at some point. Having a mentor 3 days per week seems to be working well enough at this point.

All-in-all, my experience thus far, has been great. I am very excited about completing the course, and finding a job as a developer.

As a brand new student to programming, what I have enjoyed the most about Thinkful is the community. They offer plenty of tools to meet with new students and mentors whom are always flexible to share their knowledge and help you when you are stuck at some point in your course.

I believe motivation is a key component for all students and Thinkful targets this very well with fun projects yet challenging enough to create and strength solid skills in short time!

Another aspect I appreciate is their fast response with the support team and in general they are always looking to improve by actively listening to us: the community. 

I totally recomend it! 

I started the online-only course with some apprehension, but I was quickly relieved once I started my weekly meetings with my mentor. I love that the course is designed so that you can work at your own pace, which makes it great for people like me who work full time. On top of getting weekly video hangouts with your mentor to get feedback and discuss your work, mentors are also available via Slack and email throughout the week. I have learned so much in such a short amount of time, and I am already applying what I've learned to my design process. The Thinkful site is very well organized and the tools make it easy to keep track of all the coursework. Overall, it has been a great experience!

hi there,

I am really happy with the course so far, I'm learning a lot and this is exactly what I was looking for.

I have only one thing to share with you,

Obviously it might be only me, but I found the jQuery section a bit confusing. I didn't know anything about jQuery and JavaScript and I think the lesson covers too many things at the same time instead of giving a step by step overview of what you can do with jQuery and how to write it.

so, before going properly through that section, I studied all the jQuery lessons that W3s chool has to offer, I found them really helpful and easy to learn. After that, I came back to Thinkful and going through that section was way easier than before and I understood everything.

Obviuosly I don't know about other students, so maybe it's just me, but I wanted to share this with you.

Anyway as I already told you I really like the course so far.

Many thanks

Giuseppe

I have done the Front End Web Developer course and now I am doing the Angular course. Thinkful has got everything just right:

- one on one mentor

- course material that challenges you but you have assistance if you get stuck

- show you how to use real industry tools like sublime text and GitHub

- career advice

- price: great value for money

At the end of four months I feel confident in being able to change career path, what more can I say!