DevPoint Labs

I took the UI/UX design course offered by DevPoint Labs about 8 months ago. Coming from a backgroud in digital marketing with a heavy focus on content strategy, this course was just what I needed to improve and add additional skill sets to my career. 

First and foremost, the ability to create digital interfaces and curate design tasks/ projects for personal or company needs was a huge help. I've now been involved in refacing mobile apps, landing pages, logo design, and other tasks that I would have normally had to outsource. 

In addition to the creative production, the in-depth knowledge of user research and user experience that was gained has been monumental for my career/ personal development. Understanding human behavior has always been a major interest of mine and being able to apply that type of physcological study to the digital world has opened a variety of new doors for me. 

My instructors were very hands on and involved in the entire process. Their ability to understand our needs and level of competencies helped our class achieve goals and objectives that we may have been overwhelmed with the first week of the course. Our objecitves were also tied to actual companies and stakeholders that were building or iterating live products. 

In all, the course was very useful and worth while. It's a perfect course for those seeking new learning environments or those in pursuit of a new career path. From a critical stance, this course is not set up for those already experienced with UI/UX. Many of my classmates - including myself - had no prior design/ dev experience. It would still be a beneficial course for someone with a moderate level of design, dev, or UX understanding. However, it's an introductory level course and someone with prior experience might feel too ahead of the curve for it to be worth the cost (at least until the last few weeks of class). 

Like I said above, I'm glad I had the opportunity to take this course. The instructors were great and I have/ will continue to recommend it to friends, family, and co-workers. 

APPLICATION PROCESS:

Easy and straight forward. once I met with Will, I knew that it was the program I wanted to attend.

INSTRUCTORS:

At the time of attending we had to instructors Ty Hatch and Dan Hatch, they offered a very unique dynamic to the design process with a mix of lecture/discussion and hands on activities.

CLASS AND SCHEDULE:

The class itself was challanging and rewarding because we focused on a real world project with a tough problem to solve in only 8 weeks. The 3 day a week schedule was perfect with my daily work schedule.

OVERALL:

Dev Point Labs offered a great learning experience at an affordable price. I would and have recommended Dev Point to a ton of people.

DevPoint Labs has everything you need to jump start your developer career. I took the full-stack JS course and was really impressed with Dave's enthusiasm and knowledge of JavaScript. It is obvious that he enjoys teaching and being involved with the JS community. The rest of the DevPoint staff is extremely supportive and helpful in advancing your developer career. If you put in the work, you will get a ton out of it. It's no secret that all the material you need is out there, for free, on the net. DevPoint Labs is about the people, experience, connections, and all that in-between that you can't get from an online course... and that's why it's worth it.  

I didn't fully know what to expect when I went to DPL and thought to myself 'it can't be that hard'. It was challenging to say the least. I was up into the wee hours of the night all the time trying to grasp all of the concepts taught in this course that I could. I don't know where Nhi Ty and Will found them, but Jake Sorce and Dave Jungst make DPL the best bootcamp in the state hands down. I have little doubt anywhere else you look will not have comparable assetts.  They are like walking information machines that will get you the answer to any question if they don't alreadt know it. There is a lot of information to learn going through, but Jake and Dave have made a course and teach in a way that will allow you to learn it. There is almost 'round the clock access to help with the T.A.'s and the instructors will answer questions however dumb you think they may be. 

To preface, I attended the Full-Stack Rails course (not the JS like it says), but this review and the space allotted will not do justice for how amazing that I believe DevPoint Labs to be. Writing as a recent graduate who quit his job in a completely different field, moved to a different region of the U.S., took a chance on DevPoint Labs praying it would work out every step of the way, and is now comfortably 3 months into his job as a PHP and SQL developer, I can say that I owe everything I have achieved thus far to what that I learned and who I met at DPL. To start—the teaching staff. Jake Sorce and Dave Jungst were two of the most knowledgeable, understanding, and passionate instructors I had ever met in any given industry. Even amongst all of the trivial questions thrown their way, or the countless hours they invested back into students learning outside of the classroom, they both still remained incredibly patient, passionate, and caring for every lost student in the classroom. Most of us came in with little to no background in out cohort (including me), but they emphasized the pre-course work as your most beneficial tool, and my cohort seemed to have taken that to heart.

Next: the curriculum was organized in such a way that it was meant to push you, but down a thought process that most are not used to thinking—like that of a developer. The constant push was to not focus so much on the languages being taught and the syntax that exists in just those specific languages, but the thought process that occurs while solving those problems. This has proven to most valuable piece of information that I took away from the class and it alone allowed me to sell myself better when I got out. Thankfully, that didn’t long at all. I met my future employer on the Launch Night that DPL puts on every cohort to showcase our capstone projects. So, if you read before that people land jobs on Launch Night, and you are still somehow a skeptic, contact me and we will chat.

DPL provided everything that I needed to successfully transition into not just an industry that I had no background in, but to work daily in languages that I wasn’t ever specifically trained in as well. I can’t stress how well DevPoint is at providing the intangibles that you need, but there are many proven cases that prove this for me already. I would recommend choosing DevPoint time and time again.

After my Spring 2016 semester ended I was wondering what I can do over the summer. I decided to take the Ruby on Rails course and it was honestly one of the best decisions I have made in my life. Coming in to the course I thought it was going to simple web developement that can compliment my IS degree at the U. The instuctors teaching styles are very distinct from one another and its great to be able to learn from these different teaching styles. This course gave me a passion in web development, I was hungry to learn more after the course, so after the course I became a TA(Teaching Assistant) at DevPoint Labs and started taking the JavaScript course during the night time. The JavaScript course made me want to work towards front-end development. Currently I am a full-time student at the U, also I'm the TA for the Ruby on Rails and JavaScript course. I will graduate in the Spring of 2017 and hopefully I will be able to find a full time developing job after that.

I decided to attend Dev Point 2 years ago after years of trying to work my way into a programming position at my previous job. It was the best professional decision I've made. If you work hard, and I mean hard, and devote yourself, then it will pay off. The staff genuinely cares that you succeed and will give you a lot of help after the course. 

Be aware, this isn't a guarantee for getting hired. The job market, especially if you're in Utah where DPL is located, is tough for junior developers. But this is a great way to get started and become involved with the community.

One of my biggest hesitations about quitting my job to attend a bootcamp was just the initial investment. However, having gone through the course I can say that it is 100% worth it.  I looked into several other local programs and felt that DevPoint was the best fit for me. I liked the culture, the location, and the technologies that were being taught. The intsructors are super knowledgable and are really great about helping students navigate their way through the course work. I loved that the Rails course had 2 intrusctors with different styles. I was able to learn a ton from both of them and appreciated the variety. I had no coding experience prior to starting at DPL and now feel very ready for the job market. I think that the thing I valued most about my experience is that the education went beyond just learning the technologies. There a heavy emphasis on learning to think like developers. We are taught to be problem solvers. I think that helps set the graduates of DPL apart from other candidates in the job search. The learning environment is fun and supportive. The staff are cool and want their students to succeed and are willing to go out of their way to ensure that happens. They also have someone designated to help students with LinkedIn profiles, resumes, and networking. I would not hesitate recommending DPL to anyone. 

I've been into computers in many ways as we all have in this tech direction, but DPL is a school that took my dreams and life seriously to make sure my needs were met, and asked me how they could assit me, and that was a wrap! I felt DPL had all the tools to polish my already deep knowledge in tech and transform my 'in my head coding career' not only into a salary, but a career direction that could go 'full steam ahead'. I'm about to graduate in just a few weeks, and already have the confidence to apply for work, and I feel very confident I could actually 'do this'. I'm already employed, and have three paid consutlant projects off the ground. I could not have done this without DevPointLabs and there amazing staff!

The good: You'll want to read this.

I took DevPoint Lab's Full Stack Ruby on Rails course and was blown away by the rigour and thought put into their curriculum. I've taken lots of online programming courses. DevPoint's curriculum is superior in every way. 

Sidenote: I make a living teaching online. I always thought a bootcamp wasn't neccessary. Hellboy was I wrong. I learned more in one week at DevPoint than I have in two years of learning on my own. The instructors (Dave Jungst and Jake Sorce) are veteran and are actively creating world class products being paid for and used by real people. (Not those fake people you see on Glee. Although I love me some Glee.)

Now get this: Not only do they have real developers teaching this stuff, they have at least half a dozen TA's that are there Every. Single. Day. that helped me whenever the intstructors were with others. I'm not sure when or if they ever go home. But they're a fantastic resource that as far as I know no other school or bootcamp provides.

Hackathons. Oh, you thought 9:30 - 5:30 Monday - Friday for 12 weeks was plenty? No, they also have weekend hackathons where they provide breakfast and lunch that all the DevPoint Labs Alumni come to. Now that I'm done with the course I get to keep using those hackathons as a learning and networking resource. (Keep it on the DL in case they decide to start asking us to chip in on the meals.)

Now I know what you're wondering my dear reader. Did I get a job as a programmer after I finished the course? No. No I did not. I got a job as a programmer two weeks before I finished the course. I rocked my...  no, I Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnsoned every new hire test and whiteboard interview. I channeled my inner SQL and injected myself right into the workforce.

The bad:

The cereal dispenser. How many must we break before an industrial one is bought? I believe this is a game at this point. Someday someone will find a closet full of broken cereal dispensers and make a Franken-Dispenser out of them. You've brought this upon yourselves.

The coffee maker: It's like the coffeeshop owners accross the street sneak in at night and jack it up so it won't filter. "Yeah, you're gonna have to buy coffee from us now."  If it's not them it's the Mormon students. Trying to lead us down the path of rightousness.

Conclusion:
I recommend DevPoint Labs because I know you will too once you're done with their program. Just look at the other reviews. The data is clear.