Le Wagon

Before Le Wagon I was an English teacher at an international university. Besides some experience in Educational Technology (for example, collaborative learning through Learning Management Systems like Blackboard or shared document platforms such as Google Drive), I had no IT or programming skills. As coding had been a skill I was interested in learning, I decided to take the dive and after some intensive research, I found that Le Wagon suited my needs perfectly.

Overall Le Wagon was a great and formative experience for me! As expected, the boot camp was intensive and strenuous, particularly as a complete beginner, but the support given by the teachers and the collaborative learning system helped me understand programming concepts and mindsets that I would have otherwise not been able to comprehend easily on my own. The friendly learning environment also made the social aspect of living in a new place much more palatable. 

After the boot camp I took a small break from coding, but I've found it's easy to jump right back into it because all of the materials from the camp are accessible after the program finished, and I've learned from the boot camp how to tackle coding problems by myself (Ruby-docs and Stack Overflow are your friends!). My plan is to become a freelance programmer, and I'm 100% confident I'll be able to sustain myself through the skills I learned through Le Wagon.

I greatly recommend Le Wagon for its effective teaching methods and constant support in and after the camp! As someone who wanted to start fresh in a new career path, it was the best choice for me.

Being in the automotive industry for the past 3 years and half, I wasn’t quite satisfied with the direction of my career. I decided to take a chance and I quit my job. The next few months, I experimented different things: digital marketing, setting up an e-commerce, sales for a small company, but I still felt that none of these were right for me. I remembered that I used to program a bit when I was younger, and that I enjoyed it. As I was getting more work through my digital marketing service company, I wanted to offer more to my clients. I thought it would be interesting to give it a try again. I began doing online course, but very soon I hit a wall. I could not get myself to complete any of them and wasn’t making any progress. Something had to change.        One day, searching through the web, I came across Le Wagon bootcamp in São Paulo. They promised in 9 weeks to teach the skills to build a web app. As I read reviews and watched their Day Demos days presented by former students, I got convinced it was the right choice for me.   On the very same day, I applied for batch #81 of Le Wagon São Paulo. And 45 days later, I was sitting in class for my first day at Le Wagon.       The lectures are fast pace, and take place in the first two hours of the morning. The rest of the days is focused on solving problems with your buddy of the day. The first month is definetely the hardest because you’re being taught core programming concepts. The methodology is amazing, the course is designed around hand-ons development practice. You have to learn, because you have to write code all day long. The teaching assistants and teachers were eager to help me out whenever I got stuck on a bug. They knew the material deeply and were committed to helping me understand the concepts of the day. In the last three weeks, I got to develop two full funcional apps. Le Wagon taught me not just solo programming, they showed me how to contribute in group of developers. My final project, a platform for investors to trade private securities, was developed by 3 students and me. I learned how to collaborate as a team of developers while building out a product. I found this to be most valuable lesson. Additionally, every week, after class they would set meet-ups with start-up leaders and the occasional beer to relax after a long day of coding.       After completing batch #81, I jumped right away to freelancing. A week after completion of my batch, I got my first client for development of a full web app.  Le Wagon gave the stepping stone to learning anything related to web app development. I could not have made a better choice.  I made new friends as well forever changing the direction of my life. By far Le Wagon has been the best learning experience that I had ever had. I recommend it to anyone seeking to learn how to code.

I joined Le Wagon in July 2017 in Paris during my gap year. I am studying in a business school and it was the first time I coded ever.  While initially sceptic about the possibility to become a coder within a few weeks, I acquired thanks to a  9-week intensive program the necessary skills to be on the right track. Le Wagon coding program provides all the tools needed to learn how to code a web application. The strength of Le Wagon bootcamp is in its community for several reasons:

 

-    Staff / Teachers: Thanks to all of them, Le Wagon is not a coding bootcamp but an experience. Learning how to code is not easy and requires discipline but the staff makes sure that you are not left behind and have fun.

-    Class / Events: you are always working with the other students on the exercises so the staff will do its utmost to create a warm and friendly team environment by organising activities, lectures and parties.

-    Job Opportunities: according to the one’s wishes, the staff and the community will help you to find an opportunity (web development, consulting, project/product management) or freelance contracts.

-    Community-Mutual-Aid: The community is very active, events are organised, job offers are shared and whatever the issue with your code, just post a message and you get the answer within a few minutes (!)

 

I accepted a job opportunity as a web developer 15 days before my graduation day. As I underlined, in addition to the quality of the teaching and of the dedication and support of the staff, the experience is by itself amazing and very rich. Thanks to the community, this experience with Le Wagon is still going on!

Baptiste Horn Batch#83 in Paris

Technology is something that I always liked, that's why I decided to major in computer engineering. It was that moment when I started to love coding, as c++ was the first programming language I learned my passion for coding started to grow. I wanted to know more and increase my knowledge in that aspect. While online courses may teach you the syntax, they can't teach you how to solve problems or think in various ways to reach a certain solution.

 

After searching for something different for a while I found Le Wagon Tokyo. At first I was a bit hesitant to take the course as I was short on time and the course took place in Tokyo (Japan) which is very far from my country. I didn't even know if it was worth it , but i must say I'm really glad that i took it.

 

It was well worth it as it doesn't just teach you how to code, it teaches you how to think , to actually be able to solve a problem. Then it goes to teaching you everything you need to know on how to be able to build a colorful website, backend to frontend and how to use that knowledge to start your own projects or even work as developer which was my main goal from this bootcamp.

 

But furthermore, it wasn't only about coding and programming, we also had many activities there such as yoga sessions and group lunches. I personally met many many great people, from teachers to students and many others. I've gained many experiences from each of them, we worked together daily from 9AM to 7PM each day with a different partner, which in a way taught me how to work with different people and bonded the students together as well.

 

After graduation, I was finally able to call myself a full stack developer and I knew i was able to create any website I could think of. I honestly never imagined i could learn all of that in just 9 weeks, it was just GREAT.

 

Before Le Wagon Tokyo, I was teaching English in South Korea. I always had an interest in coding but I could never manage the time or the patience to teach myself after regular work hours. I was a bit reluctant at first to do a bootcamp. But after I read all of the rave reviews online about Le Wagon, I figured it was time to take a chance. I signed up for the first batch in Tokyo.
The course is as intense as everyone says it is. You get out of it how much you want to put in. You might as well push yourself if you're going to join a bootcamp, right? All of the exercises or extra work have a purpose in improving your skills. I still look back to some of my old code or lessons for helpful reminders.
The final project/pitch was a great experience that really challenged me in ways regular code work couldn't: working with peers, managing time, and meeting expectations. All of these are things that I deal with on a regular basis now and I'm grateful for the practice I had.
Afterwards, I found a job fairly easy. I was setup with a lot of contacts from the tech scene in Tokyo through all of the Le Wagon events. I'm currently working for an e-commerce startup that does a lot of work on Shopify. We develop apps, plugins, you name it, to help merchants and consumers in Japan. To this day, I still talk with a lot of people through the program and will be forever grateful for it. 

I always knew that I wanted to code, but I was afraid to try as it seemed to me as something very difficult at that time, so I spent about half a year doing various online courses, but I still couldn't build anything by my own. 

That's where Le Wagon shines, it doesn't simply teach you the syntax of the language, it gives you the mindset you need, it teaches you the way to approach a problem and solve it, because coding is not about the language syntax, it's the easiest part in fact, breaking down the task and finding the ways to build/solve the task is what coding is, syntax comes very easy when you know what you have to do. 

The pace of the course is fast and I can say that it was pretty intensive, but you'd be surprised of what you can build after only 9 weeks of Le Wagon.

Le Wagon far surpasses any of my previous learning experiences! I’d even say that it’s more fun than most vacations I’ve had.

If you’re considering this course, you’re going to go through three stages:

Stage 1: You are skeptical that you can learn to code in 9 weeks.

I live in San Francisco, have had a career in operations in tech companies, and I am surrounded by coding bootcamps. There is literally one 500 feet from my apartment. Given my exposure to tech, and living in San Francisco, I was extremely skeptical that I could adequately learn full-stack development in 9 weeks abroad.

But, I decided to go with Le Wagon London for two reasons: The glowing reviews and the diversity of students (international and non-tech backgrounds). My goal was to learn full-stack development and make new friends from different walks of life.

Stage 2: You realize how hard coding is, and how good Le Wagon is at teaching it.

The first few weeks are spent learning the core fundamentals of programming and Ruby. The second half of the course is spent learning front-end, database, and rails – which includes a lot of real-world examples such as geo-location and payment processing.

The coursework is tough and the pace is grueling (close to 8 hours a day of coding!), but you have ample help with teammates, TAs, and the teachers themselves. I found it difficult even though I understood most of the core concepts before I came to the course as I had worked on the operations side of SaaS tech companies previously.

Luckily, the teachers are BRILLIANT. They are able to explain concepts so that anyone is able to understand them. That takes an extremely special skillset that all the teachers seem to do so easily.

The TAs are from previous batches. These are prior students who are helping you solve problems when some of them literally learned to code 9 weeks ago, which is amazing!! It was really helpful to learn from them, as they understand exactly what you are going through.

Stage 3: You realize that you get so much more than the amount you paid.

When I completed the bootcamp, I left with much more than I expected. I made genuine connections with my classmates, and surprisingly with the teachers and staff as well. All of them are so approachable, caring, and friendly. They want you to succeed, which is definitely something that’s missing from the San Francisco / Silicon Valley scene. These are people that I laughed with, cried with, and partied with during the 9 weeks. There was no forced interaction, it was all very organic, and they are now all friends for life.

You also leave with an extensive and international network of developers via SLACK that no other course can really compare with. It’s a huge network but it also feels very accessible. That is invaluable!

After telling my family and friends about the program. Many of them wanted to do the program! One of my friends already started the batch in Tokyo and she is loving it. My wife (who is a lawyer and has a great career) wants to go do an upcoming batch just to have a great experience and learn more about tech.

As for me, I’ve started working on my own ideas, and have even started learning Python on my own. My advice to anyone reading this is to do Le Wagon even if Ruby isn’t the language you want to learn. You will leave with a completely new mindset that will allow you to learn other languages rapidly!

I had a terrific experience @LeWagon Bordeaux Batch #85, never learn so much in such a short time. The atmosphere is super friendly and yet very professional. The teaching staff is dedicated, passionate and experienced. 
I chose Bordeaux for 2 reasons. First, the entrepreneurial ecosystem is exploding and not saturated yet. Second, I am an outdoor lover. Having the beach, the countryside and Spain within easy reach was just a blast !!
I joined the Bootcamp to gain legitimacy and technicity as a product manager in the tech industry. Also, now that I know how to develop an MVP I am eager to launch my own project! ;)

I’m Robby, alumni at le Wagon in Paris (batch 83).  I didn't know anything about coding before joining le Wagon. I was just a business analyst in the tech industry who wanted to learn code to have larger tech skills valuable in the industry.  I can say that I am not disappointed, I was even surprised by the level that I acquired in only 2 months.  
This was the most exciting and intense summer that I had in my life, every day was a challenge but it was worth it. The program is well constructed, you end up knowing the back-end (you develop in Ruby with the framework Ruby on Rails) and the front-end ( you learn Javascript, HTML5 and CSS3). I discovered at Le Wagon that I can build anything that I have in my mind, being able to code enables you to do that.  most important takeaway from my time there is the way of learning, I feel that I can quickly learn any programming language. 
For a person like me who didn’t know how to Code and who finally built a music streaming app for influencers is just insane. And towards my initial goal who was to make valuable my skills in the tech industry, I can say that the skills I added to my profile were a strong added value that allowed me to land a job at Amazon Web Services.  As a matter of fact, nobody should hesitate to join Le Wagon, it is a good investment, it is worth it.

Before Le Wagon I was in my third year at Queen Mary University. While studying, I founded a P2P learning platform where students can learn form other students that aced their module. We had over 60 hours of tutoring during the 2 weeks of testing. I felt I needed technical knowledge to take my business to the next level and let me tell you that Le Wagon did not let me down! 

The program consists of 9 weeks of pure hard work. I learnt more at Le Wagon than during my 3 years at business school (and I was a good student). But the best part of it is the people. I met the best teachers I ever had there and made amazing friends.

So if you are willing to excel and make the best out of your time don't think it twice and join Le Wagon.

Le Wagon is surely one of the best experiences I had in my life, even more than I could have expected!

Before the bootcamp, I studied engineering and I was taught high school students, but I wasn’t really satisfied with my work, my studies and the environment.

I’ve always been really curious about modern technologies and the start-up world, so I decided to try to understand how all the instruments we are using today are working, searching the web and following online tutorials to learn how I could build some prototypes of ideas I had in mind, but I found out that online tutorials were’t enough for me to really learn to code and build my own products, so I decided to look for a coding bootcamp.

After some researches on the internet I found in Le Wagon the place that perfectly suited my needs and applied for a summer course in Lisbon… the best choice I could have done!

The way the entire bootcamp is organised is just awesome! All the people involved, the drivers, teachers and all the other students, were from the first moment amazing and always friendly.

The first weeks of the bootcamp are focused on Ruby, a very modern and powerful back-end language, and are really hard if you are not accustomed to staying all day at a computer, but once time passes and Ruby notions are quickly building up along with front-end languages, it became more and more fun!

The second part of the school is focused on Rails, an incredible framework built on Ruby, that allows you to build amazing products with very powerful features.

Learning to collaborate is also a very important step, and the final weeks of the bootcamp are all about collaboration: students are divided by groups and they have to build and deploy a web app in 2 weeks.

At the end of the bootcamp we had a great event where we presented our products, 7 amazing final projects built from 26 students from all over the world in just 2 weeks, and I felt very proud of everyone!

My groups final project was Papyru, an education platform that allows students and teachers to connect. We had to work really hard but we were all amazed by what we were able to accomplish in just 2 weeks!

Is very sad to finish the bootcamp, you really wish it could last forever! I made a lot of connections with awesome people and now I feel I have the freedom and the tools to build anything I want. I loved it, I’m still living in Lisbon working with the amazing people I met, and I definitely recommend it to anyone who’s into technology and wants to change his life!

I was fresh out of University and excited to join the work force, until I found myself with 3 years worth of theoretical knowledge… but no hard skills. I decided then and there that I wanted to: learn how to code, meet people in the Tech industry, and travel to a new country. That’s when I found Le Wagon.

I’m so grateful that I did, because I got exactly what I was looking for. At Le Wagon you learn from skilled and dedicated teachers. You meet new people pursuing similar goals. You become part of a highly active tech community. Also, most importantly, you get 9 weeks of being engaged and challenged (that was my favourite part).

As a candidate with these in-demand skills, I now stand out in my applications to multiple research programs. In the future, I hope to join a start-up and have more learning experiences. I feel that opportunities have opened up to me and for that I can thank Le Wagon.