Online Coding Camps (Paid)

In My Humble Opinion
1

Looks like I’m getting an education grant soon. So, now I need to figure out how to spend it. I’ve been looking around for education in programming/web development.

I graduated from a technical college, years ago, with a degree in computer programming, but then didn’t work in the industry, so my (admittedly meager, to begin with) coding skills deteriorated. Now, I’m in Phoenix, which has lots of tech jobs, but I’m not up-to-date/need practice/xp. I’ve been studying/practicing as much as my schedule allows, but since I have no budget, I have been relying on free online instruction. Codefights/Freecodecamp/Hackerrank/Udacity/etc.

Now I’m getting a one-shot of about $4000. I want to make the most of it, so am not going to rely on merely my own Google-Fu. Because of my schedule; four ten-hour shifts per week, with a one-hour commute each way, I need an online program. Especially since I may end up getting a better day-job, which would preclude a daytime schedule in meatspace. I’m finding lots of boot-camps out there, but many are $5000 and up.

Break Into Tech + Get Hired - Skillcrush looks good. I may or may not be able to convince my benefactors that they should pay for multiple blueprints. Even with all of them, it falls way short of my (hoped for) $4000.

(By the way, I know it is stupid for me to try to get into tech at my age, but let’s presume that I am obsessed and cannot be deterred by mere reason. Besides, I can try freelance work for people needing websites and who won’t know I have limited experience; I just know that if I have to be a hospitality manager for another two or three years, I will strangle a housekeeper)

Thanks in advance Tech Dopers!

2

Hmm, looks like DevMountain online course is $4500 . . . ok, more than $4000 . . . but, if I could finance a mere $500 . . .

3

Do you want to do front end, which is more about design and layout or programming?

Do you prefer solving puzzles or do our passions tend towards aesthetics/layout/interaction?

What about tech interests you? Is it the wages or does learning about the tech interested you?

Can you describe what your ideal working day and tasks would be like?

Do you learn best by being handed directed challenges that you work on alone, or do you learn best in instructor lead courses?

4

My SIL quit his job voluntary about three years ago in his mid-40s, took a coding course (he had been an editor before with no programming experience), got a job as a web designer. He has been very successful at it. Just one datum.

5

My dream job is Software Engineer. I like programming more than design. Solving problems by creating algorithms and implementing them is something I find entertaining. My interest in web design is mostly due to my perception that “proper” programming/software engineer jobs require more formal education. It seems a more attainable goal and one from which I can work towards degrees/certs conducive to the greater one. The aesthetics of design and layout don’t particularly interest me, but I can deal with them as a necessary part of the work.

What do people in-the-know think about my strategy self-directed study?

1: HTML, CSS, PHP, Javascript, SQL
2: JS.node, Jquery, JSON, Python, Bootstrap, Unix/Linux
3: ??? (Hi, Opal!)
4: Profit?

6

Unfortunately, the shop I moved to Phoenix to work for has been . . . volatile. The hotel at which I was AGM was sold after a few months, I moved to other hotel to manage housekeeping, that wasn’t working out, so moved to operations manager, which was also a bit precarious. I requested a demotion to an hourly position to have more time to study, job-hunt and have been driving (Uber/Lyft) and doing freelance writing to make ends meet. By “volatile” I mean very high turnover in staff and super high turnover for managers/supervisors. In a year we’ve had two chefs, 3 front desk supervisors, two operations managers, three housekeeping managers . . . my station now is low enough that I think I can survive until a real job comes up.

In short, there was really no assurance that I could keep my job to begin with. Eventually, something would happen and I’d have to fall on my sword. That or work 100 hours a week almost constantly and 30 hour shifts occasionally. The money wasn’t good enough to save anything significant, I wasn’t empowered to make any substantive changes to the way things were done allowing improvement, and the work itself wasn’t producing anything I could learn from or augment my resume. I just couldn’t see any upside at all.

7

I’d say more like…

  1. HTML, CSS, Javascript, Bootstrap, Jquery, node.js
  2. PHP, SQL, Unix/Linux (Apache), Python
    3a. Mobile App development
    3b. Whatever software language you choose

Really tho if you’re in to software development I don’t know why you’re wanting to do HTML. HTML is for web sites, and software development is for software. You could flip the above list around and do the actual hard stuff first and then learn HTML as needed. Most likely if you got a job doing programming, even for web sites/web applications, you wouldn’t have to do much HTML - you’d work with a team that includes people who do HTML but don’t know much programming.

FWIW I have been working for 20 years in the field, and have my own web development company (for these 20 years). I am the person on the two-person team who does the HTML/CSS stuff and my business partner does the “heavy lifting” Programming stuff. We work in C#/ASP.NET (before that, VB and ASP) with MS SQL and I do a lot of the programming now too. But my partner is still just an HTML novice. He just turns that stuff over to me.

8

At your level, don’t spend the money just learning a specific language or tool. That is, don’t take a class to learn Python. Languages come and go and you’ll have to eventually just be able to pick things up. Instead, find programs that are more oriented towards being a developer and teaches you group of skills you will need. So something like the courses you had in technical college.

One way for you to break into development is to get a low-level job at a tech company that isn’t in software development. For example, get a job in testing or customer support. Then use your time there to learn the product and get up to speed on whatever language or environment it’s developed in. Once you’re there, it will be easier to transfer into development than to get hired as a developer.

9

I think your perception is incorrect here.

Software development is still a field where demonstrated ability matters far more than formal education. By which I mean: an existing software project that you’ve built that actually does something users want is at least a hundred times more valuable than a CS degree. Of course, building something that actually works well is a challenge, and the things you learn on your way to that degree are helpful, but the credential is pretty unimportant.

Don’t study web design if it’s not really what you want to do.

10

If you don’t want to work on design I would consider knocking HTML/CSS etc… way down the list, or just worry about a code academy style overview course

SGML/HTML/XML/Json structure will be pretty interchangeable as far as a data structure goes, and you want to focus on learning why you do something and not focus on the how. That front end course will spend a lot of time making layout work across various platforms and products which is useful for a design/ux track but not really something you will work day to day on in a programing track.

I will disagree on the Python statement above, mostly because it is a rare language that lets you work in an OO context, functional context etc…but the secret will be to dig into why you are doing something when you master how to do it.

I hate to give specific examples and endorsements, but the site I am going to suggest you look at allows any instructor to upload content, and so I have to be more specific as the quality differs.

If you can take your benefactors offer and take a sabbatical, using the money to pay for living expenses but don’t care about the fact that the courses wont’ be that expensive look at Jose Portilla’s courses on udemy. They are self paced but instructors do answer questions so it is not exactly like a code academy. Note that you can find 90%+ off coupons for that site at any time.

Jose Portilla’s delivery style seems to work well for both people who need to slow down or prefer to go fast, and as a data scientist he covers a broad swath of computer science.

Consider checking out his python bootcamp, then look at his data visualization and algs for interview courses. He also has capstone projects that when complete can be posted to your github account.

Make sure to create a github account, and when you are using tools and run into bugs use those opportunities to start fixing bugs in open source projects. Do this even if you do go to a more traditional bootcamp because this will show experience and employees will look at it.

Those pull requests will matter more than any certificate that you can earn, and you will learn a lot by working on those real world problems.

Even if you are only fixing the documentation, those pull requests for some big name projects will break down walls.

11

The sabbatical idea sounds great, but is impossible. I’ll have to continue to work a couple jobs (unless I find a better one), while studying. The grant is to be paid directly to the educator. My wife is still disabled (she’s been fighting cancer for about seven years), so I can’t take a loss of pay. I’m not worth anything, no property, savings, retirement, investments, etc. One check from homelessness (depending upon how long it takes to evict someone in this jurisdiction). I can’t even kill myself to buy the fam another year, since my new position doesn’t have life insurance.

I know it would have to look like an accident to pay out, I used to have an insurance license; just letting you know the lay of the land.

Also, I’m not financially illiterate or have stupid money-destroying problems. I’ve just had a rough patch the past few years with wife being sick, preemie dying, then hurricane wrecking the area, leaving me out of work, then cancer coming back shortly after marrying current wife, who had cancer twice as a kid.

12

If you’re in that kind of financial situation, just get any kind of job in tech–help desk, tester, etc. You’ll find there are many opportunities for on the job learning.

The difficulty I see with going to school now is that it will take time to go through the training, and then you probably won’t get a job much better than you could right now. As a developer, you’d be competing against CS college graduates as well as people with years of experience. I’m sure you could get a job as a developer, but it would take some creativity and more time to find that job. So rather than spend months in school and looking for a job as a developer, get any tech job now and do the education in parallel.

13

Excellent suggestion. But, the two are not mutually exclusive and this still leaves me the question of who I shall give the grant money to for training.

Thanks to all who have posted, so far. I appreciate the input.

14

Lots of good advice so far, and there are many ways to go.

You already have a tech degree in computer science. Have you considered applying to an on-line university bachelor’s degree. A bachelor’s degree isn’t a requirement to be successful, but the majority of jobs will ask for a BS. That path may take several years to complete however.

At our technical college we have students take two different paths in programming: web focused or mobile-app focused (we also have a general computer science degree). The web sequence covers HTML/CSS, JavaScript/jQuery, PHP, and MySQL. The app sequence is Java 1/2, user design, and Android 1/2. Students will normally take both paths at once, so learning databases using MySQL makes learning SQLite in Android easier.

Both of these paths start with Python as an introductory programming course (I assume you know the basics of programming), and conclude with course that’s a capstone class, using GitHub. The idea behind the capstone class you could put the GitHub link on a resume, and employers can make hiring decisions based on your actual work. Regardless of what path you use, generate a portfolio of projects you can point to during interviews and the such.

I’ve used Coursera courses before, which seem high-quality. They’re sometimes free but many have a sequence of courses. Whatever you decide, good luck.

15

While I hate giving specific examples, udemy has a special for $12 for any course sale on right now.

If that is expired just google for their 97% off. This is a useful course even for people with python experience, and is a great value for a course where you can ask questions from the actual instructor.

Programming is like any other skill like playing the guitar or skiing, putting in hours over time is the important part.

(I do not have any information about the quality of other udemy instructors content)