NYC Onsite Software Engineering Immersive

I'm usually wary of reviews that have only positive things to say, but it's difficult for me to denote anything intrinsically wrong with Codesmith.In essence, you don't need a bootcamp to get a job, all the information necessary to get a job exist if you're driven to find it. But what Codesmith offers, which I don't believe you can find anywhere else (except, perhaps, another exceptional bootcamp. This is my only experience so it's all I can speak to) is the community. I was wary of joining an online immersive, but I developed strong bonds with the other residents, we all struggled and succeeded together. From the core curriculum to the hiring process, we stuck together and looked out for each other. That community is largely responsible for my success, and Codesmith is intentional about building that community, my experience wasn't an anomoly.In terms of the hiring process, the hiring-support team were worth the 20K price tag alone. Eric Kirsten heads the salary negotiation and job search strategy lectures, and that lecture alone got me a 10K signing bonus. In every stage of the process, they were present and helpful, at no point did I feel abandoned or alone in the search.

As someone who has never worked a full time job in the US, I have to say that going to Codesmith is the best decision I have ever made in my life. I got a freelance offer of $55/hr within 2.5 months of graduation, which I left in a month after because the codebase had way too much technical debt. Within another 2-3 months, I landed 2 other offers - 1 from an acquired start-up with TC at around 120-130k and 1 from a tech unicorn with TC around 140-180k - and I ended up taking the latter because of the technology they are using.Codesmith has a huge emphasis on technical communication, deep understanding of Javascript and helping students to become what the industry called a T-shape engineer, where you develop a strong domain knowledge in one technology. That is the real reason why Codesmith grads were able to land Senior Engineer roles straight out of the program. The best part about Codesmith teaching philosophy is that it makes every graduate of the program less of a cookie-cutter than their peers and I believe that is also what makes the placement rate and salary of Codesmith grads much higher than every other programs (according to cirr.org third-party-audited data) because everybody ended up with different strong domain knowledge in the end - some become expert in testing, some in React, some in Vue, some in GraphQL, some in gRPC, some in Deno, some in databases and some in microservices.  In this 12-week program, the portion with a curriculum (we call it the junior portion) really only spans 6-7 weeks and the rest of the remaining weeks (senior portion) are spent on tech-talks and projects where students have the time to learn certain technologies really deeply in groups. Curriculum-wise, I honestly wouldn't say this is a 5 star curriculum program, its more like 3.5-4 in my book. Within the first 6 weeks, lectures are very short and are around an hour each day, and we spent the most time mastering our skills by "hard-learning" and doing exercises that are very difficult but achievable through pair-programming. However, what makes Codesmith's teaching really stand out is its teaching philosophy and that REALLY justifies the 5 stars I give to the curriculum here. The curriculum is more about teaching you how to learn and be curious with new technologies so that you know what to learn and can learn them really fast and really deeply all by yourself without going through numerous tutorials. Almost all of us ended up implementing different technologies by ourselves that weren't taught in the curriculum at some point for half of our projects. The teaching philosophy of Codesmith is so solid that I think the quality of the curriculum is probably purposely designed to be not too perfect so we can fill in the gaps by ourselves, which I am surprised by how well things just magically worked out in the end. Before we graduate from the program, Codesmith allocated a week for the hiring portion, which I personally think is the best career advice I have ever had. That portion alone is worth at least half the tuition. We learned how to job-search, negotiate salary, write resumes and cover letters, reach out to recruiters and network effectively on LinkedIn with other working engineers. We also have an alumni channel where alumni would throw job posting and give referral to those who reach out to them and have the right skills set. Overall, I would say this is an imperfect program that gets everything worked out perfectly and Codesmith will forever have a place in my heart. 

My experience at Codesmith was a solid 3.5/5, but I would definitely round up to a 4. The community is probably one of the best parts. Everyone is super friendly and supportive. The staff are probably a bit overworked, but you can tell that they genuinely want the best for all of the students. I was a happy student and I ended up finding employment.I will be separating my review into pros and cons, as follows:Pros:

Strong, supportive community. Readily available and friendly staff. I made some pretty good friends during my time here.
The production project is a great opportunity to work on something that will, without a doubt, deepen your understanding of the technologies that you choose to work with.
Very solid curriculum. The technologies that you learn are very relevant and high-demand. They also teach systems design and machine learning, although the latter is just a very short introductory unit.
Remote stipend for office setup.
There is a pretty solid network of alumni. 

Cons:

Needs-blind admission. At the time of admission, I was a low income applicant and I received zero financial assistance. While there are scholarships, the vast majority of them are diversity scholarships and were not applicable to me.
No job guarantee. This is something that other well-established (and even newly established) bootcamps offer.
The instructors are mostly former Codesmith alum. While this is not exactly necessarily a bad thing, I noticed none of the instructors have a computer science degree or any real-world experience as a software engineer. Does that mean they're bad problem-solvers? No. It does, however, mean your instructor or fellow will most likely not utilize or understand best practices when writing code and designing lessons/codebases.
Despite the great curriculum, the React unit is in sore need of a revamp. Codesmith does not teach Hooks, which is a must-have for any React developer.
The job searching unit was pretty good overall, but I wish Codesmith was more specific about listing the production project as experience. A lot of job searchers are kind of left to figure things out on their own as far as that goes. I also think it would be nice if Codesmith made themselves available as an educational institute on LinkedIn. Being a bootcamp grad is not a shameful thing and giving alumni the option to list Codesmith on LinkedIn would be great.

Overall, the experience was great, but there is still much room for improvement. I look forward to seeing how Codesmith evolves in the years to come.

A quick overview of my experience: I attended Codesmith from Febuary-May 2020, worked as a fellow until August, and started my first engineering role at the end of August, after applying to jobs for 1-2 months.(If you don't feel like reading the whole thing, scroll down to the Conclusion section at the very bottom) I was drawn to Codesmith because I already had a little under a year of self-taught experience with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, and I wanted to attend a bootcamp that had a higher level of entry for its students. After narrowing my choices down to Fullstack Academy and Codesmith, I ultimately chose Codesmith due to the appeal and quality of its in-person workshops. In particular, the Hard Parts series elevated my understanding of JavaScript to a new level — even after I thought I already had a decent understanding of the basics!I had high expectations coming into Codesmith, and generally speaking those expectations were met. However, I should point out that our cohort switched from on-site to remote instruction halfway through the program due to the pandemic, which affected the cohort's experience for the second half of the program.Codesmith's curriculum was divided into two halves when I attended (and I assume it's still fairly similar):

Full-stack instruction: an intensive series of lectures, pair programming exercises, and projects teaching essential full-stack technologies like React, Redux, Node, and SQL/NoSQL databases.

Production Project & Hiring: students build a developer tool over six weeks, and they also attend a series of lectures and workshops preparing them for the job search. They'll also put together a resume with the guidance of a fellow. Some supplemental lectures and exercises are also included here, touching on topics like AWS basics and CI/CD fundamentals.
In addition, we also had an assessment or algorithm exercise each morning.
Curriculum & LecturesOverall, the first half of the program was by far the most engaging and fulfilling for me. I came into the program with some frontend experience, and after the first half I felt confident building basic applications with servers and databases. Our lead instructors knew what they were talking about and gave their lectures in an engaging manner.At some points I did feel that the curriculum could be updated a bit (particularly in the second half - there was an AWS update that wasn't covered in the instructions, and we lost several hours as the instructors worked to find a solution), but I understand that the curriculum was updated during the latter half of 2020 and possibly later. It would also have been helpful to cover modern practices such as React hooks, linting, best practices for codebase architecture, etc. before going into the production project — these would make good quick additions to the curriculum if they aren't already included.ProjectsPossibly the biggest part of Codesmith's appeal is the "production project" - a development tool that a group of residents work on (4 or 5, for my cohort) over a span of 6 weeks. Before tackling the production project, we also completed a handful of other projects, ranging from a Chrome extension to several fullstack apps, which did a lot to prepare us for this project.While the production project our group built from scratch wasn't exactly what we'd call "production-ready," we did have the opportunity to iterate on several past projects and refine the codebase while adding extra features, which in retrospect might have been the better option, since it's closer to what most engineers do at their jobs!One aspect of the production project that was a little less than ideal was the group dynamics. In my group as well as others, there were conflicts where some members "led" the project and created a less equal learning environment for others, or in other instances some members were unwilling to make meaningful contributions and instead preferred to chat. I expect that this is always a risk when forming groups (not to mention in the actual workplace), but this did detract at times from the experience. To future students, I highly recommend getting in touch with your group's assigned fellow if any conflicts or issues occur - I don't believe it's worthwhile trying to solve them on your own when the experience is something you're paying a significant amount of money for.Hiring PortionWithout a doubt, the best part of the hiring portion for me was the resume. I came out of the program with a dense, polished resume that I didn't feel embarrassed sending to employers - in contrast, the resume I wrote before CS might as well have been written by a child.I had high expectations for the hiring program because I had heard past grads praise it, with some even say that it was worth the cost of tuition on its own. I was 30 when I attended the program and had worked a number of non-technical jobs previously, and I didn't feel that the instruction regarding the job application or interview process broke any new ground for me. I've spoken to some other grads who are around my age and felt the same — I suspect that the people who get the most out of the hiring program are in their late teens to mid-20s.For me, one thing I would have changed about the hiring program would have been to include some engineers in the workshops and lectures who had experience interviewing and working outside of Codesmith. While our instructors did make a solid effort to cover the standard materials for these lectures, sections like the system design portion would have been more engaging if they were led by an experienced engineer who had gone through or given SD interviews, rather than a fellow who had only completed this same unit weeks earlier. Likewise, I would have gone into the interview process a bit better prepared if I had been given more concrete details about the typical interview process, common exercises, etc. This is something that I had to do on my own time, through speaking to other grads and going through interviews. Disclaimer: since we had just switched to a remote format at that point, there were issues with timing that caused several hiring lectures to be rescheduled, and unfortunately Will wasn't available to give his usual lectures. I'm assuming this isn't the current experience.While it's true that you only get better at interviewing by interviewing, some more concrete guidance would have helped immensely, as some lectures felt a little vague. When I attended the program, we were able to interact with full-time engineers at three different points: during an alum Q&A session, during an hour-long mock interview with an alum, and during a 15-minute (I believe) phone call where we went over our narrative with an alum. When I began applying to jobs, I was uncomfortable about reaching out to the hiring support fellow for advice — while they were doing their job to the best of their ability, I felt more comfortable reaching out to someone who had gone through the hiring process themselves. I'm aware that Codesmith now gives graduates the opportunity to book time to speak to past graduates who are now employed as engineers, which is great. I think bringing engineers with this type of lived experience into the hiring program would also be a huge win for everyone involved in it.ConclusionBased on my experience, I'd definitely recommend Codesmith to anyone who has decided that a bootcamp is the right choice for them. Codesmith helped fill in the gaps in my engineering knowledge, and it also gave me the chance to work on an in-depth project with a group of other developers. My production project was likely a big reason why I was considered for the first role that I got hired for — I built a GraphQL tool, and GraphQL was a big feature of the stack I ended up working on.Overall, I'd say the hiring portion was the only part of the program that didn't meet the expectations I had coming in, for the reasons I mentioned above. Still, a hiring program alone won't help you get a job. After the initial lectures, Codesmith provided me with an environment to push myself to improve, and a community of graduates that supported me as I moved on to the job search and beyond. Without Codesmith, I definitely wouldn't be at the engineering level I am today.

I want to start off my review with a quick preface. If you are looking for an easy way into the world of software or web development then this most likely won't be a good fit for you. It takes a tremendous amount of work throughout. Before the program, during the program, and after the program (where some would say that this is where the real work starts). Your mileage may vary depending on your initial experience and innate affinity for coding and problem solving, but there is simply no way to avoid the effort that is required for this transformative experience. I started off with absolutely zero prior experience in coding and began with first learning what a variable is and what we use them for. After a period of self-studying, I wanted to take my learning process to the next level and came across Codesmith by pure chance. What immediately stood out to me was the great sense of care that they had for their applicants and the Codesmith community. What really sealed the deal for me was going through all the free resources that Codesmith provides that I felt were a great benefit in helping to solidify my understanding of the basics. After watching some of the javascript hard parts videos led by CEO Will Sentance, previously obscure and confusing concepts started to click. I was hooked and knew that this was what I was searching for. From that point forward my learning process and exposure to coding took off. Everything was geared around getting through the technical interview, which for me was quite difficult. The technical interview IS difficult, but it's not without reason. If applicants aren't able to demonstrate the level needed to enter the immersive programs then it really isn't in anyone's benefit for that applicant to be accepted as once the immersive starts, the brakes are few and far between, and the level of difficulty increases exponentially. Believe me when I say that Codesmith is not trying to trick anyone during the technical interview nor does it require any esoteric knowledge. It's simply testing if the applicant has a good understanding (not mastery) of a lot of the fundamental concepts in javascript that serve as the building blocks for what is to come in the immersive. If you are struggling with the technical interview, reach out to people in the Codesmith community. They truly do care and want to see you succeed, but the effort and dedication from your end HAS to be apparent.As challenging and exhausting as the full-time immersive was, it was an incredible experience that I wish I could do all over again. Never before have I been with a group of people so focused and passionately working towards a goal for such an extended period of time. The struggle and pain that we went through as we were hit with wave after wave of difficult concepts and frameworks/libraries really helped us to bond and form a close connection (they are still my friends to this day that I confide in). You really do start to get a sense of working as an engineer when going through different group projects, especially when you get to the production project phase and start mapping out your workflow with your team members. The sense of pride that you feel when you create something from scratch at the end was such a rewarding feeling as you work under a deadline with your team members. The anxiety that I felt when going through the program and not understanding everything was subsided by the constant support from the staff and fellows. When you wrap up the technical side of things, you start getting into the job hunt phase where you learn how to finally work towards leveraging the skills that you've acquired towards a full-time job as an engineer. Most people would say that this part is actually harder than the technical portion as the job search process is quite volatile. There will be a lengthy trial and error process and no matter what there IS a level of luck involved as well. But those that prepare WILL be able to capitalize on the opportunity when they eventually come across it. You will be able to go through the entire application process at Codesmith, from developing your profile and resume, to how to optimize your LinkedIn profile,  to how to write cover letters and sell yourself as a credible engineer. Codesmith also has advisors like Eric K, who have been in the industry and are a tremendous benefit to helping you navigate scenarios that you will encounter like negotiating your salary and benefits, discussing your narrative and background, and how to portray yourself as a competent engineer so that when you do come across these situations you are able to recall to the experience provided to you!To wrap up....I have been on both sides at Codesmith.  As someone that went through the full-time program, and as someone that works for Codesmith. I can truly say that there is no subterfuge, Codesmith genuinely cares about this process and helping people to achieve their goals and to fulfill their motivations for going through this rigorous program, whatever they may be. The effort required is tremendous but all in all, I can say without hesitation that it's worth it. The community that Codesmith has developed here is second to none, and it's why I wanted to work for Codesmith. I wanted to be able to give back to other applicants going through this process just like how when I was applying to Codesmith there were so many people that reached out and helped me to get through everything. Life as an engineer/developer is one of continuous learning and improvement, and if that's what you're looking for I truly believe that Codesmith is a great way to get started. The outcomes and salaries may seem very enticing, and rightly so. But more than that, it's this valuable skill that you are acquiring that will be in demand and dominate our society for years and years to come. 

My Codesmith story pretty different from most, but it has the same happy ending.I come from a more technical background than a lot of people who come to Codesmith. I studied mathematics in college, taught math and science professionally, and was already comfortable with the basics of coding. To top it all off, I wasn't even very interested in web development, I wanted to work in Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence and was looking for a way to enter into that field.Something about the culture, philosophy, and pedagogy of Codesmith drew me in, and I joined. It was an excellent decision.During the program, I found ways to take what we were working on and make it interesting to me. I spent more time focusing on databases and algorithms, and focused my projects around things that related (however tangentially!) to Machine Learning.Right after I graduated, the pandemic hit, and Codesmith hired me on to help deliver some of the lessons remotely and to help maintain their website. The managers at Codesmith knew my interests, and were kind enough to let me spend a significant amount of time developing their Machine Learning curriculum. After I left at the end of 2020, I was able to build a web app that leveraged computer vision that I could show off to companies and demonstrate my interest in Machine Learning. After a few months of job searching, I was able to find a perfect position for me – a software role developing tools for a machine learning team at a startup using computer vision to help diagnose cancerous biopsies.To be clear, I'm not saying Codesmith will turn you into a Machine Learning engineer. What I got from Codesmith wasn't some specific set of skills or special knowledge. Instead, Codesmith provided me exactly what I was missing: the ability to spearhead a publishable project from ideation to deployment; experience working with a team of engineers on a project for extended periods of time; familiarity with the tools that professionals use; war-stories to tell of uncovering and overcoming daunting technical challenges. In short, Codesmith developed my engineering maturity.If you too lack engineering maturity, and have the determination to work through the long hours and challenging curriculum, then I can't recommend Codesmith enough. I don't know what you are trying to achieve, but if you are creative and hard-working, you can leverage the catalyzing environment of Codesmith to make it happen.

What's brilliant about Codesmith is they don't just teach you languages and frameworks. About a third of the program is dedicated to actually building an open source developer tool that other engineers can actually use that will impress potential employers. This is a step beyond where most programs leave you and is critical to their graduates' success -- it gives you a huge leg up and something fascinating and deep to talk about in an interview.I came in from a completely different background and only learned what JavaScript was half a year prior. I was no doubt intimidated by the rigorous curriculum, watching engineers only weeks ahead in the program write applications I never believed I could in that period of time. Soon enough, I was at the same level. I faced challenges when it came to applying for jobs. That part of the process can be rough and is a psychological battle as much as it is a test of strategy and skill. Codesmith walks you through in very practical terms how to apply, and their strategy is great. But ultimately, graduates will come up with their own strategies and use Codesmith's as a springboard. In the end, what got me through was that Codesmith instilled a belief in me that I could do it, and that conviction, while sometimes quite small, carried me through. I eventually received an offer to the same generous tune of their average graduate outcomes, which I did not believe could happen.You absolutely have to put in the work; applying to jobs will come easier to some than others. Know that you're embarking on a challenge. But as far as there being a better program out there for launching you into a Software Engineering career, I'll believe it when I see it.

The best investment I ever made, the people in my cohort alone are worth the money spent. Now imagine that, coupled with the intense immersive curriculum and the power house instructors, AND the leader of CS - Will S is an actual human being that's so down to earth, real, extremely helpful, and actually cares. This is a no brainer, it's the real deal, I landed a role shortly after graduating and I got more than what I was asking for. When does that ever happen in life?! If you have the funds or can get the funds, stop thinking, CodeSmith is the answer. 

My experience at Codesmith was invaluable, and I was able to land a senior role less than two months after finishing the program. The codesmith community is one of a kind. The outcomes are a result of dedicated engineers and community which develops thinkers instead of technicians. With special credit to Eric who taught me how to negotiate for a salary I could write home about. Codesmith is one of a kind.

I, like many others who attended Codesmith, was hooked the first time I attended JS: the hard parts. The approach to learning CS was the exact opposite of the dusty, archaic book-learning of computer concepts I experienced in college. It was not long before I signed up for the immersive program. I won't mince words: this program is spectacular. Attending the CS immersive was a highly formative process in which I learned how to learn. Codesmith is not a program where you can turn your brain off, hop on the conveyor belt, and expect an offer from IBM at the end of the process. It will challenge you. Your brain will contort in ways you hadn't thought possible. But in the end, if you've given it the diligence required, you'll come out with the mind of a highly capable software engineer.Of course nothing can be perfect-- there are some issues that might be present in any (albeit quite successful) startup, and it must be said that this is likely not the best path for everyone. But I can say without a doubt this was the right choice for me, and I had no qualms in recommending the program to a friend who starts next month.

I attended Codesmith a couple years ago, graduated in Jan 2019. Prior software experience before attending Codesmith - part-time JS / CSS / HTML / bash self-study for about 6 months => some JS The Hard Parts sessions => CS Prep. Upon graduating, I landed a role as a Senior Full Stack Engineer at a large company that has been a great experience for me over the past couple years. I felt compelled to write this review because I wanted to bring some attention to the excellent continued career services support that Codesmith provides (s/o Eric 🤙). Even a couple years after graduating, when it came time to negotiate a salary increase/promotion to tech lead in my current company, Eric was there to provide top notch feedback on how to negotiate effectively. (He also helped me negotiate a $130k base offer with $10k signing bonus back when I first started in the role).The program is challenging (in a good way), and well-worth the time and effort. After working as a sr. dev for the past couple years, I can say that Codesmith does a great job of getting you in the mindset of what it's like working as an engineer, being faced with new challenges every day, and figuring out how to solve them, step-by-step.Big shouts to the Codesmith community, would highly recommend 🚀

I graduated Codesmith and landed a 6 figure job within 2 weeks. Codesmith has an excellent hiring support program that actually cares about you and your career. They were always available whenever I had questions or just to provide some moral support (shoutout to David and Annie). Erik is a wonderful guy, helped me tremendously with negotiating. He is an expert at it!! It was a pleasure to work with Erik during my negotiation process. He was available to get in touch with me throughout the day and support me no matter when I hit him up even though he is exceptionally busy. About the program, I think the materials are very up to date. Everything I learned I saw in job descriptions. I wish we had spent more time on each unit because even though the instructors and materials were great, it was a lot of extra hours I put in to actually master the crafts on my own. The best thing about codesmith i would say is the community. I have found friends for life even though we were fully remote. They were able to cultivate a culture of empathy, teamwork, and leadership. I would not have got to the point i am today without the support of my cohort mates!! 100000% recommend!

Codesmith is an incredible program that delivers on its promises.  The below points are in no particular order but all incredibly valid.1) The hours are long.  You are truly immersed in code.2) They want you to fail (but they will help you overcome those failures).  The point is to learn by doing and understanding the process and then overcoming the frustrations.3) They emphasize an empathetic engineer.  The goal is to be not only a knowledgeable engineer but also one that knows how to communicate about the code.  That helps in life - but also in interviews after the program.4) As others have said, I did not believe the CIRR reports when I joined.  But after hearing the results of some of my peers, I am surprised that the results are not higher even.5) They don't create a cookie cutter bootcamp graduate.  They teach you to be a 'T' shaped developer that excels in a category that you focus on for your production project.  The beauty of that is each person has a different strength from everyone else by the program's end.6) The hiring portion is top-notch.  They teach you how to sell yourself - and that is worth the price of admission alone. 7) The post-codesmith job search is tough - particularly mentally.  They do prepare you for that, but just going to codesmith alone doesnt get you the jobs.  You really have to put in the work.8) I graduated in December 2020 and it took me 2.5 months to find a job.

Codesmith is a great program for those who are ready to put in the work to become a software engineer. Codesmith's way of instruction can feel rough at times, but because they push their students out of their comfort zone, that's why Codesmith is so successful. Their approach to the job hunt is amazing and I encourage you to go through the program and see it for yourself.A lot of what you're paying for at codesmith is invaluable. Personally, I loved that they put me in a mindset to succeed and to go after what I deserve and nothing less.

I attended Codesmith from August to November 2020 in the LA36 cohort. I was initially pretty skeptical about boot camps in general, but got the feeling that Codesmith might be different after attending a Hard Parts lecture and speaking with the lead instructor Dave. Every instructor at Codesmith has a deep understanding of JavaScript and a knack for explaining it in an easy to digest way. On top of that, you spend the majority of your time in the immersive writing code with other students, so you get experience collaborating with Git/Github, pair-programming, and explaining your thought-process. The work is also really difficult and the learning comes at you like a firehose, but everyone is really supportive and the community really holds each-other up. I honestly don't know how they do it, but I felt really close with my cohortmates and made lifelong connections. In the job search, I drew upon my production project experience to find common ground with other engineers and got help from Codesmith, even though I had already graduated. The alumni support team and network frequently posts new positions and helps you prepare for interviews, which I would've never had without Codesmith. Overall, it was 10/10 and really worth it. Would do it again if I could go back! 

Codesmith's immersive program was an unforgettable experience.  Not being given the answers to everything is quite uncomfortable, and can be quite overwhelming at times, but couldn't think of a better group of people to go through it with.  The level of commitment and empathy shown by everyone from the instructors, to the residents, and hiring support made it all the more worthwhile.      The CIRR data speaks for itself, it's just whether or not you choose to believe it.  I'll admit that I was pretty skeptical the first time I saw the reviews.  Having gone through it all and meeting these wonderful people, I'm proud to be one of the testimonies that feels lucky to be a part of it.  

Codesmith teaches its residents how to take on any new software technologies quickly and efficiently - not through memorizing syntax, but understanding the logic and how the code works under the hood. Its curriculum facilitates deep dives into central techs, eloquent communication, empathy, and engineering mature products. Its emphasis on collaborative workflows allows residents to work effectively as teammates, ideate exciting, marketable applications, iterate on features, bridge different engineering approaches, and troubleshoot through code reviews. The staff and support community is superb from teaching to hiring. A life-altering growth experience. 

Best bootcamp out there IMO, but I don’t think there’s anything particularly special about the curriculum. It is mostly taught by (extremely capable) recent grads, and all the stuff that is taught can just as well be self-learned (for a much lower price tag). However, “hard-learning” and hours and hours (and hours) of pair programming are where a bulk of the growth happens. A lot of people look at the outcome numbers and are skeptical, but they’re 100% legit. This is in part because Codesmith kind of paves its own legacy by making the bar for admission very high compared to other bootcamps. Peeking through the resumes of my peers, there were plenty of UC and Ivy Leaguers in my cohort — the kind of ambitious folks who would probably have been successful without doing a bootcamp. This isn’t to say you have to be a genius to get in, but you need to be dedicated and driven. By getting to the level where you can even get admitted, you should feel encouraged that you can eventually master Javascript land a high paying position in the industry. On the other side of that though, the community that Codesmith cultivates, and their hiring prep program are outstanding. You don’t really graduate until you are hired - that is- you have unfettered access to the staff and can schedule support sessions well after the program ends. These aspects were critical to me landing a high paying job within 3 months of graduation. I would make the decision to enroll every time.

At the beginning of 2020, I had never written a line of code in my life and could not tell you the difference between Java and Javascript. A little under a year later, I'm at $170k annual base comp for my first software engineering job.Long story short, I was let go from my non-programming job at the beginning of COVID and started looking into a career pivot into software engineering. From dipping my toes into the space and attempting to self-teach, I quickly realized what a great resource CSX (which introduces you to the "hard learning" philosophy that others have spoken so much about in other reviews; e.g. for most of the problems, they do not spoon-feed you the answers a la FreeCodeCamp) was and was quickly introduced to the broader Codesmith community. Anyway, I went through CSX and enjoyed it enough to sign up for CSPrep. If I were to be brutally honest, I did not find CSPrep worth it. You'll get just as much value from going through CSX, deeply understanding all the exercises there at a fundamental level, and attending the free Hard Parts lectures. I found nothing new in the CSPrep curriculum. However, it was helpful that the tuition rolled over to the immersive program though, so I can't complain too much. The immersive itself was a blast to go through. While I would say that the curriculum is again nothing special - you spend a lot of time being taught by fellows (aka former students who literally just graduated from the program) and they can be hit or miss. Unfortunately, there's no way for prospective students to really screen who the fellows will be in their cohort (as half of your fellows will literally be hired a week or two before your cohort's start date); you can at least vet the lead instructors through their Hard Parts lectures (they are overall very solid). It's just that you won't necessarily be any better off at Codesmith vs. if you just rely on the abundance of free or cheaper resources online to learn the core technologies that are taught. That being said, the real value of the program comes from the project portion and the focused multi-week job hunt strategy curriculum. The smaller projects are mostly your standard CRUD apps that any bootcamp will have you make; you are encouraged and should explore new technologies / libraries with these projects - e.g. GraphQL, OAuth, D3, Typescript etc. The highest profile project you'll create is the production project (which Codesmith itself markets quite heavily). You'll be granted the choice of either iterating on an existing project from a previous cohort or creating a new project from scratch - from my experience, most choose the former. Granted, most projects, especially if you are starting from scratch are of dubious usability / quality but the real value comes from diving deep into a particular technology and tackling tough challenges that comes with building a developer tool to help fellow devs overcome their tough challenges. When on the job hunt, I was able to consistently pass non-coding screens with recruiters or hiring managers by being able to talk shop about my chosen technology's pros, cons / tradeoffs as well as having pointed examples about interesting technical challenges I had faced (I got this question on almost all my interviews), all gained from working on the production project. The point is that it'll always be a tougher job market for bootcamp grads, but Codesmith solves for this by providing you the tools to job hunt effectively and craft a cohesive and credible (sounding) narrative around the skills that you have hopefully picked up from attending the program. And that's where most if not all of the value from the almost $20k tuition comes in. Again - the curriculum is nothing special, but you can't really enter the job market at the salaries that Codesmith grads do without a robust portfolio of projects that you have been forced to create, a well-written resume (Codesmith is very strict about how they want grads to craft their resumes and will force a few rounds of edits until students get it right), and the technical communication skills to back all that up. Special shoutout to Eric, who is the resident salary negotiation expert. He's a great hypeman but more importantly, provides a solid framework and strategy for students to lean on during negotiations, which are often really damn awkward. He's available on-call post-grad as a resource once you're able to secure an offer. Using his script, I was able to confidently and successfully negotiate a material bump to my total package. 

There is no other bootcamp like Codesmith.  That's it.If you apply to all of the big-name coding immersive programs, you will immediately see that Codesmith is a step above the rest.  Even ones like hack reactor or app academy are cakewalk interviews, whereas Codesmith actually challenges its students before entry.  Once you're accepted they throw you into the gauntlet.  It's a lot.  But you come out a better programmer and team member and technical communicator.  Because so much of the curriculum is project based, especially the last ~5 weeks, you have a wealth of topics to talk about in your interviews.  If you pay attention to how they teach you to speak and present yourself to employers, follow their guide and you will get a high paying software engineering role.  Guaranteed.  You may still feel like an imposter, and you probably are, but you're confident enough and speak well enough that nobody can tell.Go to Codesmith if you're serious.  It takes your time.  But you'll know some shit after.They really do help with resume and getting a job.  Their resume strategy is unique and effective.  They check in on you and help you in negotiations.  All around win win.  They money you spend on this program will be repaid in your salary.