Chegg Skills

I graduated from Thinkful in August 2017. I thrived from havinig a cohort sized at 8 because it felt like a space where I could comfortably ask questions or discuss with classmates when I didn't understand concepts. I walked away from Thinkful knowing how to do a lot of "things" in javascript on both the front end and backend. It was during the career services portion of the course I realized I was closest to becoming a developer because before the program ended I still couldn't imagine it. Building Javascript 30 applications, a suggestion of one mentor, gave me a better understanding of the foundational curriculum Thinkful jumpstarted us with. I had an ally from the class that I worked through problems daily in a safe space where we grew from our mistakes implementing solutions. I also had a career coach that helped me identify my weeknesses then provided pointers to strengthen them for my next interview or project. I liked most that when I was interiewing, mentors were ALWAYS available to double look over assignments, clarify concepts, or give me a confidence boost with helpful feedback. This tremendously helped me grow and learn that my work as a developer only enhances with conductive criticism. The connections that the career coaches made with Thinkful's existing partners was so helpful. It ultimately led me to multiple offers and my ability to choose my the best fit for me. If you're thinking "I can't", you definitely can... because you'll have a whole team rooting for you and encouraging you through the gruesome and vunerable interview process. 

I am taking Thinkful's full-stack flex program now.  It's definitely intense, but I'm amazed at how much I've learned in just a few short weeks!  My brother works as a developer here in Atlanta and has been in this field for 20+ years, and I'm learning things he only learned in the past year!  A few times I actually knew about something he never even heard of, so I got to educate him a little bit!  Because I'm doing this online I really appreciate the fact that they offer free classes every week so I have the opportunity to sit down in a classroom-like setting and have some of the concepts explained in further detail.  You also get between 3 and 6 hours a week with your mentor, so there's help available should you need it.  I'm so glad I made the choice to do this and can't wait to see what comes next!

I chose Thinkful because I was sold on the fact that they update their curriculum based on what's popular in the industry. So at the time of my experience, React and Node were the two big guns, and now I feel pretty comfortable after my months of hard work and motivation. 

Thinkful's best asset is its mentorship. You get to have a 1-on-1 meeting with someone in the industry who knows his/her stuff. During my weeks of React, I got someone who is amazing at React. During the Data Structures week, I got another guy who exceled in that. I would also like to mention having a boot camp that has time spent in Data Structures and Algorithms will REALLY benefit you come interview time.

Basically, you never feel alone, despite this being an online/remote experience. I struggled learning to code because I didn't know where to start or who to meet. Thinkful put me in front of the right people and more importantly, kept me motivated, because face it: you have to do this yourself!

Oh, and I got a job pretty quickly after the course finished. They take their career services pretty seriously as well :-)

Short Version

 

I was spooked by the whole remote thing. I wasn't sure about who I'd be working with or what the quality of everything would be. If you're on the fence about this school, don't think twice. This is a great program that's been well thought out, and it's going to get you to where you need to be. I have zero regrets dropping $14k on the full-time program.

 

Long version

 

WHY THINKFUL?

 

Prior to Thinkful, I went to App Academy in NYC. I made it to three weeks and then quit. I commuted 4 hours from the burbs, and slept 3-4 hours every day. I couldn't retain knowledge, my brain tapped out.

 

After leaving, I set out to find a school that eliminated my biggest issues with App Academy — pace and commute. After much digging, I found Thinkful, and it turned out to be more or less what I was expecting (which is a wonderful thing), after Benjy and Bhaumik fielded my bajillion questions about the program.

 

CURRICULUM

 

The quality of Thinkful's curriculum was the biggest unknown to me, and I'm happy to report that it's legit. You could tell it was crafted with care and attention to detail. Sure, I'd find typos, but if you can get over that, the high quality is apparent. Only once or twice did I need to reference outside resources, but I always heavily favored Thinkful's interpretation of a topic (as opposed to some half-baked or outdated tutorial on the web). The biggest compliment I can give to Thinkful's curriculum is that it reminds me of a textbook — it felt like the foremost authority on the topic at hand.

 

Other than teaching us the skills to confidently be called Web Developers, we learned how to discuss programming topics with others, which I found to be essential in forging the sorts of relationships that would later turn into job opportunities.

 

STAFF

 

With the staff that you work with on a daily basis, you quickly learn that these folks are 100% invested in your success. They genuinely care. I'll go into who I feel were the heroes in my experience.

 

Instructors. I can't understate the importance of the instructors. They create/maintain the learning materials, present them, and are a resource themselves. All of our instructors demonstrated an airtight command of their topic, and they were always available to take questions. (Shout out to Rich, Chris, Joe, Tauhida, and Ray!)

 

Program Manager. Invaluable to me is the person who's running the show, and managing the cohort's day-to-day. Thinkful assigns this person the title of Program Manager. Our PM, Theresa, was exceptional. I can't thank her enough for creating a synergistic, organized, personalized, and human experience. On a daily basis, we submit our thoughts to her (kinda like a diary), and she shrewdly makes adjustments based on your reflections. In the end, you're left with an experience that optimizes your learning and mitigates any peripheral hurdles. She was someone you could go to for anything and everything — positives/negatives, suggestions, questions, complaints, etc. In a remote program, I feel like this was a huge deal. And she was always very quick to respond, even on weekends, or late at night. To me, things felt seamless, but I'd guess a big reason for that is the Program Manager. Thank you, Theresa!

 

Mentor. Your mentor is a big deal. My mentor and I quickly established a rapport and that meant I could reach out to him for questions all the time. This was essential in my development throughout the course, because that meant I'd have minimal logjams, and additional enrichment on top of an already solid foundation. Considering the pace of the course, this is so, so important.

 

SUPPORT

 

You have SO many support avenues at Thinkful. Firstly, throughout the day, you have the TAs. Our TAs were stellar. I'm talking about Elias, Sidharth and Joshua. They're teaching us not only the solution to problems, but how to think about solving problems, and how to think about the bigger picture. Slowly but surely, their problem solving habits become our own, and to be given that skill is important for any uncharted territory that you have to tread later on. My only complaint is that on some days, there would be a significant wait because of students in the queue, but most of the time it wasn't bad at all.

 

I already covered mentoring so I'll move on.

 

There's always email and Slack, and folks in the full-time program get back to you within a day at the very most. Often, you get responses instantly. There's also a general "front end web dev" channel where you can post questions, but it's hit-or-miss.

 

You can also ask questions during the daily workshop (where the instructor is presenting the new material). Or you can catch the instructors before or after the workshop, which I did several times. Or, sometimes instructors would stay and help you well after end-of-day (looking at you Chris Klanac). They are the most knowledgeable in their particular topic and they were pretty easy to get a hold of.

 

When you get support, everyone's got a positive attitude (which was helpful for my sometimes negative/angry attitude lol). You never feel like you're rushed or wasting someone's time. You never feel punished if you're wrong. You're given help by an intelligent, polite, tactful person that's just trying to get you on board with the day's concepts.

 

My one major gripe I have with Thinkful are their Q&A sessions. This is like having office hours throughout the day, every day, even on weekends, on several (if not all) topics being taught in the course. In theory this is great, but I encountered firsthand what happens if you aren't aggressive about getting your question answered — sometimes you get cut in line! This is frustrating after waiting for 30+ minutes. I rarely used Q&A after that. It would be a boon if they had a queue function built into the session, and even better, if you were notified when it's your turn so you don't have to sit through a question that isn't relevant to you.   CAREER SERVICES   I was fortunate to get a job days after completing the program, so I didn't get to work with Career Services a lot. But I'll say that the time I did spend with them left me encouraged and feeling positively about the job hunt. I also think it says something about the school that I was able to get a job so quickly after graduation.

 

WRAP UP

 

The program isn't easy and you reap what you sow. It's important to understand that no one at Thinkful is going to force you to learn, or force you to work hard. They do a lot to keep you accountable on a daily basis, but ultimately you gotta decide how much you get out of it. There are no tests; there's nothing to keep you in fear of failure or dismissal. But as long as you can work hard every day, you'll be fine, because Thinkful will set you up to succeed.

I completed the Full Time Web Development course at Thinkful a little over a month ago, and have just been hired as a Frontend Developer at a startup in NYC. The cirriculum and people involved are both fantastic. They very clearly care about the success of their students, and do everything possible to get you hired. 

You continue to build applications throughout the coursework, each getting more and more complex, until you have a full sized portfolio to help you get a job. The mentors along the way were excellent, helping with any and all problems I had.

Careeer Services begin after you have completed the course and last until you get a job. With daily and weekly check-ins with a career coach, you are actively working on your approach and job hunt, rather than just sitting around. 

It worked for me, and it was work for you too. 

I definitely recommend Thinkful to all!

I enrolled in the Flexible Web Development Bootcamp because I work full time and have family. What I liked about it was it's at your own pace and you aren't forced to graduate by a certain point with half-baked projects. The plan was to make a career change from sales into becoming a web developer. Studied curriculum during 2016, so my viewpoint may be different that what's currently on the program in terms of curriculum. Graduated in 6 months time while dedicating on average 20 hours a week. It took me about 5 months to get a job in the Bay Area after I graduated. DISCLOSURE: Getting a job in the Bay Area out of a bootcamp is VERY HARD! There's a ton of talented competition out here, so bootcampers often get sidelined. Not impossible but difficult. I leveraged my previous experience combined with my new web developer skills to find a job that utilized both.

I came into the program with my feet wet on HTML, CSS, and a little JavaScript. That helped a bit as the curriculum and examples can be difficult to follow at times. A couple of times I took it upon myself to sign up for a $10 Udemy course on the side for specific topics to better my understanding. Curriculum was heavily text based, which is fine but I would have liked some diagrams or videos integrated.

The best part about Thinkful is the mentor program, which is where you meet 3x a week with a personal mentor who's already a web developer to talk through challenges and explore topics. Where the curriculum lacked, the mentor program filled the gap. I loved having my mentor and felt he gave me a wider perspective on what was being taught.

I really enjoyed building capstone projects which are portfolio pieces you'll need to show when job hunting. I probably spent more time that I needed to on some of them but the work paid off. 

Career services was excellent and very supportive. They helped keep me on track with job applications and refined my resume and LinkedIn to shine in the best possible light.

The last section of the course focused on Data Structures & Algorithms. Kind of a minor focus in scope compared to the rest of the course but important to know. After finishing the course I took it upon myself to purchase a textbook on the subject and get better at it in prep for interviews.

I would recommend Thinkful to others! Very happy about my experience as a whole.

Thinkful has taken my web development to a whole new level. I studied on my own for 6-8 months and decided I needed more structure. After only 1.5 months I have learned more than the entire time I was doing it on my own. Thinkful’s mentors, program managers, and curriculum are all top notch. The projects Are great at applying what you learn and building up to more advanced concepts. I know I will have a job after completing the course, and I will owe that all to thinkful. 

-Chris

-Thinkful Student

I have been around the block in terms of learning basic python learning (in the hopes to get some data science chops): I've dabbled in Code Academy, General Assembly intro classes and a few free resources. The main issue I kept running into is integrating Python skills with Data Science. All other courses out there will teach you basic Python syntax, but getting the context-- how do I use this in real life and to solve data science problems-- is hard to get a grasp on. 

Thinkful's prep course is the best introduction to Data Science out there. It teaches you the basics of Python in the context of data science -- so you are learning programming with purpose. The curriculum is well-written, witty, and engaging-- with plenty of opportunity to practice as you go. Though I haven't taken the full bootcamp (I don't feel it's the right time for me right now) I would absolutely go to Thinkful in the future to pursue Data Science further.

With that said, the one area I feel they could improve is the mentorship experience. I realize it's a tough nut to crack--matching the right people together, and quickly-- but there needs to be some more centralized approach to improve quality. For example, my mentor didn't really help guide my Final Project for the prep course based on the criteria that I was being graded on. He coached me through Python issues I was having, but ultimately my project ended up being less "data sciencey" than was expected of me. 

I just started my 7th week with the Thinkful flexible bootcamp, and it has gone smoothly thanks to everything Thinkful has in place. If you're pretty motivated and can hold yourself to a schedule, this is probably the least stressful choice.  My learning is all online and fits my schedule, but the 1-on-1 skype-style meetings with a mentor 3 times per week have helped me to discuss what I'm learning in the correct terms, and how this sort of project would work in a team setting.  It is also great to have someone look at my code and take the time to tell me how it looks, and how I'm doing overall. When I'm stuck in between mentor sessions, there are Q&A video chat sessions I can jump into most hours of the day and run it by a Thinkful programmer.   I imagine this support is what most of my tuition is paying for, and it's been really valuable. 
  I've already been encouraged to attend meetups and talk to a career coach, although the real coaching is supposed to start once you've 'graduated' the curriculum. The curriculum wastes no time; it explains only what you need to understand about a subject, but provides great resource links for when you do want more detail. I'll let you know about the job assistance once I get there :)

My experience with Thinkful has turned out to be a very knowledgable one. The curriculum is straightforward and systematic. Interaction with mentors is encouraged. I was looking for a good introduction into the UX design techniques being a full stack developer wanting to get more into design. 
Anna Mendoza is the mentor assigned to me. She has been a great help. We go over each assignment and the next steps in detail. She is always encouraging and goes the extra step to explain a concept.
To conclude i would recommend anyone looking for a good introduction to the core concepts in user experience to try out thinkful. I do believe the program is expensive and can be made more affordable. 

Where I am now:

I figured it'd be good to start with where I am now to qualify my review. I currently work at a local 5 year old startup where we build software for other companies. I've been at my current position for about 10 months and have primarily been a mobile developer having done projects in React Native, Swift (ios), and Java (android) with a short time in web with MeteorJS and React.

My Review:

I enrolled in Thinkful's Full-time Web Development Bootcamp 2 years after graduating college with a degree in Architecture. I worked in a call center for a year before that and took 1 programming course (C++) in college in 2010. My experience with Thinkful was overwhelmingly positive and I was able to go from doing random lessons in Codecademy to building full stack web application to now, almost a year later building applications in different languages, working with scripting continuous integration, AWS and etc.

While there are many, many other bootcamps out there, one of the primary reasons I chose Thinkful was their transparency in their statistics and reviews. I saw many, many great reviews but also some mediocre ones which told me they did not censor reviews like I've seen other bootcamps do. I was also part of the second ever cohort and thought that they had a LOT of stake in me as a student. If I failed, they fail -- so it gave me much confidence in their ownership over my success. 

The bootcamp is open to people of any and all backgrounds so if you've never coded in your life, you can still enroll in the program. Given this, the curriculum and assistance daily is very good. They provide TAs that are available during the projects and the actual written curriculum is broken down and constantly being improved. The TAs and curriculum writers are also relatively accessible and are able to clarify and assist. On top of that there is a mentor you meet with 4 of 5 weekdays to get more individualized assistance. 

Read if you have programming experience: While this is really awesome and allows for you to learn from the very beginning, the curriculum can feel pretty slow at times if you have experience. Because I came in with some programming experience, I felt like the material could move faster and found ourselves finishing early on many of the days. One thing I wish would have been improved is having supplemental material or "challenges" to challenge those who come in with a little experience. 

When it comes to the instructors, they're incredibly helpful and dedicated to our success. Not only do they help us with the material and concepts but they instill in us industry standard practices and try and stay on top of what the latest tech trends are. While many bootcamps were still teaching Angular 1.5 and etc. Thinkful saw the trend moving towards React and planned accordingly. The bootcamp has so many mentors from around the world that you can find a mentor for any language or framework you're working on. 

When it comes to job assistance, they provide you with a career mentor that helps you build a resume and figure out your job hunting plan. Throughout the bootcamp, they have you do mock technical interviews and help you build your portfolio. My experience with the career mentor was pretty good overall with a couple of hiccups in the beginning. Overall, they provided assistance in helping find a job but really, this portion is on you and your initiative. I was very heavy on networking and applying to just a couple jobs and was able to get two offers within two months of graduating. Thinkful provided mentors and extra coursework to learn different frameworks to prepare for the technical aspects of the interviews. 

Overall, I really enjoyed my experience with Thinkful and would recommend anyone to enroll and join the programming world!

Nervous and skeptical is how I felt as I approached my first Thinkful intro session.

Could I really learn coding? I didn't know the first thing about HTML or CSS... 

Would it be worth the money, time, and energy...?

Now that I've finished, it sort of makes me laugh at all the challenges that I feared would undermine my success. None of them actually happened.

Overall, Thinkful knocked it out of the park for me! Paid work started to become available even before I finished the course. 

The #1 reason for my accelerated learning was my 10/10 mentor, W.N. One of the many things he did so well was to figure out where the limites of my knoweldge were, and then he would help guide me to the next step... week after week... month after month. Patient and diligent, he helped accelerate. Honestly, he went way above and beyond the specific terms of the mentor/mentee contact and was clearly personally invested in my learning. 

Working together online from the same screen, going over the code, and having someone to guide me right there when I was stuck was invaluable. Mentor sessions were just a lot of fun too. We will be friends for life at this point.

My program manager was another all-star in my time with Thinkful. With every call he had awesome perspective from a few steps beyond that of pure development. He shared about the industry and helped motivate my entrepreneurial under pinnings to help really fan my fires to keep going. Big props to him D.F.

I came in as an online entrepreneur who had built a few wordpress websites for clients in the past. I just felt like there was so much I was missing. I knew nothing about coding, programming, what an API is or even the difference between back and front end development. 

After my experience with Thinkful, I feel like a better informed person in this age of the internet. And it's not just about the coding, It's about learning to work collaboratively online and using the tools of the web to build and work through the web. 

You can't learn everything from Thinkful, but that's not the point of web dev. It's more about devloping the tools to think about coding and web challenges. Once you have those skills, you can dive into documentation from different tools and technologies of all sorts and you will be better suited to pick up and use all sorts of skills that you had never needed until the next project moved you in that direction. 

If you have the ability to commit to a path of study week after week and month after month, your return on investment for your time and energy in Thinkful will be more than worth it. 

I did quite a bit of research before applying to a software developer school. I wanted to make sure that I would have time to work full-time while I attended school. With the flexible schedule I have through Thinkful, I am able to do just that! My mentor always provides me with multiple options for our pairing sessions and understands that my schedule varies week-to-week. Additionally, I wanted a program that was worth the cost. I have always enjoyed teaching myself and asking questions later rather than a classroom setting. With the one-on-one teaching style, I am able to efficiently work through my own problems and have support along the way.

Even though the course work can be difficult at times, my mentor and extended thinkful community have been very helpful with my questions. I can see how much the thinkful staff cares about their students and our future success. I am excited to move forward in the program and start looking into my career as a sofwatre developer. Keep up the good work, Thinkful!

While I would prefer to attend a physical class, I'm never in one place for long enough to get through a class. I was so glad I found the Thinkful data science bootcamp! I just completed the bootcamp prep course, and I've already learned so much.

I'm a self-taught programmer, but without any guidance, I was unable to focus on developing specific skills. That's exactly the piece that Thinkful has been able to provide. With one-on-one attention from my mentor and a well-structured course, I've already developed basic data analytics skills and I'm eagerly working towards becoming a full-fledged data scientist.

The prep course itself was an intense bootcamp experience. It introduced me to a lot of new topics and tools and asked me to use them in a capstone project at the end of just three weeks.

The Thinkful staff went above and beyond in making sure that my capstone project met their standard of quality before admitting me to the full course. I appreciate their effort to prepare me for the course - they would rather have me do a good job than take my money and admit me into the course unprepared. That means a lot to me.

I would recommend Thinkful to anybody who is unable to attend a physical bootcamp. This is the next best thing.
 

I have recently enrolled myself into Thinkful Flexible Full stack Web Development Bootcamp. Thinkful has a solid curriculum tailored for peaople with little to no coding experience. Each unit involves extensive material, exresices, drills and projects to make sure you learn how to code most effectively. Additionally, I have 3 times a week mentor sessions and endless access to Q&A sessions run by all Thinkful's amazing mentors. My Program Manager is always available for me to make sure I have everything I need to succeed. Fruthermore, I have to go through in total of 5 mock interviews to make sure I am prepared for the real world technical interviews. I have recently signed up for my first mock interview and very excited about it. So far, I am having an exceptional experiece learning how to code. Thinkful has created a wonderful curriculum and made all assistance available so I can be a successful Web Developer. Finally, job assistance option is just the cherry on top.