Chegg Skills

I’ve always been interested in data science, but with little to no background in CS and already having been out of college and working for several years, I found it a bit daunting to consider making a career change, start a bootcamp and still continue working at the start time. While it certainly hasn’t been easy, the support Thinkful provided to me through my mentor, the community and the endless number of resources has been wonderful. It’s definitely a lot of work and time management is key to stay on track, but the flexibility of the program has allowed me to adjust my schedule to allow of everything else I have to do outside of the classwork. Meeting with my mentor twice a week helps keep me accountable, while the slack channels and Q&A/workshop sessions are incredible resources to tap into all throughout the week. This program is intense and definitely a big investment of your time and money, but so far for me I’m thrilled I decided to make the jump and am really looking forward to my development as a future data scientist as the program progresses. Would absolutely recommend!

I've got about a month left in my bootcamp and I gotta say I've probably learned more in these past few months than I could have alone. The curriculum is really streamlined to give you the most important details and best practices, that otherwise on my own I would have to spend a bunch of time researching what to actually learn, which is a huge time sink. Especially since I'm doing the part-time program, after working my full time job, I really only have 2-3 hours a day. So every minute is valuable. That being said, the curriculum can't possibly teach you everything, but it's a good starting point to let you branch off and help you know what you should be learning. If you are planning on attending a bootcamp, Thinkful's part time is great choice. But make no mistake, part time doesn't mean half the effort, if you want to do well in the bootcamp and as a web developer in the industry you gotta give 100%.

I am more than half way through the full stack flex bootcamp through Thinkful and it has been a great experience so far. The course has progressed through a lot of interesting and useful content in an intuitive way that makes it easier to learn and build on knowledge. I work full time as a product manager and everyday at work I am able to connect things I’ve learned in the bootcamp to development being done by the software engineers I work with every day. The two mentors I’ve had have been very engaged and always ready to answer questions and help me if I get stuck or just want to learn more. Besides always having a dedicated mentor to help with students through the content, every student also has a designated project manager who helps guide a student through anything administrative and is the go to person for any questions or advice about the course. Even though I’m not done with the course just yet, I have already learned so much and can build out my own full stack web apps now. Besides the basics, Thinkful teaches up and coming topics such as react and node so students are up to date with knowledge. The career management resources are also very helpful and connect work being done in the bootcamp to the overall goal of getting a job in software engineering. I have completed 3 of the mock interviews and with the combination of live coding challenges as well as classic interview behavioral questions they are a great way to practice interviewing as the bootcamp progresses. I have had a great experience so far and am looking forward to getting through the rest of the content and starting a career as a software engineer utilizing all the I have learned through Thinkful both technically and professionally. 

I'm about half-way through my Bootcamp experience as a Fullstack Flex student, and although it's been very challenging at times. I'm impressed with my skills now compared to a few months ago. I started out as a somewhat coding newbie and my mind has flexed muscle I didn't even know it could! I can't wait to finish up the course in 3 months and I'm beyond excited for where this journey will take me. The best advise I can give is, if you're on the fence about applying just go for. As long as you put in the time, work and effort, you will succeed. 

I enrolled at this place because of the personal mentoring. I read the negative reviews and knew going in that the mentor would make or break the experience. I decided to trust Thinkful, that even the worst mentors could not be that bad. I was wrong. Among the mentors I've had: one was completely useless - he would show up to our sessions like he was high. I would have to repeat myself several times before he attempted to answer my questions otherwise he was silent and staring at the screen for the next hour. He only got upset and started berating me when I tried to log off because he probably wouldn't get paid for the session. Another mentor I had kept bringing up my gender. How, as a woman, I need to have more confidence - every session I've had with this ahole started off with a lecture about how I have impostor syndrome when I just wanted someone to help me troubleshoot an error in my project. I tried to placate him and agree, but he would not move on until he finished his 15 minute speech. And yet another one would make passive-aggressive remarks about how women should be in the kitchen ha ha

I ended up on slack more often because my mentors would not respond to my emails and learned more from the grads online. I eventually confided in others that I did not feel comfortable because of my mentor and boy was I surprised when I found out that not only was this normal, but that no matter how many times students complained about the lack of professionalism and the lack of knowledge (there are mentors that don't know a single thing about js, despite it being the principal language for your projects), the offending employees could never be fired. One of the mentors was even caught giving wrong answers to his student several times so the student would have to spend extra weeks figuring out what happened, only for the mentor to insist there was a "misunderstanding" at the next session. That's an extra $35 per hour for the mentor and weeks lost to the student. Easy way for the student to fall behind and pay another $2000 to extend the program and mentor access - good for Thinkful and explains why this mentor hasn't been fired.

The curriculum itself is set up so that if you don't have some background in programming, you are going to fail to finish in 6 months. html and css are easy to bypass which is why they can afford to offer the trial period but once you get to js, you are rushed through everything with no foundation. The exercises are limited and the content becomes overly vague. Thinkful offers outside resources in the beginning, but stops around js and in turn, slack is always full of requests for outside material because nobody understands what's going on. You have no teachers if you do not get a good mentor. You are reading and doing everything by yourself. Every section has a button for reporting spelling errors and issues with set up or unclear instructions. You do not get alerted to content changes and even mentors on slack will be surprised at how something was deleted and not know when the content was changed.

Thinkful also offers office hours and workshops and if they aren't cancelled last minute with no explanation, you take a gamble and go to the session. The good tutors have a long line, the bad ones are practically empty because they never know how to answer questions.

The interviews after every section are a joke. The reading does not prepare you adequately and the interviews ask more in-depth questions that do not reflect the rigor in the curriculum. If you fail the same interview twice, they give you an exercise to do but I have seen several students post the question and get the answer on slack.

The only winners here are the company taking your money and the predatory mentors who take advantage of the students and Thinkful's perks.

Here are the problems with Thinkful:

For $1500 per month, you get to meet with an assigned mentor about 2-4 hours per week.  All other learning is done on your own.  My mentoer actually told me in the first week that I should add some other inexpensive courses from Other online sources to help guide me as well.  What??  Its like the teachers at your college telling you also to enroll in another college at the saem time because their time is limited to actually teach you. 

In addition to the 2-4 ohours per week with your mentor (again you are paying 1500 per month for this) You also get Access to randomly scheduled chat rooms to sit in line and hope you can get to a chat room mentor, so you can ask specific questions and SOMETIMES get helpful answrers, which you have to do in about 5-10 minutes because others are in line in the chat room breathing down your back. 

Ask UP FRONT EXACTLY WHO guides you in the employemnt search when you finish.  Then ask exactly HOW they guide you.  Fact is, 'guidance' from them means You pretty much do everything on your own, and someone just checks in to make sure you are meeting their emplyment search guidleines defined in the their 'money-back 6-month job placement gaurantee'.  If you miss a guideline or requirement one week, they are examplt from having to reund your money and honoring their gaurantee.  

The online instruction is all just reading material on a page and then triying to satisfy the project requirements, which get more complicated at the end.  Try to writ edown all your questions for when you meet your mentor 2-4 hours heach week. 

Your 'advisor' may contact you and tell you at the very start of the program that, even though the program is 6 months, you can always take 7, 8, or 9 months to really learn more deeply, because "Many of our students do that to really learn the subject matter.".  If you do this however, know that they don't not have to honor their job palcement gaurantee because they don't tell you this up front.    

Many of the mentors are from overseas which is no problem, but they are difficult to understand because of heavy accents.  And forget about THEM leading YOU in practicing, rather it is YOUR job to come up with questions to ask THEM.  Otherwise, they just sit back and let the clock tick as you struggle and pay month after month.

Honestly, I know a lot of reviews here are organized and strageized marketing reviews written by people connected to their own staff and comany.  But as a former student who found other ways to learn the material more scucessfully and become a developer, I would avoid Thinkful for now - until they make some major improvements.  --As of Septmeber 2018.  

I started this program with broken promises. Before enrolling the school GUARANTEED  A FULL TIME JOB  OR A FULL REFUND. None of it has happened. The first month was great the easy stuff. The months moving forward I was assigned about 7 different mentors. Reasons being they did not know javascript or they would direct me to google.  A lot of times the mentors would complain about the low rate of pay. The Q & A sessions offered are even worse, the mentors pick and choose who they want to work with. If they didn't like you or if you did not meet a certain requirement they would again point you to google or say they don't know the subject matter.  About 75 % of the Q & A's I registered for were cancelled, no reason was given.  The curriculum is dated and old it is a lot of reading and more reading. The mentors are not experienced at all. They just come to collect  a paycheck and update their skills on the expense of the students. The school does not monitor the mentor sessions or the Q & A sessions which are just a waste of time. The slack channel your questions will go unanswered or if they answer it they will shame you and point you to an article on how to ask questions. I was not a professional programmer I was a student looking to learn.   This program is not designed  for students to be successful. Not a single assignment was graded or was any feedback given. I was given a pacing guide on month 8 of the program. 
 The statics show a 98% success rate  which makes sense. If you go above the 6 months they will forcefully withdraw you to keep the data looking good. 
Save yourself the time and money go buy the same course on udemy for $10 bucks. Employers do not look at education they look what can you build. The stuff learned here I was not even able to get a UNPAID internship. 

I've just completed my first month in the Fullstack Flex program.  It's been a great experience and the amount of knowledge presented has exceeded my expectations.  Besides their own course materials, which is extensive, they provide additional resources throughout each unit.  Some of these resources have become my favorite websites to frequent.

Even though it's flexible and go your own pace, there is just enough structure to keep you focused, disciplined, and motivated.  I've tried some other tutorials and self study web programs, but the difference maker with Thinkful is the industry wide support staff.

The mentors I've been assigned are experienced and very motivated to help you succeed.  They provide a nice balance to the solo course work.   There are a variety of Q&A sessions available at nearly all hours of the day and a very active Slack channel which is to say you always have support from staff and students.

Overall, I have enjoyed Thinkful so far. I've been a student for a couple of months and have found the course material valuable. The curriculum is very heavy in reading so I think it's worth considering how you learn and whether or not that feels like the right style for you. With that said, it does provide a good outline of topics for you to go research on your own and then you can use the curriculum as supplemental.

The Q&A sessions, along with the Workshops, are very helpful. I think this is what sets Thinkful apart from just going off and learning on your own. It's game-changing to have a person you can ask questions to, and with Thinkful, you also get a one-on-one mentor. I had two mentors who didn't show when they said they would on a few occasions so it started out rough but Thinkful was accommodating and extended my graduation date due to the mentor absences. I'm now paired with a great mentor who has helped me a lot. 

I would recommend Thinkful to somebody considering it but would caution them to consider what learning style is best for them. I do think anybody could be successful with Thinkful, however; the human element really helps to get you through difficult learning curves. 

Justification to attend:
I had done a lot of googling before coming to Thinkful and I had found through various sites similar to this one that it had some of the best reviews.
I had been in the web development field (primarily backend) for more than 10 years. At the end of my most recent engagement prior to Thinkful I began dusting off the resume and realized
that most of the jobs at the places I wanted to work at required either full stack skills or strong frontend skills. Sure, I could have taught myself how to do all of this, and most often when I need a new skill in a pinch I read a book or two on the subject but often times when you need to learn something fast, it is difficult to know what to learn and how to learn it thanks to a large amount of content (both excellent and horrible) available for free online. 

What I needed were structure and resources that I could tap to ask questions when I got stuck or needed more clarification. This is really where Thinkful was a benefit.

The Course:
I took part in the engineering immersion program which was typically more than 12 hours a day (for 5 months) five days a week, and often times during the weekend we had some time of reading that we should do (sometimes optional).  If you are lucky, you do get a break week for a holiday (or two) but for the most part, you are hustling it up to get your skills up to date.

The typical day included workshops in the mornings and drills in the afternoons with your peers. This is very important as you get to see how other people think and approach problems (some great, some not so great) and it really helps you get familiar with working through issues and problems in a collaborative fashion.

Having been self-taught for the majority of my career - I lacked knowledge in one key area: Data Structures and Algorithms.  I knew the basic data structures and algorithms but having someone break it down so you fully understand it is really the main reason why I believe that Thinkful is worth it.

The Outcome:
As soon as I shared some of my portfolio projects on my LinkedIn the recruiters started flooding my inbox  This was nothing new as having been in the field for so long, recruiters would always  contact me - but with the new confidence that I had gained from what I had learned I was able to receive multiple offers and had the luxury to pick the job I wanted (as opposed to getting a job because you need it).

You see, aside from the impostor syndrome I suffered from - what got me 90% of the time was the whiteboard/coding challenges that I would receive from the interviewers. 
not being sure about which data structure to choose - or even how to explain your thought process clearly with the right terms (all of which Thinkful walks you through)  was what would often be the cause of the response "We decided to go with another candidate".

During the final interview for the company I ultimately ended up working for - I explained ES6, Core JavaScript and more advanced topics such as higher-order components, webpack , react and redux and I was even complimented by being told that "many of our senior devs aren't at your level" (extremely proud moment as all the terms and knowledge I shared at that interview was exactly what I had just learned at Thinkful).

What could be improved:
There isn't too much I'd change from Thinkful, though I must admit - now that I am no longer in the program that it is not without its faults.
Thinkful is full of awesome and amazing instructors - they are worth their weight in gold. The mentors are okay. Sometimes you get an amazing one, sometimes you get one that is more a friend and less a mentor.  I requested my mentor when I signed up and I received what I asked for (someone extremely strong   in the frontend side since this is where my biggest weakness was) except I feel most of the benefit of having a mentor came when we covered the frontend portion of the course - other than that (e.g. during data structures and algorithms) there wasn't much help but the instructor was always an email or screen sharing session away.  

Another area that could improve - as far as my experience goes - was the career services. Now I cannot speak to this too much because I found a job on my own prior to completing the program (a week or two early), but when I did reach out to career services I didn't get much response. I did send over my resume and received a cookie-cutter version of my own resume on their template and when I compared it to some of my peers they didn't change much, so I just ended up using my own resume.  Also, we were supposed to get a LinkedIn profile review but mine was never done.  We can use the excuse that since I was ahead of the class by a couple of weeks I didn't get the attention that I would have normally received (after all there are cohorts after cohorts all needing attention so I get it) but either way - we are not getting FREE career services, this is something we are ultimately paying for as well. SPEAK UP and GET YOUR MONEYS WORTH.

NOTE: This was my experience, however, Thinkful has a high job placement rate and if their career service folks are anything like their instructors I don't doubt I would have been taken care of eventually.

Really at Thinkful you are paying for a few things:

•   a 1 to 1 mentor (ask tons of questions!)
•   a structured course led by industry professionals with extensive knowledge
•  a community of developers of all  skill levels that you can tap into during and after completion of the program
•  a set of resources that help you get a job and coach you through interviews, resume writing and social profile presence

And as you may hear from someone eventually, be it someone at Thinkful or alumni, "You get out of it, what you put into it" 

If you do all your work, read all your assignments, complete them and do all you have to do, YOU WILL walk away with highly valued knowledge

If you attend a workshop and do your drills but skip the evening assignments or put things off... you will struggle, you may miss a few things, and you will effectively lose money as time IS money.

---
In the end, was it worth it to me? YES! I recommend it to all my friends and family interested in doing what I do.

Some tips if possible: 

Pay the tuition up front if you can afford it, even if you have to take out a loan at your bank or borrow from a family member - it will be way cheaper.

I did not pay the tuition up front - Don't worry though the tuition is the same, if not slightly less than the other bootcamps I looked at... (but financing it with Thinkful's vendor when I signed up doubled the cost of the program) That being said, if someone said: "Give me $30k and In 5 months you will earn $70/hr would you do it? HELL YES! I would do it again, and again, and again... (matter of fact I'm preparing to go back for the data science course -- except I'll pay it up front this time :D )

Are you still thinking about this? Do you really love solving puzzles and creating things? What are you waiting for! DO IT! 

Pros:
- Great curriculum that provides lots of challenges & drills
- Mock interviews test you throughout the program to make sure you are on track and understand concepts thoroughly
- 1-1 mentorship, meeting 2x a week and a great community to ask questions through

Cons:
- You can't replace a computer science degree 100% -- there is so much "miscellaneous" extra stuff that you won't learn from a 6 month bootcamp. Be realistic about expectations.

Overall:
The full stack flex program is great. The curriculum is thorough and mentors do the job of filling in real-world gaps in your knowledge. Just make sure you are realistic and understand that you will get out of it what you put in, and expect to put in a good number of hours! However, the mentors and your program manager do a great job of providing a graduation plan if you want, and supplying extra resources to give you the best experience possible. I'm so thankful that I finally took the dive into the software engineering world via Thinkful!

I joined this program because I really wanted to get started in Web Development (web dev), and since web dev is so involved and requires knowledge of multiple languages which each have their own numerous libraries, I had no idea where to begin or what to focus on. My overall thought on Thinkful is that it does a nice job of outlining the important technologies that is used in web dev, and the curriculum throughtfully walks you through scenarios where they would be relevant. 

I came from a programming background already, and the challenge of learning to code wasn't an issue for me, so I was pleasantly surprised when I still felt like I was being challenged by the curriculum. The capstone projects require thought, planning, and a 'software engineering mentality'. I believe the challenges of the big capstone projects combined with the detailed curriculum is what produces quality software developers if they get through all the material in the program. There is a lot of stuff covered in the program, you learn front-end basics like developing a dynamic website with JQuery, to API integration, server-side development with Node, DataBase stuff, React/Redux (my favorites) and data structures/algorithms. 

The curriculum aside, you get a fair amount of support from mentors if you need it which I think is important especially for design-concepts of your code when you first start. For example it is easy to google syntax, but not easy to google what sort of patterns to use in your code in order to optimize your app. You get assigned a personal mentor whom you meet with regularly, and there is also a good amount of community support.

I have to say that I am impressed by this program, mostly because I see that it is well-thought-out and the program seems to care about the quality of the education it provides and the quality of job candidates that it produces.  

I had a very bad experience with Thinkful. My mentor was really great though, as a person and as an amazing professional in his field, which is why I am giving him 5 stars. Actually, all mentors that crossed my path were really great.

I started the program in September 2017. In good faith, I paid up front the whole amount for the Web Development Flex program (bad idea, as it turned out). Everything was fine for five months, until I discovered that none of my two program managers (PM) were aware of my falling behind. So after five months, I finaly recieved my graduation trajectory, after asking for it for weeks. Well, it was there all along, it just wasn't shared with me. I was one month behind. There was no way that I would finish in time. My second PM told me that I would have to pay monthly until I finish the program, in addition to what I already paid. I was really upset about this. Few days later, they broke the contract and accused me of yelling and insulting the staff. Absolutely ridiculous. I am a firm person, I know what I want and I know what is fair and what is not. I don't have to be pleasant when I am presented with this mess. I invested $8000 in this and I wanted to get what was promised to me. But, this was one-way deal, it was their way or the highway, which is fine, but they also kept my money, which is not fine. 

Miss-worded policy 

During the one-week back and forth between me and my PMs that were not hepful at all, and if I didn't ask million of questions, while trying to learn and code (I basicaly did their job), I would not even know the protocol concerning the pause days. So I finally looked at their pause days policy and asked about that, and so my PM told me that the policy is miss-worded and I did not understand it correctly. 

Also, my PM said that she told me that I haven't been investing enough time in my projects during our meeting. That conersation never occured. I called her out on that and she appologized. I accepted the apology.

Attempt to resolve my problem,

There was one attempt during the video phonecall, where we came up with a plan and continued to work together. By the way, it is during this cideo phonecall that they said I yelled and insulted the staff. We continued to work normally after this, at no point did they say to me that I was yelling or insulting. I remember us smiling, discussing, also my husband was in the room, he tought it went well. Really strange, but also dishonest, in my opinion, to later deem this conversation to be disrespectful. I think that if somone was yelling and insulting me, I would ask them to stop right away, why go for 30 min with me yelling and insulting? That makes no sense.

Also during the same call we reached a plan, that they would change a day later without consulting me. Again very autocratic. They said that there were multiple attempts to solve my problem that they caused. but there was one and in the period of exactly two days, and that one went from bad to worse.

Dismissal letter

Few days after the video call, I recieved the letter, I wrote the letter of apoogy, because they, in my opinion, held my investment hostage, I felt emotionally draned after dealing with them. I really had nothing to apologize for, as I received no apologies from them for being in my predicament. As other things in my experience with Thinkful, my apology fell on deaf ears, but I had to accept their apologies for fabrications, "miss-worded" policies, resolution plans that they kept changing. Actually my graduation date changed twice. 

 In this whole process, I asked the student support manager to call me, he did not communicate with me at all. Just with his staff that was at fault. They did not want to hear from the student. 

The thing is I had a major red flag when I read their term of service and the learning contract, they are both extremely one-sided and autocratic. Where is the respect for my investment? Should I have just pay more, accept the solutions to my problem that were detremental to me? They said that their employees felt bullied by me, but they just went along with it and did not write a formal complaint, why didn't they? I feel bullied in that they dismissed me like I was their employee but kept my money. 

So, I ended up paying $5300 for the following:

-no job guarnantee, or a job or a chance to obtain a job with the their help. 

-no full stack knowledge, 

-I got nothing out of the course that I can monetize, because I am that absolute beginner that did really well, but that was of no concern to the support manager. I needed job assistance, help with portfolio.

- mentorship, that I didn't purchase, or consented to purchase. I purchased the whole program.

-forceful withdrawal, because they were sick of my questions and requests as a paying customer. 

The only reason why I decided to go with Thinkful is because of the job guarantee and because of all these great coursereport data. 

My problem lies only with the administrative part of Thnkful, this was just not a good fit, I don't like relaxed policies or the idea that somone has an autcratic control over my investment of thousands of dollars. I deeply regret ever investing in my education through Thinkful. 

I enrolled in the full stack flex, signed up in May 2016 and finished my course in Nov 2016. My instructor is nice but sometimes missed details. The curriculum did give you some junior developer experience but which is not enough for the tech interview. 

The job assistance is frustrating. Because I graduated in Nov, the transfers from graduate to job assistance wasted two weeks because of the holiday. The coach in my program only has HR experience, not the SDE. She just did some changes on my resume and only provided me some slides like conversation guide or Amazon interview guide which was got from another student. In her mind, the most efficient way is to attend meetups in my area. However, after I attend three times, I found the meetups can't do any help for my job seeking because of my cultural background. I talked to her about my experience in my weekly session. She insisted on the same way. When I stopped corporation with Thinkful in this May, I only got one tech interview from my online application and all interviews introduced by Thinkful is stopped after HR call. 

The most frustrating thing is they blame all on me when I asked Thinkful return my money back. The reasons they use are weak, pale and unreasonable. They said I didn't attend enough meetups to satisfy their requirements for at least two a month, while I didn't find the requirements when I enrolled in the program. I also told my coach I can't attend meetups at the beginning of the job assistance and she didn't mention the requirements. They also blamed me for not pursuing my job search to the best of my ability because one mentor helped me about the code challenge who totally gave me wrong suggestions. And finally, they just say "we would be happy to support your continued job search in any way possible" and refused to refund.

After five months I graduate from Thinkful, I update my resume and just apply online with no meetups. I find my new job in a worldwide company as an SDE. It proves the strategy which Thinkful uses is totally wrong.

If I could get another chance, I wouldn't enroll in the boot camp.

If you are looking for learning programming, this is a great place to go. If you are looking for a developer job, this might not be your choice. 

Pros:

The mentor session is great. This is the time you learn the most of the things. You will build a strong fundamental concept of web development. The curriculum is great and it is fully structured. However, the curriculum is not enough for handling a technical interview. You need to use other resources to build your JavaScript knowledge.

Cons:

As I mentioned, this is not a place to help you find a coding job. There is no job assistance although they market for that.

Overall, the learning experience is great. The people and community are also good.