Ironhack

It was a very pleasant experience. It fulfilled all my expectations and I am very happy with the decision I took three months ago. It sure is intense, but if you work every day you can do it!

Is nice to share the experience with the other students, staff, TA's and teacher. You'll end with a bunch of new friends!

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"Si tens fred al peu, tens fred a tot arreu" - ???

Discover who said that at the BootCamp!!

I came to Ironhack with very, very little knowledge of anything to do with web development. In 9 weeks (that FLEW by), I learned more than I ever could have imagined. The staff are all so friendly and knowledable. The social aspects of the school are also amazing - beers every Friday and multiple events and speakers each week.

I was initially worried about the career support (as I am from Canada and have no EU/Schengen citizenship), but the hiring week was a fantastic experience, with several large, international companies with potential for visa help.

The Ironhack web development bootcamp has taught me so much and given me the tools to continue learning and growing my skillset. I am very proud of the projects I completed over the course of 9 weeks, and look forward to showing them at more job interviews. I wish I had done Ironhack sooner!

Dear future or current developers,

I would like to write a review with a double intention:

· Help you orientate if you are wishing to do a developer bootcamp

· Thank Ironhack team for they unconditional support

   1. Learn latest technologies

   The school is aware of how the market evolves. That’s why in previous editions they’ve teach Ruby on Rails or React. Don’t worry on the technology, just trust them, companies are always interested for the latest techs as they are trying to get updated.

   I was surprised to see that even programmers with 10 years experience were joining the bootcamp to get updated on technologies. Companies will value those learning’s, don’t worry.

   2. A dedicated team that encourages learning

   At Ironhack I’ve coded next to smart and passionate teachers. I was surprised by 6:30pm after 9 hours coding they were there teaching me last details of the lesson I hadn’t understood or even helping me improve my projects. One teacher and three assistants on the full-time bootcamp, where else are you gonna find that much support?!

   Moreover, the rest of the staff is unbelievably friendly and supportive. They will weekly ask you for feedback and make that you feel like at home (that’s for example how we got our BBQ at the rooftop and a Ping-Pong table) :D. Believe me you’re gonna get surrounded by an awesome atmosphere. Staff takes very seriously on QUALITY, proved through the learning units, IT events, job placement, fully equipped kitchen and much more. 

   3. Hiring week

   Compared to other bootcamps or online courses, Ironhack were the only ones offering some kind of direct shortcut for placement. Last week you have the opportunity to get interviewed by 20-30 companies. They do not assure you to get a job, but definitely you’ll have an experience on how to deal and prepare for technical interview. You won’t lack of a job on IT field if you work on your skills.

   4. Awesome classmates

   This will depend on every cohort. Usually Barcelona attracts people from all around the world (in my cohort: Canadians, Italians, Germans, Austrians, Caribbean, Portuguese and of course Spaniards). Sincerely, I am gonna miss my mates a lot. They were the reason and the necessary support to keep coding by 8:00pm, when all what your head whisper to you is: “Go home!” We’ve spend great time together having Ironbeers, roomscape, music festivals, lunch at the restaurant (of course, most of it on weekends, week if for coding haha).

   I also want to thank the UI/UX students. We’ve had the opportunity to collaborate at some point and also see their projects as they have seen and advice on ours. We’ve also had true programmers coming from different industries to evaluate our projects in order to decide for the three contestants that deserve to present in the Hackshow. All this makes the experience much more complete and close to the real working world.

   5. Coding bootcamp, online courses or autonomous learning at home?

   I speak from personal experience: I’ve tried learning from home, but then if you get blocked maybe you can spend 4 hours with no clues. That gets soon very frustrating and increases the chance you give up with code. That’s not how it is supposed to be in the working environment.

   You’ll probably get great contents with other online courses, but as soon as you want to go further you may face technical problems. At Ironhack, teachers give you the right support to be little bit creative at the same time they train you with all the basics to be able to continue your own-training after the bootcamp.

   6. Full-time or Part-time

   Both are great! Part-time will require you the endurance to go coding after your other regular timetable that you follow, but also full time will challenge you 9:00 to 21:00 for 9 intensive weeks… be ready to abandon all other social compromises that are not having beers with your Ironmates!

   Part-time also allows you to develop your projects more calmly (as you have almost one month to deliver each one of the final projects), but then it will depend on your discipline to commit to work even at home.

Thanks you all readers & Ironhackers!!  <3

Learning

The teacher and TAs have a very deep understanding of the programming languages being taught in the program, and years of real industry experience. In our cohort it was clear that the teachers were a gold mine of information for those who had practiced coding for some months beforehand. On the other hand it was very easy to get lost in the depth of the conversations for those of us less experienced - so I highly recommend doing lots of prep to get the most out of their expertise. 

Job prospects

As an applicant I had some concerns about how employers would recognize a less traditional form of education such as a coding bootcamp, but I'm happy to say they have been put to rest. Senior staff from very well respected multinational companies have attended Ironhack to give presentations, give us students feedback on our projects, and discuss job opportunities with their companies. 

It’s day one. You ring the bell and enter a strange land which will be forever your home. You sit next to an unknown person that you will never forget. And so it starts. You finish day one: you think you might not make it. Day two: the faces start to be familiar but you’re struggling with the names. Another bunch of concepts on top of the ones you learned the day before and that you still don’t remember. You know you won’t make it. It’s the end of the first week, you have laughed, you have been frustrated twice (per day) and you have shared lots of memories with 21 new family members. What you are able to do by now was unbelievable five days ago. You know for certain that this is the change you were looking for. And there are still 8 weeks to go.

The whole Ironhack experience is one the best decisions you will ever make. Never a journey has been so long and short at the same time. The amount of things you will learn and will do almost feel impossible to accomplish in just two months. And when you look back you will wish to keep struggling with the everyday organized chaos your life just became over the last few weeks. Those days will be some of the best you ever have.

If you are reading this review it's probably because you're in the same position I was 5 months ago. You've probably stumbled upon the Ironhack website and you're contemplating, "Is this the right decision for me?". When I decided to join Ironhack I didn't realize it would be one of the best decisions I would make. For most of my adolescence I didn't have many challenges in university, but Ironhack tested my personality, my passion, and my knowledge. The friendships I've created will be everlasting as well as the memories that came along with it. It is in an intense program and most of the times you might feel frustrated, tired, and even cranky, however, the satisfaction and sense of accomplishment that comes along with these feelings are the best residual effects you can experience. It eclipses frustration, fatigue, and mood with ease. I would recommend this bootcamp to everyone everytime without hesitation whatsoever. So do it, make an impulsive but imformative decision to join Ironhack and become an Ironhacker, you won't regret it.

Ironhack is a tremendously fun and intense experience that is rewarding once you finish. From my point of view, anyone who comes from another sector and has not been able to write a line of code before starting is a true act of faith. Thanks to the need of the sector and the teaching method that I do not finish to understand by the rapidity in which the content is taught, Ironhack manages to turn around your professional career and / or prepare you to take on any professional challenge within the front area.

In short, it is a quick way to acquire the knowledge necessary to practice as a programmer in a fast and forceful way, to live a beautiful experience with all kinds of feelings and a challenge with which to overcome oneself

Looking for a change in my career I went to Ironhack. I came from a secondhand store, a sector, totally different and even though it cost me a lot in the end, you get it out. You have to be constant since the rhythm of learning is marked by yourself, the classes do not stop!!

If you are looking for a new experience and a fast and complete learning this is your site, professionals willing to help, well-maintained facilities, talks for students and especially people who want to help.

At least I can't do it, but I don't want to deceive you, you must be ready for hight levels of demand, especially if you don't have programming experience. 
If you want to change your profile without losing time and especially if you like programming, this is the place. 
It hasn't trick, the syllabus is very extensive, if you are a novice prepare yourself to the maximum, your Preework surpassed with solvency, tae online courses is a good idea, you will need to be familiar with the syntax and the lexicon of the code, you will have to ask and be understood. 
You'll learn the most demanded technologies. The team is excellent, they will take care about your career and help you to find a new job.

It's never too late to follow your dreams. That's what I was thinking 9 weeks ago when I started the Ironhack web bootcamp along with other 25 people that soon would become like my family. We were told that it was going to be hard, and it was. But also we were told that we will improve like crazy!.. and we will, everyday... pushing our limits and doing what we couldn't and more. It was a unique experience, intense, very intense, and full of proudness for me and my colleges and what we acommplished along the way. Now, I am proud to say that I am a programmer, yes! My dream came true! :-)

Ironhack was undoubtedly one of the best decisions I’ve made not only for my career, but for my personal growth and self esteem.

From the initial interview to the my very last day, the team and instructors made me completely at ease in my lack of understanding and were intentional in checkups and encouraging me and my classmates to push ourselves.

I had zero experience in coding when I first entered the course and was incredibly intimidated. On my first day, I felt pretty anxious and out of my league, but the instructors, TA’s, and Ironhack staff make you feel at ease even when you feel out of place. They are patient and are genuinely interested in your growth. Nizar was our instructor for our bootcamp who is hands down one of the most talented instructors I’ve met. He is able to meet you where you are and is accommodating to your needs in the classroom. It’s easy to feel incompetent in such a large subject that is completely new, but Nizar and his team do a great job of making you feel comfortable in a challenging space. He also has a gift for teaching students with all backgrounds and will meet you where you are in your understanding.

The bootcamp is intense, but it’s well worth the time spent there. I came out with confidence in my new skills even though I knew I had a lot more to learn. The bootcamp provides you a great foundation along with a large network of talented individuals who are more than willing to help you navigate through the tech realm as many are completely new to this space.

There are a lot of valuable resources as well. They keep you well informed on all things tech happening in the community and Daniel Brito, the Placements Manager, prepares your for your interviews leading up to the end of the bootcamp.

Daniel Brito is invested in your time at the bootcamp and your time afterwards. I still go to him for questions and advice in regards to job hunting or interviews. I gained an internship as a Jr. Web Developer within 1 month of the program because of the confidence and tips I received from Daniel Brito and the team.

Overall, I think that if you are looking for a quality bootcamp then I highly recommend Ironhack. I loved the community I built and the challenges that were presented to me. If you want to take your career to new heights or just challenge yourself in a safe space - this is it. 

If you're on the fence just do your research, commit, and go for it! 

You can read more about my experience on my blog here.

(If the link doesn’t work: http://www.rootandravish.co/lifestyle/coding-bootcamp-what-the-heck-is-that)

Oh boy. I haven’t written anything besides code in the past three months, and the longest piece of text I’ve typed recently was a string for a database. So how do I begin with this one…

As a foreword of sorts, I didn’t know a thing about coding before I decided to apply for Ironhack’s Web Development Bootcamp. I had seen pieces of code before, and I could understand them just as well as ancient Egyptian. Until then, I had worked in the fields of journalism and communications, but if you have paid any attention to the world and its changes, you won’t need me to tell you about how hard it has become to make a career- and a living- in that sector nowadays.

What I’m trying to convey is that, at first, coding was my Plan B, a way to escape unemployment and get back on track- but I had no idea if I could handle it, or if I was going to enjoy it at all. And (to my own surprise), not only did I make it, it also seems that I enjoy coding- although it still gives me the occasional headache.

It might feel like I’m rambling, and I apologize- but there is a point in all of this. Like myself, many consider going into coding, but they wonder if it’ll be the right thing for them, if they will struggle trying to understand how code works. And I’ve come to find that you don’t require an intensive technical background to become a web developer or programmer. True, you need to tackle problems with a very different mentality compared to other trades, often needing to examine the task from every angle and understanding exactly what you will require, and what items will be involved, before you write the very first line of code. But once you adopt that mindset, code becomes less of a threat and more of a puzzle that challenges you and ignites your curiosity.

Getting used to this new strategic, however, is just the first milestone that you will have to conquer. Our worst enemy during the bootcamp wasn’t Javascript, Angular or any other framework- it was frustration. The pace of the lessons rarely gave us time to catch our breath, and the daily exercises (both individual, and in pairs) would often test our limits. On a couple of evenings, I found myself with my head buried between my hands in a moment of panic, telling myself “I can’t do this, I wasn’t ready for something like this”, and I wasn’t the only one.

If I’m painting a bleak picture so far, don’t worry- I’ve resorted to the “bad news, good news” mechanic to save the best for later. Although intensive, the bootcamp (divided in three ‘modules’ of three weeks each, with a final project at the end of each one) helped me understand the basics of code in a very comprehensive way, starting with basic exercises and steadily increasing the number of iterations or the challenge they offered. The bootcamp covers many areas that are key for a developer including Javascript basics and advanced features, layouts and design, database management and package management to expand the possibilities of our frameworks- and yes, all of that sounds like a lot at first glance, but again, even a complete newbie like me managed to successfully complete the bootcamp.

Now, my classmates and I are getting ready for the hiring week. For some of them, this will be a ‘level up’ in their career; for others, this is the start of a new one, and although I still have much to learn, I feel prepared to walk into web development with my head up high. And in addition to this, my final project -a website for musicians to find one another and start new bands and projects- became more than just a task to deliver at the end, and I have decided to continue working on it. Who knows, I might be releasing my very own website, made on my own and from scratch, in not too long!

Because of work, I had to enroll in the part-time UX/UI Design program at Ironhack and I am so happy I did regardless of the late nights and crammed weekends. Entering this program not only has it provided me with the amazing toolset I need in the UX/UI world, but it also has given me a new network and amazing support system. I'm extremely thankful for my professors for taking the time to coach me and as well as Brito for being so diligent with me in finding the next step for me post-Ironhack. Thanks guys!

I'm 40 years old, I travelled the world and lived very intensely. Trust me if I say that the whole Ironhack bootcamp has been one the highest ranking experiences of my life. Let me explain you why.

Coding is hard. Learning to code in 2 months is very demanding and does seem totally impossible. Believe it or not, the Ironhack campus in BCN is designed at every level (from the location, the building itself, the staff, the teachers, the syllabus, the events and the job opportunities) just to make that happen. It doesn't get more ideal than that. Let's address these points one by one.

Location: Barcelona is one of the most international cities in Europe. You do breath modernity and opportunity here, especially in the Poplenou neighboroud where the campus is located. It has become a kind of tech district, so on the way to class you pass by real tech companies and it gives you a feel of where you might end up working. Feels like you're there already.

The campus: Fantastic open space with glass walls (Kanban boards drawn on them), plants hanging from the ceiling, kitchen, showers, desks, standing desks and tons of architectonic eye candies. It's like your mind expands in there, and you're hooked. You don't want to leave. In fact you don't. You're given the keys and take advantage of the 24/7 access policy. You'll need it on project weeks!!

The staff: They're doing a fantastic job at keeping the place so well organized YET very informal, frienly and welcoming. I felt like I could express myself without having to fit in to any particular mould, and that was very valuable to me, because during the bootcamp you are reinventing yourself and pushing your brain hard on coursework in order to do that. So nobody will judge you if you spend hours by a standing desk coding and dancing looking more like a dj (or a crazy person) than a developer. You're tired? You can take a nap in plain sight. Wanna play? Let's skate or play football, inside of course. Nobody will ask you to stop. The staff is committed in having you become a web developer. They know kicking a ball will help your unconcious brain solve the kata.

The teachers: Andre has been one of the most inspiring and influential professional I ever met. The guy has more than 20 years of experience, and he knows how to deliver it to you. His technical knowledge is so intimate that I'm sure he natively thinks in Javascript then compiles in English for the rest of us. But it's not just that he tought us a programming language (and to love it), he focused a lot on best practices and the workflow and mindset you have to adopt in order to transform your ideas in to products through coding, and having fun in the process.  Then, he passed on us so many insights drawing form his own experience, filtering out for us the most valuable. Maybe not obvious at first, but Andre insights sit on the brain and release value as time passes by. And also, it must be said: he let us appreciate how cool a fully fledged web dev can be. 

The teaching assistants: Ironhack employs the most suited students as teaching assistants for next cohorts. They're three, with different levels of experience depending on how many cohorts they survived. Yes, because it's not easy to stay patient having to debug horrible code by current students still not having a clue!! What you get from them is the closeness of relating with somebody who just finished the bootcamp, as well as accurate code revisions and debugging, directly from somebody who still remembers on what silly thing you're more likely to get stuck on. They were stuck there too just a couple of months before, they know how and where to help.

The sillabus: Javascript is on fire nowadays and Ironhack is one of the few bootcamps to base its entire curriculum on it. Backend, frontend, all JS, because this is the present and the foreseable future of web dev. In fact, anything different would have felt like time wasting. The course is divided in three modules, each module giving you the teaching first and then challenging you on a project. The course material is constantly updated, you get exercises on a git repo to work on all night if you want. You'll get a detailed revision of your code in the morning. In the first module you learn the basics, HTML, CSS and JS, and make a late 90s style JQuerish app with it. Addictive brain gymnastics. Then you're introduced to Node.js in the second module, but server side. Mongo DB, Mongoose, Express. And you make a '00 style server rendered MVC app, which almost feels like a real thing. In the third module you're thought a Javascript framework (this time it was Angular 5), and are given two weeks to complete your own full stack project. At some point while doing it, which happens at different stages for different people, it's guaranteed that you will see the light. Like in the Karate Kid movie you'll see how all they made you do click together. Your fingers begin flying on the keyboard, translating your thoughts in to code as if it was the most natural thing in the world, while you wonder what the hell is happening. That's when a web dev has finally emerged from within you.   

Events and job opportunities: Each week we had at least a couple of talks by external speakers, giving us insights from within the industry. That has been very valuable, the best one was somebody explaining us how to make a bot using Dialogflow, with git repo and all. Fantastic. Unfortunately, you are likely to be very fatigued by all the mental work you're doing in the bootcamp to fully engage in the talks. But it is all meterial you can go back at a later stage, having had direct exposure to it, and maybe even networked with a real tech-industry specimen. And we came to job opportunities. I yet have to attend the hiring week which is organized at the end of the bootcamp and it's supposed to be a kind of speed dating between us graduate and tech companies. BUT, during the last event one of the speakers gained an interest in my final project and we're now exploring the prospect of remote work for his creative, amazing and well established start-up. So yes, nothing concrete yet but I can't beleive the fact I'm actively asked for interviews even BEFORE I start searching for a job. Amazing.

Last point to address is the people. I barely been alone during these two months, the group spirit has been fantastic. From spending the night all together coding, to partying at campus on the weekends, I felt so fortunate to get to meet so many great people. On a personal note, that was even more important given the fact that I lost my father while I was attending the bootcamp. It wasn't an easy decision to stay and learn coding, but it was the right choice. The understanding and support I received from the staff and the other students has been invaluable, don't know what kind of place I would have been without it. 

I do reccomend the course, it delivers on expectations, but be ready to push yourself as hard as you can in the learning process. There's no magic, it all comes through hard work. Ironhack will provide you with the best environment, tools, knowledge, people, it's like a state of the art gym: the sweat is still all yours. As for me, I might take the UX/UI bootcamp, Ironhack is kind of addictive.