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Coding Bootcamps Already 1/8th the Size of CS Undergraduates
First time accepted submitter Valejo (689967) writes "According to a study released today by Course Report, programming bootcamps are expected to grow by 2.8x in 2014, meaning that bootcamps will graduate a student for every 8 CS undergraduates. The survey (PDF) also found that 57% of the schools teach in Ruby and that the average tuition is $9,900. The authors collected responses from 95% of US schools, including General Assembly, Dev Bootcamp, and Flatiron School."
1. Programming can't be learned in a few weeks. You need the freedom to play with it. To experiment. Boot Camp doesn't exactly inspire that.
I do believe you can be marketable within a year though.
2. This is about selling papers, certs. Just like colleges are most just about selling diplomas now.
3. What you learn there, you can learn online, for free.
Of course, you won't learn collaboration and all that (except on soureforge or someplace) but not really at a bootcamp either. That's what a job is for.
4. Pumping these students out suggests there will be soon a glut in the market. There is only so much software needed in the world. Other than games, there isn't the same demand for big, constant changes (maintenance and adhering to law changes notwithstanding) in all markets. Not that a bootcamp gives one the experience to touch old/big/production systems anyway.
5. This will end badly.
There is the ability to write scripts. And there is understanding of the field of computer science. The first is a miniscule subset of the second.
There are jobs where people only need the subset of skills needed to write scripts. There are jobs where scripting is the main task but a knowledge of theory is useful. And there are jobs where the 'science' aspect of computer science is critical.
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All of what you call "fluff and filler" is what makes someone well-rounded and more than just a clueless brogrammer. We need more people writing software that actually have a good grasp of algorithms, data structures, etc. Not just more clueless fuckwit scripters.
The last contract I had I walked into the "star" programmer using hidden text files to store data on client machines.
It took over two weeks to prove to him that SQL could store the data without errors.
People who are tossed into a learning environment for a month or two can't program their way out of a wet paper sack, let alone analyze and create tested solutions for a business.
But businesses will get what they pay for. If they want someone who can do a web page without a real back end (that's secure and actually usable) will end up paying the price.
It's good business for me. I can charge 4 years salary (of the bootcamp idiot) for six months worth of work to fix boot camp idiots work.
_ _ _ Go for the eyes Boo! GO FOR THE EYES!
Why are there no civil engineering boot camps? I'm looking forward to driving over a bridge designed by someone who learned engineering on a boot camp. How could that possibly go wrong?
"XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve your problem, use more." - Anonymous Coward
What is this? A bootcamp for ants? How can we be expected to teach children to learn how to code if they can't even fit inside the bootcamp? I don't wanna hear your excuses! The bootcamp has to be at least... eight times bigger than this!
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kids who don't understand pointers
There are two things that this can mean: Do they understand the concepts of indirection and aliasing, or do they understand the concept that memory is addressed by numbers? The former is important to pretty much any programming problem, but can be taught in any language that has references (including Ruby, Java, and so on). The latter is only really important to people doing kernel or embedded programming.
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"Second: they teach Ruby because that's what's in demand today."
In demand by whom and where?
I don't understand pointers. I mean, I read about them about 15 years ago when I was playing with C and C++ For Dummies but I don't feel like I understand them enough. I also pretty much deal with Javascript when I code and I use JQuery instead of vanilla javascript as well. Does that mean I'm just a shitty scripter?
I mean, I never even went to a bootcamp so I probably know less about scripting than the graduates of said camps even though I've been doing web shit for a few years now. Am I worthless? What if I told you I troubleshoot other people's code and optimize it for them? What if I said I can get shit to work in Internet Explorer when other people can't? Or that I'm building a shopping website now for a decently large company and that I'm stuck using SharePoint 2013 to do it due to management's decisions? Am I still shitty?
Maybe people in bootcamps aren't all Ruby bros. I have a self-development goal that I have to meet and I might consider some BS like a bootcamp if I can't just claim all the on the job learning I do. Maybe people who know something about the web or coding take these bootcamps because they want to learn the language better. It seems elitist to call anybody who takes those classes a shitty scripter or a dumbass kid. I'm definitely not a kid and I don't think I'm terribly shitty. I think I come up with novel solutions that work.