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Four Code Bootcamps Are Now Eligible For Government Financial Aid (hackeducation.com)
Long-time Slashdot reader theodp notes a pilot program for improving computer science education which includes financial aid for students at four code bootcamps:
In this week's Hack Education Weekly News, Audrey Watters writes, "The US Department of Education has selected eight higher ed institutions and eight 'non-traditional providers' that will work as partners to pilot the DoE's new EQUIP experiment, meaning that students will be able to receive federal financial aid for coding bootcamps, MOOCs, and the like...
"Good thing there haven't been any problems with for-profit higher ed and exploitation of financial aid, otherwise this would all seem like a terrible idea."
The original submission has more details on the participants (including the four code bootcamps). Ultimately the program involves pairing "non-traditional" providers with higher education institutions -- and then monitoring their results with a third-party "quality assurance entity" -- to improve the ways we measure a school's performance, but also testing new ways to fund training for computer careers. (I'm curious how Slashdot's readers feel about government loans for attendees at code bootcamps...)
"Good thing there haven't been any problems with for-profit higher ed and exploitation of financial aid, otherwise this would all seem like a terrible idea."
The original submission has more details on the participants (including the four code bootcamps). Ultimately the program involves pairing "non-traditional" providers with higher education institutions -- and then monitoring their results with a third-party "quality assurance entity" -- to improve the ways we measure a school's performance, but also testing new ways to fund training for computer careers. (I'm curious how Slashdot's readers feel about government loans for attendees at code bootcamps...)
I've got a computer engineering degree. While I do currently have a job, some of these bootcamps claim to offer just a handful of weeks of work then the connections to get you an interview. They claim they get jobs that pay 6 figures on average to nearly all their graduates.
When I was looking for a job, this seemed pretty tempting. It's also hugely more efficient if any of their claims are true. It makes more sense for people to finish high school/get a cheap associates degree and then use a bootcamp to get relevant, immediately useful skills. Out of all the courses I took for a degree, at least 80% of the knowledge I don't use on a daily basis.
On demand education makes a ton more sense. Train people intensively for the 20% they actually need. 10 years later, those 6 figure jobs doing full stack web dev will probably not be nearly as lucrative or in demand. So people would go to another bootcamp.
It's far cheaper and more efficient if it works. I can't say for sure if it does - as I mentioned, I only looked at advertising copy for these bootcamps - but the idea makes a lot of sense.
Source URL: http://www.ed.gov/news/press-releases/fact-sheet-ed-launches-initiative-low-income-students-access-new-generation-higher-education-providers
FACT SHEET: ED Launches Initiative for Low-Income Students to Access New Generation Of Higher Education Providers
AUGUST 16, 2016
Contact: Press Office, (202) 401-1576, press@ed.gov
More Resources
pdf icon Transcript of Press Call
Today, the U.S. Department of Education (ED) is inviting eight selected partnerships between institutions of higher education and non-traditional providers to participate in the EQUIP (Educational Quality through Innovation Partnerships) experiment.
These partnerships will allow students—particularly low-income students—to access federal student aid for the first time to enroll in programs offered by non-traditional training providers, in partnership with colleges and universities, including coding bootcamps, online courses, and employer organizations. The goals of the experiment are to: (1) test new ways of allowing Americans from all backgrounds to access innovative learning and training opportunities that lead to good jobs, but that fall outside the current financial aid system; and (2) strengthen approaches for outcomes-based quality assurance processes that focus on student learning and other outcomes. The experiment aims to promote and measure college access, affordability, and student outcomes.
EQUIP falls under the Experimental Sites Initiatives, which test the effectiveness of statutory and regulatory flexibility for post secondary institutions that disburse federal financial aid. Through the EQUIP program, the Department seeks to learn about these new models and their costs and educational and employment outcomes for students, as well as explore new methods to measure quality. Testing and learning from this program may help inform future policy reforms.
"I'm thrilled that students will soon have access to these innovative programs, developed in partnership with colleges and new providers, with the help of federal financial aid," said Under Secretary of Education Ted Mitchell. "As these innovative programs continue to develop, it will be increasingly important to understand what an outcomes-based quality assurance system looks like for such programs. I am encouraged to see that these colleges, providers, and quality assurance entities have stepped forward to provide models for doing so."
Why we are launching EQUIP
Over the next decade, the share of jobs requiring some level of higher education is expected to grow more rapidly than those that do not, with 11 of the 15 fastest-growing occupations requiring a postsecondary education. That is why the Obama Administration has worked to ensure that all students have access to a high-quality, affordable higher education. From the First in the World grants with which institutions of higher education designed and are testing innovative approaches to teaching and supporting students, to recent changes that will allow students to apply for federal aid earlier and more simply, the U.S. Department of Education has continuously worked to promote college access, affordability, and completion.
The expansion of higher education to more students means that students today are more likely to be older, living away from campus, and attending part-time while balancing work and school. To meet the needs of all students, our higher education system must continue to innovate and evolve.
There are many efforts across the higher education community to explore new ideas and affordable models for offering a quality education, such as short-term credential options, and online or blended skills training that is responsive to the need for accountable innovation. These programs can be accessible, affordable, and customized to the needs of a diverse student population.
For students seeking access to these new models of education, there are two key barriers to enrolling: lack of access to financial aid, and lack of information about
Source URL: http://www2.ed.gov/documents/press-releases/equip-partnership-press-call.pdf
Page 1
Educational Quality through Innovative Partnerships (EQUIP)
Experiment to Provide Low-Income Students with Access to New Models of Education and
Training
Press Call to Announce Selected Partnerships
Moderator: Kelly Leon
August 16, 2016
11:15 am CT
Coordinator: Welcome and thank you for standing by. At this time, all participants will be
on a listen-only mode. During the question-and-answer session, you may press
star followed by the number 1 on your phone if you would like to ask a
question.
Today’s conference is being recorded. If you have any objections, you may
disconnect at this time. Now I would like to turn the meeting over to your
host, Ms. Kelly Leon. You may now begin.
Kelly Leon: Good afternoon, everyone. Thanks for joining us today. My name is Kelly
Leon. I’m the Assistant Press Secretary with the Department of Education.
Today, the Department has invited eight partnerships between colleges and
non-traditional providers to participate in the EQUIP, or Educational Quality
through Innovative Partnerships experiment, under our Experimental Site
Initiative.
We thank all of you for your interest in today’s announcement and are happy
to discuss in greater detail then take a few questions.
Page 2
We are pleased to have, in addition to Under Secretary Mitchell, a few
representatives from partnerships with us today. For the conversation, we’ll
begin remarks from Under Secretary Mitchell, then turn it over to President
Joseph Aoun of Northeastern University, followed by Ms. Deb Adair, CEO of
Quality Matters.
The Department’s fact sheet was shared this morning and it’s posted on our
Web site under the Press Release section. If for some reason you did not
receive it, please e-mail press@ed.gov.
As a reminder, today’s call is on the record. Without further ado, let’s go
ahead and begin with Under Secretary Mitchell.
Ted Mitchell: Thanks, Kelly. And thanks, everyone, for joining us today. I really appreciate
it. We’re all very excited about the EQUIP program and glad to have Joseph
and Deb joining us to describe their work in the EQUIP program.
You know, what sets this off is that higher education has never mattered so
much to so many as a means of social mobility, as an engine of our economy,
and as a way for individuals to better themselves and move into the middle
class. Finally, I think it’s important to recognize, especially this season, that
higher education, education in general, are one of the bulwarks of a
functioning civil society and our diverse democracy.
The Obama Administration has made it a priority since day one to increase
postsecondary access and affordability to ensure that more people have the
opportunity to earn high-quality college degrees and credentials. And while
America has some of the best colleges and universities in the world, as a
system, we’re still catching up to the needs of today’s new normal college
student.
Page 3
Today’s average student is no longer the 18-year-old whose parents drive her
up to State U in a minivan stuffed with boxes. Instead, the new normal student
may be a 24-year-old returning veteran, a 36-year-old single mother, a parttime
student juggling work and college, or a first-generation college student.
The faces we picture as our college hopefuls can’t be limited by any factor,
including inflexible or unaffordable higher education options. Indeed, to
accommodate these students, we can’t continue to do more of the same. We
must innovate. And thankfully, we’re seeing a tremendous amount of
innovation in higher education. We believe that forward-thinking colleges and
universities and new providers of education can drive increases in
postsecondary access, quality, affordability and completion.
Source URL: https://www.federalregister.gov/articles/2015/10/15/2015-26239/notice-inviting-postsecondary-educational-institutions-to-participate-in-experiments-under-the
Notice Inviting Postsecondary Educational Institutions To Participate in Experiments Under the Experimental Sites Initiative; Federal Student Financial Assistance Programs Under Title IV of the Higher Education Act of 1965, as Amended
Summary:
The Secretary invites postsecondary educational institutions (institutions) that participate in the student financial assistance programs authorized under title IV of the Higher Education Act of 1965, as amended (HEA), to apply to participate in a new institutionally based experiment under the Experimental Sites Initiative (ESI). Under the ESI, the Secretary has authority to grant waivers from certain title IV, HEA statutory or regulatory requirements to allow a limited number of institutions to participate in experiments to test alternative methods for administering the title IV, HEA programs. The alternative methods of title IV, HEA program administration that the Secretary is permitting under the ESI are designed to facilitate efforts by institutions to test certain innovative practices aimed at improving student outcomes and the delivery of services.
The Educational Quality through Innovative Partnerships (EQUIP) experiment is intended to encourage increased innovation in higher education through partnerships between the participating institutions and non-traditional providers in order to learn whether those partnerships increase access to innovative and effective educational programs, particularly for students from low-income backgrounds; assess quality assurance processes appropriate for non-traditional providers and programs; and identify ways to protect students and taxpayers from risk in this emerging area of post-secondary education. Under this experiment, participating title IV-eligible postsecondary institutions will be provided a waiver to allow them to provide some types of Federal student aid under the title IV, HEA programs (title IV aid) to otherwise eligible students who are pursuing a program of study offered by the institution where 50 percent or more of the educational program is provided by one or more entities that are not traditionally eligible to participate in the title IV programs (non-traditional providers), through a contractual agreement with the participating institution. A requirement of these partnerships between the participating institution and the non-traditional provider is that the educational program must have been approved by a quality assurance entity (QAE), engaged by the institution, that has expertise and capacity as described in this notice.
So, at 31 expanding your skillset has no value?
What proportion of competent programmers are self-taught? I would expect the majority. On my degree, the only people who could program were the ones who had learned themselves, and the students who relied on the lectures knew practically nothing.
You can't just sit in a classroom and expect to be able to program at the end of the course. You only become a competent programmer by spending a lot of time working on real applications, which generally involves dedicating a lot of your free time.
If I were recruiting for a programming job I wouldn't even consider qualifications and wouldn't care whether the applicant had a degree or not. What I'd instead want to see is examples of the programs the applicant had produced. This would confirm that they could actually program (since many people with degrees can't) and that they have the enthusiasm and dedication to be good programmers. If all you have is a degree or some certificate from a bootcamp, and can't show any work that demonstrates your programming skills, then it's clear that you have no programming skills, nor do you have any interest in programming.
Now see, this attitude is precisely why we can't have nice things. Like girlfriends.
It's kind of like, on the eve of the car, the government sponsoring camps for learning how to use the buggy whip. Here's how you know for _sure_ that coding's days are numbered: government officials are saying that everyone should learn how to do it.
If this isn't an indicator of the top of the Second Dotcom Bubble, I don't know what is.
I'm old enough to remember the first one. Since I'm a systems guy and not a developer, my side of the house had "MCSE Bootcamps." I worked for a consulting company at the time, so I got sent to one. These were some really interesting operations; some people were clearly there to cram for the exams but had real world experience, and others were basically off the street with zero idea what was going on. The second batch had just heard there was a lot of money to be made in computers...lots of former truck drivers, plumbers, etc. Lots of these places had similar business models to ITT Tech, U of Phoenix, etc. in that they would take people's federal trade readjustment (re-training) benefits or veterans' education benefits and return a dubious education.
So, now that we have the cloud doing the infrastructure for most of these startups, the thing they need is a stream of cheap web framework monkeys. Coder bootcamp will certainly give them that...but they'll only be able to copy-paste stuff from one of the millions of JavaScript front-ends.
Me: You don't seem to like IT, but you are working in it. Why?
Him: The government told me that I could make a lot of money in IT.
Me: Are you happy in working in IT?
Him: No.
Tossing out code camp degrees massively to folks might seem to the government folks that they have increased the IT skill pool.
They are wrong.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
bad idea we don't need 4-6 years of school + boot camp just to have a chance at a job. Where you may be going up against an h1-b who does not have an 50-100K loan to pay off.
Or you do you want to be like med school where you starting working at your 30's with 250-500K in loans but the down site is no unions and you may just get layed off be for you can pay that loan off.
Free Money From the Government! Except for not the students, the money doesn't go to them, it does however go to the companies running these "bootcamps." What they don't tell you is that most of these companies are owned by a congressman's son in law.
Let me make clear, NOBODY will actually get a job from these programs. Not a single person.
Can you learn to speak a foreign language in the time frame these "bootcamps" claim to? No? Neither can a programming language.
To be honest government money would be far better spent just simply with make work programs, make people go build picnic benches or something like the Civilian Conservation Corps did in the 1930s. At least we'd have something to show for it.
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This Guy Learned 9 Programming Languages in 6 Weeks, You Won't Believe What Happ...SIGSEGV at 0x0
Eh, there's a MOOCher born every minute...
What percentage of your undergraduate education had nothing to do with comp sci?
If you were able to do only the comp sci parts of your undergraduate education, weekdays 9-5, how long would it have taken you to complete?
Sure. To you.
Who want a girlfriend that accuse everyone of misogyny or rape for disagreeing with. Men were promised strong and independent women, feminism brought them cunts with the mental development of a infant. #FeminismIsCancer
I haven't investigated code bootcamps to make a decision on their quality. But one thing is for sure - government pumping money into them is going to once again skyrocket the cost enormously. Just as it's done with education and multiple other sectors.
Why does this happen? When you have a rich uncle with very deep pockets paying for you, or guaranteeing your payment, businesses realize they can squeeze the uncle quite a bit and he won't complain, just pay. All the borrower/student has to worry about is meeting the monthly payment. for several years. Unfortunately, debt adds up.
These bootcamps are a great idea, let's create some new ones!
- Lawyer bootcamp - intensive 6-week program designed to teach high school graduates and undocumented workers the basics about local, state, federal and international law, civil and criminal law, torts, and trial law. After this preparation they are legally entitled to sit for the bar exam and cannot be denied licenses solely on the basis of their not having attended college and law school.
- Politician bootcamp - intensive 6-week program designed to teach high school graduates and undocumented workers the basics about local, state, and federal government and about world governments and politics. Successful graduates of the program will have their campaigns at the local, state and federal levels fully funded by a non-profit organization called "out with the old, in with the new".
- Banker bootcamp - intensive 6-week program designed to teach high school graduates and undocumented workers the basics about economics, finance and accounting. Successful graduates are eligible to sit for exams in finance, to become actuaries, etc. and cannot be denied licenses on the basis of their not having gone to college to obtain any particular credential.
- Doctor bootcamp - intensive 6-week program designed to teach high school graduates and undocumented workers the basics about biology, medicine and health. Successful graduates are eligible to begin interning at hospitals across the country and cannot be discriminated against in selection on the basis of their not having obtained any particular academic credential.
- Manager bootcamp - intensive 6-week program designed to teach high school graduates and undocumented workers the basis about business and finance.
All of these bootcamps shall ensure proficiency in the entire suite of Microsoft (C) (R) (TM) Office (C) (R) (TM) products such as Excel, Outlook, Word and Powerpoint. There shall be a "Project manager" minor which students in any bootcamp may obtain by spending 3 days learning about Microsoft (C) (R) (TM) Sharepoint (C) (R) (TM) and Microsoft (C) (R) (TM) Project (C) (R) (TM).
Holy god, see an MD for your spelling.
>> testing new ways to fund training for computer careers
Gravy train...enabled. Kickbacks...online.
Last time my old, gray-haired self was interested in switching jobs, companies were willing to pay 30% more than they had budgeted for the position in order to compete with my other offers.
If people don't want to hire you, the problem might not be your age.
I went back to community college on a post-9/11 $3,000 tax credit for job retraining to learn computer programming. Since I already had an A.A. degree, I only had to take the programming classes to get my A.S. degree. That took five years to complete. At the beginning I couldn't get some classes because there was too many students. Towards the end I couldn't get some classes because there weren't enough students, as healthcare became the new money major. After working six years a video game tester, I went into IT support. A decade later I'm working fewer hours per week (my employment contracts prohibit working OT), making more money and paying more in taxes.
I've been helping out a school near me that is in the process of replacing their IT guy. He built the school a web-based student information system on a cloud-hosted LAMP stack. The position requires maintaining that application, and doing all the infrastructure/desktop support.
Over the summer I re-engineered their entire network - new firewalls, switches, access points, VLANs, and a new IP phone system.
I met their new "highly qualified" IT director. She has a masters degree in computer science. We did a walkthrough of the new network design and all the new components. During the review of the firewall rules she asked me a doozy:
"What's TCP and UDP?"
How on earth does a Masters Degree holder in Comp Sci get those credentials without understanding basic internet protocols?
School work only gets you so far in this business.
Even India has code bootcamps. They're much cheaper than the US (COL differences), but they have their equivalent fees and structures. I saw them advertised all over the place in Bangalore.
If you were me, you'd be good lookin'. - six string samurai
See subject: It's a starting point (just as any degree is, fundamentals) but taking the case from my own life as a single example? We had 120 people in the CS major - only 10 of us were left @ the end. Only 2 of us got jobs off the bat (in the Fortune 500 no less) in myself + a Russian friend of mine (who already was a competent programmer merely getting 'the paper' to back it in the USA)... it's probably going to be the same result here I'd guess based on that - it's NOT for everyone... HOWEVER - I know the mind, just like the body, is "plastic" & CAN BE "RESHAPED" into doing anything you want it to.
* Some of those folks who were left from that 10 of us left @ the end of 120 did go on to become sysadmins/techs @ least though.
APK
P.S.=> How bad do you want/need it is really the question, isn't it guys? That also goes along w/ how much do you LIKE doing it (which means tons, perhaps more than anything really)... apk
You're no prize either, Bubba. Otherwise, you'd be attracting a better class of woman.
"Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
Drive a California freeway for a while and see what I mean.