Overwhelming response was gotten from my business's offer to onboard developers, we had an average of over 50 emails an hour coming in applying, and we're intending on slowly accepting them all. Our little team of 5 just became a team of almost 40 overnight, an incredible growth, and all with the intention to strictly publish open source software under MIT license.
One thing that has struck me with all applications, I'll paraphrase what an overwhelming 71% of applications said, quote: "I attended name development bootcamp 3 months ago and have not gotten a job" - for many, it's a shot in the face - you work hard and pay lots of money for bootcamps, and come out empty handed for months. A problem that bugs me for new developers who deserve the opportunity and want to jump right in the workforce.
After careful discussion this early morning with my team, we're prepared to change that. (A bit about us: we're a product company who delivers SaaS products to private customers under NDA)
Here's what our thoughts are - there needs to be a better way for bootcampers to achieve careers quickly, and gain valuable experience right after completing a bootcamp; so here's what we're going to do (an outlined, public roadmap):
Our Roadmap
We're going to begin offering development bootcamps that will teach you full stack, this four week program will be available either in mornings, afternoons, or evenings - whichever time is preferable to you, and is fully remote; the cost is to be determined (we'd like to just break even, frankly) - after the bootcamp is completed, you will be offered a contract working with our company full time (this will be a paid position, length to be determined based on availability, however everyone is guaranteed a position) to get you off your feet, preparing you for your next employment - and we'll all give you a solid reference.
Now, let's talk timing:
By July 1st, we'd like to run our first four week full-time bootcamp, it'll be an evening bootcamp in EST, unlike other traditional bootcamps, we ask for payment after the bootcamp has been completed.
You can expect to learn
A variety of subjects, from a beginner to intermediate level, in no specific order:
- HTML/CSS (and tools therein related like SCSS, LESS, etc)
- Javascript (ES6+), Node (and sub-topics like async/await, promises, symbols, etc)
- PHP (tons of websites rely on PHP, so we'll give you an edge here!)
- Go (let's build a backend in Go!)
Does this sound like you'd be interested?
If it does, please give me a shout (michael@invocie.com), and we'll put you on the list to join; in order to give devs a good oversight, everything we do will be transparent and posted on dev.to along with a dedicated website for the bootcamp (and subsequent employment).
Now, we've got a question!
How much would you pay? Here's what we're thinking in terms of fees:
$200 CDN per person if the class contains 31 or more individuals.
$300 CDN per person if the class contains 30 or less individuals.
$400 CDN per person if the class contains 29 or less individuals.
$500 CDN per person if the class contains 10 or less individuals.
Can't afford it?
We're flexible, we believe everyone deserves the opportunity, we can discuss discounts for those unable to afford the bootcamp.
Wait, there's more!
I've always wanted to say that; aside that, after the employment and bootcamp completes, we'd like to retain you on as a bootcamp assistant, teaching future developers what you've learnt (oh, and we'll still pay you for your time)
Top comments (9)
Hey Michael, this is all really cool.
For context, this related to this post:
looking for workplace experience? we’re looking for developers
Michael
So just to clarify, you're planning to hire 10-15 people (or more at this point?) developers to then assist a further bunch of developers in gaining experience and getting a first job?
Any clarifications are super appreciated, and we'll be helpful in any way we can.
Absolutely, we're intending on more frankly - we want to onboard everyone over a period of time, without overwhelming ourselves with too much work (don't sink!), and our bootcamps will have users who attend automatically be employed for a period of time to get them real job experience working on exclusively open source software. It would be super awesome to host a bootcamp right on the dev.to platform? coughs
I bet we could make this happen. Between the public features and the things in more private beta I bet we already have 90% of the things you'd need. And it falls nicely into the category of things we could technically do but wouldn't want to take on all ourselves because it would spread us too thin. But it could be a really fun way to partner to make happen.
CC: @jess @peter
Let's chat about it? I'll pitch in if it's needed to be developed. Email is michael@invocie.com
I think this is a really great example to other companies out there who are afraid or unwilling to take a chance on growing their own instead of pursuing the junior developer with ten years of experience unicorn.
Everyone in todays society wants a junior with 10 years of experience - the fact of the matter is, it's highly unlikely to obtain that, and I feel incredibly sorry for anyone who accepts that deal.
Just joined a startup and was well received when I brought up a possible apprentice type program for local graduates that can do something just like this.
Thinking a step above internship, but with room to grow into a possible role inside or outside the company.
As a bootcamp grad myself I found there's still a lot of strength in the community as far as opportunities. Learning how to create these opportunities was a truly valuable tool for sure, but I'd say there's still a lot of room for improvement and grouping up to come up with the RIGHT paths to filling these gaps
Excited to see where this goes Michael! Good luck and I'll be keeping tabs!
Damn that sounds like a really good deal
All of this is great!