Advice For Potential Coding Boot Camp Students

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The decision to go to a coding bootcamp is a very difficult one. I’ve had this conversation with several friends and I wanted to have a quick guide on what to expect and how to preaper.

I went to an immersive coding bootcamp to learn about data science. I learned Python, SQL, and machine learning algorithms. My main motivation was having the opportunity to build my portfolio through the use of hands-on projects. It was a great experience of learning the skills to join a new industry while having an opportunity to work with some smart peers that are going through a career transition.

Having attended a 15 week in-person bootcamp, I would definitely suggest that option because of the ability to work face-to-face with coaches and other students. You’ll be spending a lot of time together and there’s a good chance that they will become your peers in the tech field. With the global pandemic, there really isn’t an in-person option in the near future. Coding bootcamps will now compete with online first options, which tend to be very good when working online. This is the problem that prestigious universities are facing: can they have the same quality of learning when they are now using a different medium to communicate. My opinion is that there will be a learning period for the very best professors and programs. The mediocre classes and teachers can easily be replaced by online resources.

What You’ll Learn

My experience is with Flatiron School’s data science program, but the process is very similar for the software developer. You’ll learn to code and create projects. A typical day starts with a 30-minute coding challenge that can be either be pair programming or done solo. Pair programming is a great way to learn as it involves coding what the person is thinking. You get to learn how someone approaches a problem and how they would code in real-time.

Coding Challenge Sites

Lessons and Concepts

Then comes the lesson or subject for the day. Usually, it is a lecture on a topic or technology which you’ll be spending the afternoon learning or practicing. There’s also an afternoon lecture that dives deeper into the morning lecture or moves on to the next subject. Following class, there will be homework to complete learning modules.

One of the best ways to learn a coding language is to actually go through the documentation. One of the most common advice that I received at the beginning of my coding journey is to refer to the documentation and it’s the advice I would give to new coders as well. It is much easier to google and copy from Stack Overflow, but at this point in your career, it would be much more helpful to learn the correct way. Luckily for those that are looking to learn Python, it’s documentation is very easy to read and even has a tutorial so you can follow from 0 experience.

Sometimes I’ve had to cram a lot of learning into a day and would learn from online videos. There’s no shame in doing this because you are expected to learn a lot in a small amount of time. Before taking any bootcamp, I would suggest taking a similar course online to get an overview and so you won’t fall behind during the fast-paced setting. Udemy has some great intro courses. I recommend Jose Portilla’s course on learning Python. The best thing about learning from Udemy is that you will walk through the setup of the technology on your laptop. This is extremely difficult for people new to coding and Udemy does a great job of forcing people to get this started. I remember using Udemy to learn how to install and run Pyspark and it was worth the $12 I spent. Actually learning from examples was just icing on the cake.

Top Topics To Understand

  • Big O Notation
  • Data Structures
  • Object-Oriented Programming
  • For and While Loops
  • Dictionary and Hash Tables
  • GIT

Projects

Learning to code is difficult, especially at the beginning of the journey. After a week or 2 of learning concepts and going through coding exercises, students then have a week to prepare for a project. Projects are the best way to learn because it forces you to learn applicable code, there’s a deadline, and the work is focused on showing results. I personally loved working on projects as part of a team and especially enjoyed hearing people present their work. 

In terms of projects, Udemy and other online tutorials have code-alongs where you can get started on your first project with some hand-holding. Once you’ve finished the course, I would recommend doing your own project to solidify what you’ve learned.

Data Science Project Timeline

  1. AWS for database work, simple visualizations and analysis
  2. Linear Regression and applying statistical analysis (Null and Alternative Hypothesis)
  3. Predictions Project 
  4. Classification Project
  5. Machine Learning: Practice 1 or 2 machine learning concepts
  6. Final Project: Several Machine Learning Concepts

The final project takes about 3 weeks to complete and is what you will most likely present to future employers. This is where you will start from your own ideas and showcase all the skills you’ve learned. Take lots of notes when creating a project because interviews will focus on what you learned and how you worked through obstacles. It’s easy to think you’ll remember these detail, but what often happens is that once the information becomes internalized, it will be difficult to say the reason you learned a concept. Looking at old code will often, result in seeing a lot of mistakes because you’ve learned better habits since the code was written. Even after 1 month, I’ve seen some of my old code and was tempted to do it over because I’ve already learned more efficient ways to code. Instead of working on an old project, it’s often better to keep creating and allowing future work to be polished. This is also a good time to learn to use Github. If you are very serious about getting a job coding, having a GitHub profile that is very green will make you stand out to employers.

What I wish I did

How would I have approached data science boot camp? I would have liked to prepare more. Bootcamps do have pre-work that they tell you to complete, but it’s often not enough. No matter how good you are at coding, the structure of the boot camp (learning a concept a day) will be a challenge. The best way to prepare for this is to already be good at coding and use the boot camp as a resource when creating projects. Definitely putting in more hours to learn python, SQL, and statistics would have helped me out especially in the first crucial weeks. 

The great thing about learning the topics before the boot camp is that the quality of your questions to instructors will be higher. This leads to more focused learning and better project ideas and applications. 

The point of a bootcamp is to get a job after. My expectation of the bootcamp was to re-enter financial services or the fintech sector because it would build on my previous career. It would have been a great idea to meet with a couple of people in the industry working as a data scientist to get their thoughts on potential projects and skills to learn. After 15 weeks of learning, you will have accomplished a lot, but each company will have different expectations. It’s best to know what these are and tailor your experience for an easy transition.

Suggestions before signing up

Doing all of the above would be overkill, but I guarantee that the bootcamp and subsequent job search will be much easier.

Weighing The Costs

Most boot camps cost upwards of $15k and 12 weeks of your time. Depending on what you can make when working full time, you are potentially foregoing 10s of thousands of dollars to attend. I absolutely think people should learn to code because of how many industries are using technology and automation.

Coding boot camps are great for those that are switching industries because it is immersive and you’ll get to meet many people who are similar to you in their desire for a better career. The problem with learning to code is that you’ll start to think that you can learn to do anything. At the current point in time, I think I could have learned most of what I learned on my own. It’s difficult to imagine a time when I didn’t know how to print ‘Hello World!’ or the importance of testing your code. I do have to thank the boot camp experience for helping me with all the skills I need to move into a new career.

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