Today, we’re excited to announce an awesome new addition to Firehose. We’re launching a 44-week Moderate Pace option to our Online Software Engineering Program, to go along with our existing 24-week Accelerated Pace. Why? Well, it’s simple. We talked with students and asked them what they wanted. It was clear that a significant number of them wanted the option to have more time in a structured program.
This request makes perfect sense. And it reflects the changing nature of the coding bootcamp industry. In the past 2 years, coding bootcamps (well, the smart ones) have begun to make 2 major shifts in response to the demands of the employer market and the demands of the students who enroll in their programs.
Shift One
The “Become a Developer in A Handful of Weeks” model is dying out. Thankfully. It takes time and practice to gain the skills you need to land a job in web development. You should be skeptical of anyone who promises you that you can sign up for their bootcamp and be “guaranteed” to land a job in 8 weeks.
That’s simply not enough time. It’s part of the reason why we lengthened our core pace from 15 weeks to 24 weeks back in August of this year. We have over 900 hours of content, and students need enough time to go through the material to really learn the way they are capable of learning.
Shift Two
The Online Bootcamp model is growing rapidly. Why? There are a few key reasons:
- Online bootcamps are less risky. It can be incredibly expensive to quit your full-time job in order to join an in-person coding bootcamp.
- Most in-person bootcamps charge between $12k-$18k for tuition.
- You also have to consider opportunity costs that come from not working for 3-6 months. For example, if you give up $30k in opportunity costs to join a bootcamp and eventually land a job that pays you $60k the first year, you will essentially be working for $30k that year.
- Most online bootcamps provide 1-on-1 apprenticeship style teaching that works well for students.
- The curriculum is more flexible. It’s far easier to iterate and add additional lessons to an online platform than to a network of different teachers spread out at classrooms across the country.
In the past year, General Assembly, Dev Bootcamp, Hack Reactor, Launch Academy and many more in-person bootcamps have launched online versions.
So, what does this all mean in the context of the new Moderate Pace?
The Moderate Pace is designed to meet the current needs of students like you and the job outcomes that you deserve. It gives you the time you need to learn the skills that will get you hired, and it allows you to do it part-time, without sacrificing too much time from the other important things in your life.
Here’s a little bit more about how it will work:
- This pace contains the same 900 hours of curriculum as the existing 24-week pace. We just spaced it out more.
- The average student will need about 12-15 hours per week to finish in 44 weeks. By comparison, most students spend 25-40 hours per week to finish in 24 weeks.
- The cost will be $8,500 to compensate for the increased support needed for a longer program.
- Just like the existing 24-week pace, this 44-week pace is designed to help you become a software engineer or launch your own idea.
If you’d like the review the program curriculum, you can do so here.
And if you’d like to hear us talk about the new Moderate Pace and ask us any questions, please feel free to schedule a call.
Happy coding,
Marco Morawec
CEO | Co-founder
P.S. If you know someone who might be interested in a part-time coding program, share this post with them!
