Comment by beilabs | Hacker News Reader

Comment by beilabs | Hacker News Reader

I'm going to play devils advocate here. I don't think I'd be in your target market primarily because I feel for 15k a year I can achieve a decent education just by online resources alone. It would be just as well recognized; I'd even think that a local community college could be cheaper. Granted, upfront cash is a luxury that few without the bank of mom and dad can access.

An Irish degree costs 3000 euros a year to enroll. Even for four years that would be cheaper than what's on offer here with a world wide recognized qualification.

On the whole, it seems like a very American solution to an American problem, education is just far too expensive in the states. * I'm a beneficiary of free state education from Ireland.

Best of luck in the effort, I do applaud you for it especially in the US where there are always tech shortages but...I really wish your country was in a place where your type of business didn't have to exist. A country where only those who can afford to be educated can receive education. I'm saying this as someone living in Nepal where those who can't pay can't learn either.

I really wish education was subsidized, worldwide! Alas, never going to happen.

Indeed, it is difficult to compete with the price of a fully subsidized education.

That said, we still have students from the EU that attend Lambda School. It's not all about cost, it's also about use of time. You can get a degree that is more well recognized in four years, or you can attend Lambda School and work for three years. Would you rather hire someone with an official degree from a community college or someone that attended a CS Academy and worked for three years? You could argue either way, but it's not clear to me that the degree is the clear winner.

I'm curious how your students in Europe will agree to return the % of salary back to you. I would imagine there would be more restrictions in that regard than with the IRS.

In Ireland even a degree in CS from the worst school guarantees a base of education that has been reviewed and agreed upon. I'm unaware if the same vigilance has been applied in your own curriculum.

Also, please remember that degrees are necessary should one wish to migrate internationally in many situations so don't discount them out of hand.

Personally, I'd hire the person with the degree before any bootcamp on its own. That said, I believe that most degrees are useless without real world knowledge and application. I've hired 10 staff over the past 12 months from a variety of backgrounds, some with MSc level, others who have barely scraped through their B.Sc. Qualifications means competence at school, doesn't always equal to success in the software engineering field.

We don't know how students in Europe can agree to return a percentage of salary yet, which is why we don't offer income share agreements in Europe yet.

I don't discount degrees at all, I just don't think they're the ultimate solution to anything nor do I believe they're the only way to be qualified for a job.

We have a lot of students with CS degrees that starting out could barely code their way out of a wet paper bag. I'm entirely unconvinced that a degree guarantees any real level of ability. That's not to say that no one with a degree can code, just that not everyone with a degree can code.

The timeline for community college is usually 2 years or 3 with a work term.

In the end it feels like a bad deal because you need to pay 17% and you miss out on the extra year of education

>Would you rather hire someone with an official degree from a community college or someone that attended a CS Academy and worked for three years?

obviously, one would eventually transfer from community college to a university

The concept of community colleges in the way you have in the US doesn't really exist in Europe in the same format. It's a result of education being cheap or free that everyone can attend "real" universities. So you're comparing someone with a 3 year university degree to someone from a 6 month bootcamp. I know who I would pick for my team.

What if you compared someone with a 3 year university degree against someone with a 6 month bootcamp and 2.5 year work experience?

That's not the issue, the issue is getting that first 2.5 years of experience. I would argue that a university degree gets you into that first job easier, at least in Sweden. Not only because of the (hopefully) superior education but also thanks to the connections you make with older students who might influence that hiring decision.

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