The Empty Promise of Programming Bootcamps

The temptations of programming bootcamps are understandable. Maybe you have no coding experience and want to learn. Maybe you have a bit – or even a lot – of experience, and want to add some certifications to your resume. Whatever your personal circumstance, bootcamps seem to offer it all, in a single, shiny, self-contained package. You pay several thousand dollars, and after a few weeks’ hard work, you come out with a good-looking resume and all you need to write beautiful software. Right?

The reality is rather different. Programming bootcamps do not sell training packages that allow you to become an excellent programmer; instead, they sell the idea that their training packages will allow you to become an excellent programmer. Coding skills, just like any other skill, take time and experience to develop. In the same way you don’t become a great chef by going to cook school for a few weeks, you don’t become a great (or even an average) coder by going to a programming bootcamp for a couple of months.

Boot camp (noun) : a type of prison for young criminals where there is strict discipline

Oxford Dictionary

This is not to say that education is in any way a bad thing. A small number of coders seem to have software development in their genes; from the first time they write a line in Python, everything flows seamlessly and intuitively from their fingertips. The rest of us however, need a starting point, and that starting point is usually a book, college course, professional training, or an online video.

Programming allows you to think about thinking, and while debugging you learn learning

Nicholas Negroponte

Let us be clear here. There are literally thousands of free resources (of high academic value) out there. These include, but are not limited to:

• Your local library. This will most likely have dozens of books you can borrow. The software versions may be a little older, but, particularly when you are starting out, this doesn’t matter.
• Your local (or online) bookshop. True, there is a cost involved, but you will find books for the very latest versions - often with searchable CDs - and the cost is a tiny fraction of what you would pay for a bootcamp. If you are aiming for certification, many vendors offer excellent books with the specific purpose of preparing you for one of their exams.
• Online. There are literally thousands of videos, tutorials, MOOCs, and practice websites online, many of extremely high academic value, and many free. You may have to look around to find the best ones for you, but they are out there. There are even some free bootcamps if you desperately need to add a line on your resume.

Now, education provides a useful grounding for the great majority of us, but as with almost anything, what leads to expertise is experience. There are no shortcuts: no painting book can turn you into Picasso, you will not be the next Lang Lang after attending a nine-week piano bootcamp .You simply cannot go on an expensive course for a few weeks and expect to come out of it a good software developer. Instead, after some initial education, you need to code.

Computer science education cannot make anybody an expert programmer any more than studying brushes and pigment can make somebody an expert painter

Eric Steven Raymond

Initially, it doesn’t matter what you write; when you’re starting out, any experience is good experience. Find some good books and work through the examples; use websites like Stack Overflow to discuss challenges and ideas; and, most importantly, keep pushing yourself to write code, and to learn about existing programming languages and emerging ones. Software development evolves constantly, so embrace the changes.

There is an old Kenyan fisherman’s saying: smooth seas do not make a skillful sailor. There are no shortcuts to becoming a good programmer. You do not need to pay for a programming bootcamp. You need to write code, make mistakes and learn from them, write more code, and so on. Over time, you will slowly but surely develop skills that you can use in your future career. Good luck, and save that money.