
Apprentice.at – Apprenticeships, not internships - kangman
http://apprentice.at/
======
laurentoget
"We expect that you will have your own equipment and your own software. Up&Up
uses Macs and Adobe Creative Suite and will expect you will have a late
model/version of each. "

from
[http://www.upandup.agency/careersjob_id=job_20140721143320_P...](http://www.upandup.agency/careersjob_id=job_20140721143320_PYKUIEK4CHAK5QZM)

the nerve...

~~~
flexie
I have mixed feelings about that.

You know, many young kids actually have a Mac already, and if not, a new Mac
and a monthly subscription for Adobe costs a fraction of what 3 months in
college costs.

And if you've already spent a couple of years in college studying literature,
algebra, music, philosophy, psychology, introduction to business and what not,
you might just want some practical experience that within a few months could
actually land you a job that provides a decent paycheck.

~~~
michaelt

      you might just want some practical experience that
      within a few months could actually land you a job
      that provides a decent paycheck.
    

It always struck me as ironic that student engineers, who are on track for
well paid jobs, get offered paid internships; but student journalists, who are
on course for poorly paid jobs, are expected to do unpaid internships - or
even _pay_ to _do_ internships.

~~~
Findy3ti
I am a little confused as to how that is ironic. Strikes me as anything but
that

~~~
michaelt
To vastly over-simplify our economy, we usually expect people with greater
ability to pay to pay the same or more for substitutable goods. For example,
people with more money can buy fancy coffee from starbucks, while typically
people who can't afford that will make do with instant coffee.

In this case, the people with the greater ability to pay have to pay less.

That seems ironic to me, even though I know enough about the economy to
understand why it happens.

~~~
spacecowboy_lon
There are far more English lit grads that are competing for any job with a
"publisher" or "journalism"

Also newspapers are well known for poverty level wages even when they had 30%
profit margin.

A major publisher can pick and chose from ox-bridge grads who got a first.

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anjc
Apprenticeship?

Any role I looked at there had significant requirements. "Must have
intermediate knowledge of Swift" etc etc.

That's not how apprenticeships work. If anything, this is a far worse version
of an internship given that some of them are measuring the tenure in weeks.

Edit: Hah. "Our apprenticeship is not a junior role. The majority of people
who join thoughtbot as an apprentice leave a job working as a developer or
designer to join us. Because it is such a high bar, even people who have been
working in the industry for many years may not make it through the interview
process."

Insane. You've somehow managed to find a way to destroy the value of
employment even further.

~~~
paulojreis
> Insane. You've somehow managed to find a way to destroy the value of
> employment even further.

The value of "work", I would say.

But yeah, corporatism is insanely good at it, and worst of all, in a
subversive way. The society (through education and others) is being silently
shaped by corporatism tenets so that, by now, even grassroot-like movements -
not at all affiliated with the major "interests" \- live by these ideals.

------
nthnclrk
I can't seem to find any reason to think of this as anything other than an
internship rebranded.

An apprenticeship doesn't have to be four years, but in 3-months I don't see
anyone gaining any real fundamental depth of learning. Surface level skills?
Sure.

If this was a genuine "Apprenticeship" I'd expect anything from 18 months+

~~~
tylerpachal
I agree with this. I did three co-op terms (I'm not sure how they're formally
different from internships but anyways...) two of which were four months long,
and one which was eight months long.

I found that after three months, I was just getting to the point where I could
make meaningful contributions. For my two four-month co-ops, this meant that I
hardly got to contribute. I really preferred the eight month co-op term, where
I felt like I was much more part of the team.

------
Kalium
The four-year model is based around teaching fundamentals and then adding
current technologies on top. In addition to being relatively slow, it often
fails to teach the most recent set of technologies.

However, I don't think apprenticeships are a good fit. The apprenticeship
model is great for skills that do not change rapidly or need frequent
updating. Carpentry five years ago is much the same as carpentry today. This
works well because in such areas, you can afford to gloss over or just skip
many fundamentals because the hands-on skills are all that will be needed for
a multi-decade career.

This model doesn't map well to development. Current technologies move fast.
Adapt rapidly. One year's hot approach is the next's old broken crap. Our
educational systems need to be designed around enabling people to adapt
rapidly. The only way I know to do this is to teach people the fundamentals
they need to adapt to anything within their field.

I'm happy to entertain other approaches, but this seems like hammering a round
peg into a square hole because using a square peg is inconvenient.

~~~
esarbe
I have to disagree; apprenticeships work perfectly fine in IT.

Yes, technology moves fast and if one wants to stay current in the field, one
has to keep learning.

But the fundamentals remain the same. It has been forty years since TAoCP was
published for the first time. Has it become irrelevant? Hell, no. Has logic or
maths changed because of this year's fad? Of course not.

Is four years a long time? Not if you want to give a young person a thorough
education and a solid understanding of the craft, from the foundations up.

Instead, you know, of just train them to hammer out code in the currently most
hyped language, without really knowing what they are doing and why it all
works.

Teach concepts, not implementations.

Edit: Typo, standpoint clarification.

~~~
slackson
I don't think you're disagreeing here. Kalium is saying that an apprenticeship
model is the wrong way to teach these skills.

~~~
esarbe
That's exactly where I disagree. In my opinion, the apprenticeship model works
quite well in IT.

I guess I'm biased here; I grew up in Switzerland and did an apprenticeship in
IT. Also, the company I've been working for the last five years has had
apprentices since it's very beginnings and most of the apprentices chose to
stay afterwards.

~~~
Kalium
Apprenticeships, as typically proposed in a context such as this one or in
bootcamps, don't teach fundamentals and train skills. They skip the former in
favor of getting to the latter more quickly. Skip logic and math in favor of
React and Bootstrap, that sort of thing.

That is what I am saying is a poor fit. None of the items on this list, last I
looked, are four-year apprenticeships that include CS fundamentals.

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pboos
Apprenticeship is nothing of the past! It is still done in some countries. And
not poor countries. Switzerland for example. Read here:
[http://qz.com/122501/apprenticeships-make-young-people-in-
sw...](http://qz.com/122501/apprenticeships-make-young-people-in-switzerland-
employable/)

~~~
thwd
Yeah but they're nothing like this. An apprenticeship in CH lasts between 2
and 4 years, you get paid around 15k CHF and you go to school something like 2
days a week. Also, big-ish corporations have to take on apprentices by law.

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kriro
I don't really see the difference between this and a good internship in the
software development field. Usually you get a mentor and they nurture you
fairly well or help you to help yourself (if it's a good internship and not a
"oh free codemonkey" mindset). I'd say dev internships are way ahead of the
curve compared to other industries.

The real problem (imo) is that while there's a huge demand for developers at
the end of the day it's still hard to program well and there's a potentially
strong penalty on being sloppy while learning and on top of that the
opportunity cost of people nurturing you from zero/a low level is pretty high.
There's a difference between being able to glue working stuff together and
understanding an existing codebase. Most jobs require the latter and solid
engineering principles on top. I'm afraid there is no hotfix/silver bullet.

Call this apprenticeship or whatever you want, I agree that the right step is
taking time to develop talent even if it costs you money now. But the downside
is that the workforce is ultramobile so you may invest a lot for no return.

I think the management trainee programs of bigger companies could be an
interesting model to investigate. They are essentially meant to groom and
train future >middle management through on the job training in all areas of
the company.

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Radle
If you do apprenticeships, look at Germany how to do it correctly.
Apprentice.at is not the solution to the problems you are facing.

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Bouncingsoul1
Well, I was confused by the domain since I acutally did my apprenticeship and
study in Austria (the one with mountains, no kangooros here). Well here it
looks different, apprenticeship includes working for a company and going to a
public school finishing with a certified diploma. These offerings on
apprentice.at doesn't look anything like this.

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analog31
Something I didn't get from the website was the actual difference between an
apprenticeship, an internship, and a straightforward job. Also, there are
legal distinctions surrounding what can be done with paid and unpaid interns,
so it would be useful to know how an apprenticeship compares to all three of
those other models.

~~~
joelrunyon
Not sure about the legal differentiation, but a good practical explanation is
here - [http://www.amazon.com/The-End-
Jobs-9-5-ebook/dp/B010L8SYRG](http://www.amazon.com/The-End-
Jobs-9-5-ebook/dp/B010L8SYRG)

------
bphogan
I expected something much different. I transitioned into teaching higher
education a few years ago and I would love to partner with places to send my
students after they complete their two-year associates degree. I think if I
bootstrapped people with the basics of breaking down problems, building code,
etc, and could then send them to a great apprentiship, that would change the
way we view education.

But what I see here is a very different than that. Most of my students
wouldn't financially apply, let alone make it for skills.

Some of the ads even state that people with industry experience wouldn't even
make it through the interviews... so this looks at first glance like a way to
get some cheap labor from semi-experienced developers.

I don't know if that's what I want to see from our industry, and it makes me a
little sad.

------
thomasfoster96
This is just an internship rebranded, right?

...because my understanding of apprenticeships is that they are very very
different to this concept (maybe it's different around the world - I'm from
Australia).

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klunger
The appearance of these seems like a natural reaction to the rise of coding
bootcamps. I can easily imagine how employers are hesitant to take on a newly
minted bootcamp grad, but may consider an apprenticeship program (yeah, it's a
dressed-up internship) as a kind of stepping stone / way to mitigate risk of
taking on a jr. dev from one of the bootcamps.

------
orange_county
Sounds great and seems to better process than bootcamps since you are actually
getting paid. Albeit a little low, $500/week in SF for 3 months is kind of
low. (iOS at ThoughtBot)

~~~
notahacker
One of Thoughtbot's sample success stories was a graduate of not one but two
paid bootcamps, and had industry work experience...

To be good enough to try out at thoughtbot on a little less than Australian
minimum wage, their baseline expectation is that you've already designed and
shipped an app, probably work as a designer/developer for another company and
are prepared to wait "several months" for them to deign to reply to you.

On your knees, serfs!

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scottmcdot
Why the Austrian domain?

~~~
wmboy
I assume they were going for a domain hack... apprentice at such-and-such
company.

------
shire
Where is the Washington Apprenticeships, Seattle preferably :)

~~~
mathgladiator
I am not affiliated with site, but I believe the apprenticeship model is good.
I'm currently looking for a apprentice
([http://jeffrey.io/writings/apprentice.html](http://jeffrey.io/writings/apprentice.html))
to do my open source bidding.

~~~
hndude
Does your apprentice have to be local to you or can they be remote?

------
feedthebayer
Background: I'm familiar with Sparkbox's 6 month paid apprenticeship and know
a few people who went through it. I'm also a graduate of the
[http://bloc.io](http://bloc.io) full-stack apprenticeship.

If I'm not mistaking, the current software "craftsman" and "apprenticeship"
movement has been largely influenced by Dave Hoover's Apprenticeship Patterns
(free on the web):
[http://chimera.labs.oreilly.com/books/1234000001813/index.ht...](http://chimera.labs.oreilly.com/books/1234000001813/index.html)

A few quotes from that book:

============================================================

This book is written for software apprentices—for people who have had a taste
of developing software and want to take it further, but need some guidance.
Whether you have a college degree from a prestigious computer science program
or are entirely self-taught, you recognize that there are great developers out
there, and you aspire to achieve the same mastery that they possess.

...

When discussing what it means to be an apprentice, Marten Gustafson, one of
our interviewees, put it best when he said, “I guess it basically means having
the attitude that there’s always a better/smarter/faster way to do what you
just did and what you’re currently doing. Apprenticeship is the state/process
of evolving and looking for better ways and finding people, companies and
situations that force you to learn those better/smarter/faster ways.” We think
there’s a lot of value in having this internal drive that is not dependent on
anyone else to bestow solutions upon you, and that leads you to find
constructive ways of dealing with problems.

...

Apprenticeship is the beginning of your journey as a software craftsman.
During this time you will be primarily focused inward, intent on growing your
craftsmanship. While you will benefit from the attention of your peers and
more experienced developers, you must learn to grow yourself, to learn how you
learn. This focus on yourself and your need to grow is the essence of what it
means to be an apprentice.

============================================================

In my mind, the key difference between an internship and apprenticeship is the
focus and purpose. Generally, a company hires an intern as a cheap way to get
extra help. Sure, they will help the intern as needed, but primarily so they
can accomplish something for the company.

Whereas, when a company takes on an apprentice, the primary focus is on
providing an awesome, safe learning environment. Sure, the apprentice will
likely do something of value for the company, but that's a side benefit.

Also, generally people think internship == work while apprenticeship ==
learning.

So technically there may not be a lot of difference, but I argue that the
difference in paradigms has a large impact.

\---

I'm not familiar but any of the other apprenticeships, but Sparkbox's is much
better than what's generally being discussed in the other comments here. You
don't need to already have significant experience to join. All you need is an
interest in web development. See more here:
[https://github.com/sparkbox/apprenticeships](https://github.com/sparkbox/apprenticeships)

So don't let one company's program taint your view of the rest!

~~~
chiwoojo
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. I got introduced to the Sparkbox
apprenticeship program through this post, and that's helpful! I wonder what
your friends (or people you know) thought of the program?

~~~
laurendorman
I am alum of Sparkbox's apprenticeship program (and builder of
[https://apprentice.at](https://apprentice.at)) and would be happy to share my
experience with you. If you'd like to chat, ping me!

