
App Academy's (Real) Tuition Model - unimpressive
http://blog.shevagoldberg.com/post/122468162657/app-academys-real-tuition-model
======
dmeb
Disclaimer: I went to App Academy summer of 2014. I paid ~$14,000 up front as
Canadians didn't qualify for the tuition deferment (an eminently reasonable
restriction, work visas are far from a sure thing). I had degrees in non-cs
STEM fields and CS coursework which allowed me to fit into a TN visa category,
and I'm currently happily employed in SF.

I'm disappointed in App Academy for this omission - they should be better than
this.

That said, some perspective:

They have placed 400(?) people in the SF tech market through this tuition
deferment scheme. Many of those hundreds didn't have the $10k-$18k up front
needed for a bootcamp. Many of those people, myself included, consider
attending App Academy a life-changing event. Easily the single most useful
stretch of three months I've spent over the course of my twenties.

Their system of tuition deferment + rent free living on the floor in SOMA was
unprecedented and a large gamble on their part. I'm very likely over-reacting
given my strong feelings of gratitude to the school, but there's an under-
current of entitlement in these posts I find objectionable.

They should have made certain that their complete tuition policy was clear,
accurate, and very visible. That said, the harm you incurred was learning some
minimal amount of ruby and and engaging in some screen shares. These are both
skills that will be useful in any further interaction you have with web
development, either bootcamp applications or job interviews. Respectfully, you
have a long road ahead of you and much more potential unfairness.

Your experience with them does tarnish my view of App Academy slightly.
However, the counter factual of no App Academy is a world in which literally
hundreds of people would have been unable to pursue careers they find both
financially and personally rewarding. Relative to that incredible
accomplishment, this seems less damning.

~~~
mr_turtle
\+ 1

\- They let and would let as many students live on site free of charge in the
most expensive rental market in the US. I am certain all students from out of
town or out of state are forever grateful for just this. Rent in SF/SOMA can
easily top $2,000.

\- Also agree that a/A changed my life and the best three month investment
I've ever made. Likewise many of my peers feel the same way.

~~~
busterarm
They no longer can do the live on site thing.

They're going for some sort of accreditation and that involves their TAs
obtaining teaching credentials and not allowing people to live on site unless
they have a dormitory, which carries all sorts of additional restrictions.

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noahtkoch
20 y/o App Academy grad here. I was 19 when I finished the program. First, I
must say the program was totally worth it. This is true that you have to pay
regardless after the program. It really blows. The fee was also quite a bit
lower when I went (I think it was 12,000, 3k upfront) back when it was just 9
weeks. It was explained to me that people under 22 showed more of risk as they
might go back to college since their peers are still in college. It sucks that
they weren't more transparent, but I found it to be completely worth it.

Additionally, There was more than one occasion I was late on payments and they
were always lenient on my payment dates without ever charing me interest.
Should they be more transparent? Absolutely, then and now. But I found it to
be totally worth it.

------
nmrm2
Many of these academies/bootcamps have a 90+% completion rate and a 90+%
placement rate.

Those are numbers you only get by extremely rigorous filtering on the front
end; there's simply no way to admit anything except low-risk students and
maintain those numbers.

Changing their pricing model so that they can admit more risky students
without taking on unnecessary risk isn't unreasonable at all. The alternative
is to just not admit those students.

Of course, they should have been more transparent.

~~~
gbachik
I'm 21 and went through a programming bootcamp. In fact I dropped out of
college to do it and made the highest starting salary of the bootcamp
afterwords (RefactorU).

Risk doesn't give you the right to hide something. It takes a lot of time and
effort to go through a bootcamp screening process.

For them to throw a curveball after someone has passed all the requirements is
just plain unfair.

~~~
busterarm
They're really slow to update their site, unfortunately.

When I was accepted, they had moved offices a month or two prior but had not
updated their site with the change. The $5k deposit was a recent change and
not yet mentioned on the main site either.

They have a lot of documentation that they're slowly bringing up to date. The
curriculum is constantly in flux and being improved. The people who work on
all of this are the TAs so they're spread a bit thin. It's not that they
aren't being transparent - they've always been 100% honest with me and beyond
fair - they're just overworked. I made lots of pull requests during my cohort
to update documentation which they're really good about accepting and seemed
to appreciate the help.

Based on what I've seen though, this $18k up-front probably has more to do
with the realities of the marketplace for junior devs right now. It seems to
be slowing a lot and people sans-degree or work experience take a lot longer
to find jobs. There's a glut of junior devs sans-experience in the market and
many companies don't know to filter for AppAcademy students yet. The size of
their cohorts also seem to be growing quickly - probably ahead of how quickly
they can hire TAs and fit people in the office.

Full Disclosure: I'm a recent AppAcademy grad. Also, I'm looking for work in
NY if anyone is hiring. Post here with contact details and I'll follow up with
you.

~~~
SiVal
Yeah, if only they knew somebody with the technical skills to edit an HTML
document who was available for a tiny Web project and wouldn't cost very much.
Now, where could a school that teaches people HTML editing, and assigns them
HTML editing projects, and makes these devs _pay_ for the opportunity to work
on these projects, ever find someone who could do this?

~~~
busterarm
Putting the classes to task working on small details of the site wouldn't
benefit them in any way. It's a very tight, fast curriculum that has to
benefit a lot of students at once.

I know your situation sucks and it's easy to be derisive to them. I was barely
able to come up with the $5k deposit myself and if it weren't for the
financing situation of this specific program (I am degree-less but over 30 and
have tech experience) I would not have been able to do it. If I were in your
situation, there is _no way_ that I would have been able to do it, period.
Still, their financing policies make sense to me having gone through the
program and also seeing other bootcamp grads and what the market is like.

There are some other decent programs out there that may work out better for
you. You might want to check Flatiron School's Fellowship program. Had I not
already started AppAcademy, I would have done that instead -- it's exactly for
your situation.

If you're in SF and are worried about finding housing in NY if you got in, we
can discuss it as I may be (a) either able to work out an arrangement so you
can stay in Manhattan or (b) know somewhere/someone that can hook you up with
affordable housing.

AppAcademy was a life-changing experience for me, even pre-employment, and I
do not regret doing it at all. If you can find some way to do it or something
like it (a very short list of programs, imo), you definitely should do it.

~~~
SiVal
+1 to you for being such a good, decent person, but I think you're mistaking
me for a different poster. I'm well-established in the industry, fortunately,
but I'm annoyed at those who take advantage of people less fortunate than I
am. It's very unlikely to be an accident that they don't inform people who
need to find a way to make a living of the full cost until the applicants have
spent a lot of time and effort trying to get accepted. Shady salespeople have
been using that technique to soften up potential customers for millennia. I
can't know for sure, but it sounds like shady businesspeople selling good-
quality training.

~~~
busterarm
Sorry, mistook you for the OP. It was late :)

I definitely think that there's a good conversation to be had about the
business ethics of the vast majority of startups and internet brands. That
said, having 10 years+ work experience outside of this world, there's a good
conversation to be had about the business ethics of everybody.

------
bananafarmer
FWIW I was also offered a spot at AppAcademy and asked to pay an amount that
was higher than anything advertised on their site. This ask took place on the
phone, during a 'congratulations' call, and when I emailed back balking about
the price discrepancy they said something about new pricing, yada yada.

I guess not everyone balks, so they pocket what they can.

~~~
Sheva
I'm Sheva, the author of the article. Mind getting in touch with me? Curious
to hear a bit more about your experience.

------
mr_turtle
As an App Academy grad, I'm sorry about your experience. I am unaware of a/A
charging $18,000 due to your age, or your lack of a college dree, or both. I
know several students in my cohort didn't have a formal degree. Also the age
of my cohort varied widely - young and old.

Was the $18k to be charged up front, upon finding a job, or within a year of
you not finding a job? For me I was unaware of deposit increased from $3,000
to $5,000 which they only told me during one of the interviews.

I know there are some hoops to jump through, but I don't think it's as bad as
you make it to be. The initial coding challenge can be taken almost
immediately and my live coding challenge was scheduled a week later. I was in
the conditional acceptance group where I had to do additional 'homework'. If
you were in that boat, that sucks.

~ The policy does sound a little dubious. I would be very suprised if it was a
blanket policy.

~~~
busterarm
You wouldn't happen to know of anyone looking for recent a/A grads to join
their teams, would you?

------
mst
App Academy are selling shovels, for whatever price the market will bear.

I'm not impressed but I'm also entirely unsurprised.

~~~
mr_turtle
I wouldn't say they are selling shovels. They could easily charge an upfront
free and eliminate the risk of a student not finding a job or not paying upon
placement.

Changing that model, however, would have been cost prohibitive for me and I'm
sure a lot of other people.

~~~
ThrustVectoring
They're better off owning the risk - it makes them a more competitive
candidate for smart people with relatively little money.

------
dmeb
34 yelp reviews from App Academy students.

[http://www.yelp.com/biz/app-academy-san-
francisco](http://www.yelp.com/biz/app-academy-san-francisco)

Is it possible to remove negative reviews? They're uniformly 5 stars. I'm
actually surprised that there aren't any negative reviews. I would've expected
reviewers to be primarily those with strong feelings, either positive or
negative.

Another data point, Hack Reactor, with 131 reviews, all 5 stars:

[http://www.yelp.com/biz/hack-reactor-san-
francisco](http://www.yelp.com/biz/hack-reactor-san-francisco)

I get that bootcamps are polarizing, but surely those skeptical should at
least do some cursory googling to get a sense of the distribution of people's
experience who actually go through these programs. I google either of these
bootcamps and in the first two hits I get links to review sites with dozens of
detailed reviews filled with effusive praise and particulars on the programs.

~~~
busterarm
a/A and Hack Reactor are outliers in the market, IMO. Flatiron School and Dev
Bootcamp might also be okay. Even though I might have misgivings about GA, I
have a friend who works there and know several employed grads as well who
loved it. There are many others in this market that I would run the other way
from, but different programs work for different people.

There's a review site that's helpful in researching these programs here:
[https://www.coursereport.com/](https://www.coursereport.com/) There are some
negative reviews for most programs here.

------
joeevans1000
I'm totally baffled by the jump in tuition because of... age? lack of a
degree? The latter is presumably plausible, but the first is a bit strange.
The high priced bootcamps will be seen as a signifier of the tech bubble times
after the bubble pops or deflates a bit.

That said, I'm not against good bootcamps. But I do think 10K is a maximum
ceiling for a 12 week course.

~~~
dakmau
They've also built a reputation of producing quality students, and a network
of employers associated with that. 18K is a fairly low price to pay for this,
when you compare App Academy to the cost and time commitment of a university /
community college program.

As for the tuition difference with age, I presume that a higher percentage of
22 year olds and under pursue a start-up job, where salaries are lower. Hence,
they make up for the difference by charging an amount upfront.

~~~
unimpressive
That's not the problem here. The problem is that they're being completely
dishonest about what payment is required to participate in App Academy.

~~~
dakmau
Oh don't get me wrong, I definitely agree it's dishonest and unethical of them
to not be upfront about their costs. The process they make you go through is
incredibly time consuming.

Frankly, I'm kind of surprised that they -would- do something like this, given
their reputation, and I'm confident there must've been some sort of
miscommunication. I won't make any assumptions though, until we get to hear
from the other side of things.

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lexap
That sucks. They shouldn't have such a "policy" in the first place, and not to
publish it is ethically untenable.

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lsiebert
I was considering App Academy; Now, not so much.

Honestly, I wish getting a second Bachelor's degree was easier/cheaper in
California. I could go back, get a CS degree (i'd probably have to review some
of calculus, but I could rock the CS classes easily).

------
mentat
Reading about this, it really seems like a scam. Are people actually forking
over these kinds of "tuitions"? I have a non-traditional background and
learned on the job. There's no way I'd have paid anywhere near this.

