Ask HN: Did Online Course Lead into a Job for Anyone?

[Arthanari]

Did any one do online courses like

Coursera Edx Udacity

And then use it and get a JOB.

Also what about below course

https://pe.gatech.edu/online-masters-degrees/online-master-science-analytics

Once i finish it what approach i should use to leverage this new qualification to secure a related job.

what difficulties will i face in leveraging it.

[nstart]

My entire career at this point was jump-started by udacity web dev course. Prior to that I was flitting around with developing scrapers and some basic desktop systems. After I took that course, I went from one level to another and am now working remotely with buffer.

As of late I've been looking back on this experience and wondering how much I'm losing out on by not taking more courses. Hoping to change that from March this year.

[Bashmaistora → nstart]

Did you take the Front-end or the Full-stack course?

[nstart → Bashmaistora]

It was this one. https://www.udacity.com/courses/web-development

I did it in the early days before the tracks were introduced and where it was still single courses

[Taylor_OD → nstart]

Sorry it looks like your link goes to a number of courses. Which one in particular did you do?

Thanks.

[nstart → Taylor_OD]

Yikes! I shared the course directly from the udacity app. Looks like I got the wrong link.

https://www.udacity.com/course/web-development--cs253

That should take you to the right one hopefully. It's basically Steve Huffman's course on how to build a blog. :)

[Taylor_OD → nstart]

Great! Thank you!

[JulesRosser]

I completed a couple of courses offered by Coursera and Udacity on Android development and managed to get a great role in a decent company a few months later with no previous professional experience. The courses are mostly entry level, but they gave me just enough motivation and knowledge to create my own apps, which I feel is the real reason I was hired.

The difficulty come from having no prior professional experience, so showing that you can design, build and ship a project in your own time really helps you to stand out.

The only thing about the course that you linked is that its not specific to a certain field. I would suggest that you try a couple of different courses and find a subject / stack which really interests you, then build small but increasingly more complex projects using what you've learnt.

I list the courses I've completed along with links to any verified certificates on my resume, but not once have they been referenced in interviews.. It's always the projects that make me stand out.

I'd be happy to answer any other questions you have! Also, the forums are also great place to meet like minded people!

[urahara → JulesRosser]

Is it possible to see what projects you had on your portfolio when you were hired and what courses you took? Just to have a better idea about your story and the possibilities.

[JulesRosser → urahara]

Sure, sorry for the delay. I built an extremely basic portfolio website to show all the apps and describe them, however it's no longer online and I've lost the assets unfortunately.

Projects Listed: Birthday Reminder App (https://github.com/Julesssss/BirthdayReminder) & Podcast Player (https://github.com/Julesssss/PodcastPlayer)

Followed by all the apps I created as part of the courses below. They were all basic apps, I just listed what I learnt and added a few screenshots. At the end of the courses you'll have a nice amount of projects to show off.

Courses: https://www.mooc-list.com/course/creative-serious-and-playfu... (No longer available), https://www.coursera.org/learn/android-programming, https://www.coursera.org/learn/android-programming-2, Followed by a couple of these beginner courses: https://www.udacity.com/courses/android

[drewrv]

Not sure if this is the anecdote you're looking for, but my spouse did a few online Python classes, decided she enjoys it, and enrolled in a coding bootcamp. She's set to graduate in a couple weeks and already has an offer.

[jmportilla]

I teach online courses and have had students report back to me that the course helped them get a job or pass an interview, but it's pretty much always in addition to their own self study and experience. an online course can definitely help you get a job, but it alone probably won't be enough. although more and more I see online courses or degrees that guarantee a job or your money back, do that might be with checking out.

[lalwanivikas]

Yes, for many people!

How do I know? I am actually building FirstDevJob and am interviewing such people. I have published two interviews[0][1] with people who used FreeCodeCamp. More are in the pipeline!

It is absolutely possible. But just don't depend on one course or site. Be flexible and willing to learn from many different places to develop your skills enough to land a job.

[0] https://firstdevjob.com/stories/dan-minshew/

[1] https://firstdevjob.com/stories/taylor-milliman/

[sgslo]

Anecdotally, I get many, many emails from people who have taken my React courses on Udemy (https://www.udemy.com/user/sgslo/) and go on to get jobs. They generally have some previous programming experience, but I assume if they are taking the time to write me an email then they figure the course helped them.

[connorl33t → sgslo]

I am one of those people! Thanks!

[mindcrime]

I've done a lot of online classes, and I have a job. But I also have 15+ years of experience as a developer, so it would be hard to suss out exactly which attributes did or didn't contribute to my successful candidacy the last couple of times I changed jobs. Subjectively, I feel like that stuff helped, but it's hard to be sure.