Holberton School

I am currently a student at Holberton School San Francisco (Batch January 2018). I finished my year 1 in october 2018 and least to say I have come a long way from a digital marketer to a software engineer in a matter of 9 months! Like the title mentions Holberton School is not just any bootcamp, it is better than one and less time consuming than a regular 4 year cs degree course. That is in itself a bonus point there. As a person who already has an undergrad degree I was least interested in going to a formal education to become a "software engineer" and during my research I came across Holberton and many other alternative education schools.

Why I chose Holberton and why I love it? There are many reasons for that -

1. Holberton was close to the place I live in. Living is e...

I have been learning to code on my own for a long time. It was a hobby, but when you wake up super early on a Sunday because you are excited about learning more, you start to wonder "what if I could do this every day?" But, as a 30-year-old woman, you think twice before changing career. Part of this reluctance was also coming from the fact, that despite hundreds of hours of MOOCS, I was still lacking a lot of understanding... I attended CS50 on edx, participated in the full-stack Nanodegree on Udacity and other courses on Udemy. These classes are good, but at the end, I was still not able to be a freelancer or to work for a startup. I kept on copying the examples without really understanding how the code worked. I could never re-write the code without looking at an example. Why are we u...

Hello, I am a Holberton student from cohort 5 who finished the first year (9 months on-site) of the curriculum in October 2018. After that I applied to and accepted a position as a System and Software Engineering Intern at Holberton which started at the end of November 2018.

Holberton's mission is to provide high quality education for the many. The school offers a two-year software engineering program, with no teachers, in a project based curriculum with an emphasis on peer learning. Students don't need to pay tuition upfront. Instead, Holberton has an income share agreement (ISA) system, where you won't need to pay until you get a job. This is a great aspect of Holberton because the success of the school aligns with the success of the students.

Prior to Holberton School I only h...

I’m a current student at Holberton School at the San Francisco campus. You go through Holberton’s full stack which is a project-based curriculum covering both low level and high level programming as well as Systems Engineering/Devops. During this time, I’ve learned how to use C, Python, and Bash as my go-to languages and also developed a solid understanding of how web technologies interact with each other and can configure my own servers. And because Holberton focuses hard on the fundamentals of computer science, I also found myself being able to pick up new technologies, frameworks, and languages much easier now than when I first started – a skill I found myself appreciative to have. Programming for me is something I needed to learn by experience and by doing and I’m glad Holberton’s p...

Pros:
In 7 months, I've become proficient in C and Python, and currently am gaining a ground-up understanding of web infrastructure and web based applications (Nginx, Haproxy, MySQL, HTML/CSS, Flask, etc.). The program doesn't take shortcuts, and emphasizes a foundation of core concepts before delving into specific applications, coding languages, frameworks, etc. Learning C before Python probably isn't the fastest way to get started coding, but offers a much deeper understanding of what exactly happens under the hood, but you'll be be able to pick up new concepts and languages much faster in the future. I've been happy with the curriculum, and I feel like the pacing and progression have been well thought out. It's been intense, but I've never felt legitimately overloaded.
The peer lea...

I debated between getting a masters or attending Holberton. I chose Holberton because it offered me the ability to pay back for the education I received from them after the fact. Within a short amount of time I am coding and solving problems while working with peers. It's been a great experience so far and a nice way to get my feet wet in tech. I know that after Holberton I will have so much more to continue learning and that's one of the things the Holberton community creates: It has helped us learn how to learn, and to pursue more knowledge and never stop.

When I was looking to transition into a tech career, I looked into both traditional college options as well as boot camps, the former being too long and expensive (I couldn't afford to be not working for four years) and the latter being too short (I didn't think I could learn enough in just a few months or less). After researching Holberton's 2-year program, it felt like the perfect balance, long enough to get a solid programming foundation as well as having deferred tuition. It meant that the school is investing in its students and if the students don't succeed, then the school doesn't, and it speaks to the school's ethos and quality of curriculum.

Along with that, I loved the hands-on, project-based peer learning model. You really don't know how much you understand about a subject ...

Holberton School is in a league of its own when it comes to providing students with the necessary skills to go into software engineering. Not only do you learn computer science fundamentals that most other 'bootcamps' gloss over, but you learn key work environment skills such as public speaking, project planning, and teamwork. The program is not for the faint of heart. You must truly be ready to work your ass off, because the curriculum moves fast and hard. But if your goal is to become a software engineer in a relatively short period of time, Holberton offers the tools that you need to learn, and to learn how to learn.

Holberton allowed me to transition from working in the public education sector to my current role as jr. software engineer intern. It also allowed me to discover my p...

Choosing to attend Holberton School was probably the best decision I've ever made in my life. Before attending, I graduated from a prestigious engineering school cum laude with a Chemical Engineering degree and couldn't have felt any less prepared to enter the job market. After months of applying to numerous companies and coming up short, I ended up working at In-N-Out in the daytime and tutoring high school students at night just to make ends meet. Luckily I had received a full-tuition scholarship and wasn't in debt. I can't imagine how stressful that time would have been if I also had to deal with student loans like so many other college graduates.

When a friend of mine (who also attended Holberton) suggested I apply, I jumped at the opportunity. I had been exposed to a tiny amount...

I’m currently a software engineer intern and former Cohort 5 student. I had no prior computer science background and studied math and science in college. Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed my experience throughout the program and felt well-prepared for my current position, because Holberton admittedly does a good job of simulating the tech workplace environment.

A typical day at Holberton: First, you come in and pick your favorite spot to work. Once you’ve settled down, you’ll log onto the school’s intranet and find a project assigned to you for that day. Your only task is to complete that project by the given deadline. There are suggested readings linked in the project page and your old reliable friend Google. Given these tools, you are expected to solve the mandatory problems usually by...

I have been attending Holberton for approximately 4 and a half months. Over the first three months, we learned in depth about C and bash for low-level development and fundamental computer science concepts. Those three months were perhaps the most valuable. We are getting into more high-level programming now. I would say Holberton's curriculum is excellent, with a focus on pushing you to become great at the interview process. That is another area they are unique; allowing you to practice interviews from week one definitely is going to give me a leg up in the hiring process once I complete the first year. I feel that they truly fit as much content as they can in the nine months.

The only problem I have with the school is personally I joined it as an exclusive software engineering scho...

Holberton School fosters effective learning of full-stack web development in a supportive, enjoyable, and career-building environment.

I am a student at Holberton currently half-way through the Year 1 curriculum. Already, I have learned just so much, and every day, I look forward to learning more.

I do not intend to dismiss the traditional education system; I myself am a product of it, and a successful one at that. Yet, Holberton School achieves one thing (among many) very well that I believe holds back student success in colleges and universities - removal of inter-student competition. At Holberton School, there are no grades. Rather, the emphasis is on understanding of the material you study. And not just individual understanding, but collective understanding.

Holberton Schoo...

The Holberton School offers anyone who's excited about software engineering (and willing to work really hard) a chance to reinvent their life for the better. Before attending the Holberton School, I completed my freshman year at Santa Clara University. I was frustrated by the lack of hands on and experimental learning. It felt like high school - where students where more focused on absorbing information quickly for high stakes exams than actually understanding things. The Holberton School is the opposite. It's a unique space where all your peers are there because they want to learn. You get to solve problems together, build cool things, and ultimately be the master of your own education. For me, overall, the first four months have been great. My advice to you is - don't wait. If you wan...

I am a student from batch 5 at Holberton School’s San Francisco campus. Our batch started in January of 2018, and finished the 9 months on-site intensive training in October 2018. By the end of November, I was accepted to have the opportunity to be employed as a software engineer intern at Holberton School.
In less than one year of training, I went from being an individual who has never written code on a whiteboard, to a professional being entrusted to maintain and develop features for the very web applications which were the conduit for my education. My experience at Holberton has been very fruitful, and I believe it has been and will be fruitful for others. I hope to share a bit about the model of Holberton to help prospective students make a more informed decision to determine if Ho...

In response to the previous review:

Their acceptance rate that was advertised has been taken down from their website because they changed business models (without communicating this externally to prospective students) and it is a source of frustration for many students. At one point for early cohorts their acceptance rate was somewhere around 3% but I believe they had pressure from investors to scale up their model so they decided to take anyone that could pass their simple test knowing that some % of people are going to quit and they will still have to pay them due to the ISA. This is INCREDIBLE SHADY of the founder to do since they have information on the attrition rate that they do not share publicly. So yes, they definitely take advantage of people to some degree. I would look in...

Holberton is simply the best school for learning how to learn. The approach they take to teach you is the right one. They don't hold your hand and they don't tell you what to do. You have to manage your own time and decide what you want to learn. They have their main curriculum you complete and mandatory exerices you have to do and form there the world is your oyster. There are many different ways to solve a problem and many different approaches, they will make you find the edge cases yourself and ask your peers for help more often than you might think. Setting up a environment where everyone feels like they are a part of something great. Everyday you learn something new and on the day that you don't you get to learn more about your batch peers and spend time in SF surrounded by tech an...

As a current student at Holberton School, I can’t rave enough about this place. The founders have established an almost perfect environment to learn how to be a software engineer. The school is located blocks away from Yahoo, Slack, LinkedIn, Salesforce, and many many more of some of the best tech companies I chose Holberton over a four year CS degree because I felt like it was the better value both financially and time-wise. No money upfront means the school is truly committed to making sure that every student has the real-world skills necessary to compete in today’s job market. After 4 months of study, I’m very pleased with my decision.
Holberton school’s list of mentors is impressive. They represent a range of tech companies both in and out of the San Francisco area. They are access...

I have been a student at Holberton for about a year. Before I came to this school, I knew virtually nothing about coding or how an operating system works internally. Now I feel I can confidentially say I possess that knowledge in addition to acquiring the priceless skill of independent learning with a large support system to aid in the process. Holberton's model of learning is palpable in everything that they are from the students to the setup; covered wall to wall in whiteboards and bean bags to lounge in comfortably when writing your code. It is in all these ways and more that Holberton successfully converts ambitious people with little technical knowledge into potential candidates for sought after companies like Apple and Google.

It is NOT an exaggeration when they say the program is intensive. There are tons of stuff to get through on a daily basis, and you have to put the time and effort to get the claimed results. It is a hands-on learning environment where you learn by doing rather than sitting in front of a lecturer and trying to retain that information. The curriculum is peer-learning based and there are no formal classrooms or teachers. You do have access to plenty of resources such as your peers from former and current cohort, staff, and mentors.
Another great advantage is that the school highly encourages and supports networking opportunities by listing and hosting relevant events and meetups where you are exposed to people and opportunities to connect with.
I personally really like the culture and e...

I am posting this anonymous review to caution potential students looking into Holberton School. They advertise online to "become a full-stack engineer" but you won't be one at the end of this program alone. The curriculum is no better than freeCodeCamp, and in some ways worse, and will cost 17% of your salary for 3.5 years. They have little to no job support, have no plans to become accredited, and care way more about investors, press, and doing sketchy marketing schemes than actually caring about the well-being of the students. If you are serious about being a software engineer or developer, please find affordable online resources and go to an accredited university. Don't fall for this scam.