Lighthouse Labs

Attending Lighthouse Labs' bootcamp was a serious kick in the butt. It's an unconventional approach to teaching, but very rewarding.
It's no stroll in the park, hence why they call it a bootcamp. However, if you're committed to learning and are serious... Read More about taking your education in your own hands, and make the effort, the instructors will go above and beyond to help you.

I wasn't taking the course for job support but more as a side course to further my skills for my current job. I learned quite a bit but what made the course interesting was the passion that exuded from all of the students as well as the lecturers. You... Read More can tell that coding is something they definitely do as a hobby apart from Lighthouse so when you ask them questions out of the curriculum, the are able to answer most of the time! What's also great is that they share offices with Launch Academy so you can see what startups are working on and mingle with them to learn more about the technology!

The main selling feature of this bootcamp is the career services and the massive alumni community you become apart of when you graduate. Lots of industry connections who frequently hire right out of the bootcamp. Several exclusive Slack channels immediately... Read More give you hundreds of connections who you can troubleshoot with and help you with finding work. The value of this program really pays off after graduation.

The bootcamp itself is super intense, but this is what you want. Learning code is tough, and you have to put in the hours. But theres lots of mentors on site to give you one on one help and the instructors are the bomb. An in house made learning management website gives you a great reference tool. In addition to teaching you how to code, they also teach you the tools of the trade so you can go on to make your own stuff as well as work for others.

Facility is decent, probably the weakest part of the program. Long staircase makes the toughest part of the bike ride in carrying your ride up to the top floor. Ventilation leaves something to be desired and if the classroom is full then it makes for a very busy learning environment (bring headphones).

I came with no prior coding background whatsoever and managed to find a full time job after graduation.

Pros:
- Accelerated learning: It would've taken me twice as long to learn this stuff on my own
- Awesome TAs: Talking with TAs is where you learn the... Read More most
- Excellent job support: They do everything they can to help you land that first gig
- Friendly and helpful staff
- The network opportunities

Cons:
- Curriculum's over emphasis on passing tests is at the detriment of learning
- Too many team projects: you end up learning and doing less overall as you never get to build a project from beginning to end by yourself.
- Upon graduation, there will still be a lot to learn. You end up feeling like you know a bit of everything, but not much to a great depth.

Overall, I feel like the first 4 weeks were perfectly paced, and you continued learning. After that, the focus on passing tests and team projects made it so that you were more concerned with surviving and stitching together working code, then actually learning and building a strong base of fundamental knowledge. That being said, I still recommend Lighthouse Labs.

Attending the lighthouse labs boot camp was an extremely stressful experience of consistently being pushed out of your "comfort zone" to learn the basics of teaching yourself how to learn.

I hit "brick walls" multiple times over the course of two months,... Read More and every time there was a mentor or T.A. available to help me through the problems.

While I have not found a job after graduation yet I feel very confident in the support that I have received from the career services from the labs and am hoping that it will help me lead to full employment soon.

Pros:
-I ended up with a job
-Some very good instructors
-Met some cool people
-Learned more than I would have if I had spent 2 months learning on my own

Cons:
-Difficulty was pretty over-hyped. The "One size fits all" approach that they market doesn't really... Read More work out very well, as I found a lot of the material to be time-consuming, but not especially difficult.
-Some of the lessons were pretty awful, to the point of being a waste of time, either due to poor instructors or trivial examples.
-Along the same lines, the TAs were pretty hit and miss in terms of quality.
-Poor job setting expectations re: jobs. It seems fairly misleading to say graduates make ~50k/year when in reality almost everyone gets an internship (or a temporary job) that pays close to minimum wage hoping to make more afterwards.
-Poor organisation. There were several days when instructors were late, or just didn't show up to teach that day and someone ended up filling in. Some other examples: there was meant to be peer code review throughout the cohort that simply never happened, along with weekly interview prep that was either inconsistent or skipped entirely.

Overall it's difficult to say whether I would recommend attending Lighthouse Labs. On the one-hand, there is some value to be had here (as I did get a job in a more interesting field), but I think that the current price tag is too steep for what you're getting.

I've earned a BSc at a large university, a Diploma of Technology at a small one, and I've done Web Development Bootcamp at Lighthouse Labs. Of the three, Lighthouse has by far the best overall teaching quality, student/teacher ratio, and continuing support... Read More of alumni. The Lighthouse crew works to make sure the school's vibe is welcoming and inclusive - e.g. we have trans-friendly bathroom signs. There is a strong sense of camaraderie and community. The place is full of amazing people - instructors, mentors, TAs, classmates... everyone, really. Whenever I felt overwhelmed or in over my head (which you should, at a bootcamp: if you don't, you're not being pushed hard enough, so you're not getting your money's worth) I always knew help would be there when I asked for it. Not just for specific coding questions, but help getting organized, prioritization, and reassurance that I was keeping up and doing well in the program. I can't recommend Lighthouse Labs enough. I had an incredible time there. I rave about it to friends and strangers.

In the iOS Bootcamp the pace of learning was intense, and it never lets up. And that is one of its best features. You never feel like you had an easy day, or a wasted day. The lectures start with intermediate topics and grow in complexity very quickly... Read More from one day to the next. You are always covering new ground, mastering new concepts, and taking on bigger and more complex assignments. By the end of the 8 weeks we were all creating projects we wouldn't have thought possible in week 1. The leap in learning you make in the 8 weeks in truly incredible.
I had no background in coding, comp-sci, or programming but was still able to handle the workload, just barely. The TA's and instructors made sure that they were available to help, but never just handed you the answer. They insist that you learn as you go, rather than giving you the answer, which I am grateful for. With an extremely low ratio of teachers to students, help is always at hand, 12 hours a day. It is this close interaction with instructors and other class mates that I feel really makes all the difference. It is like having a private mentor for 8 weeks, 12 hours day, sharing all of their knowledge openly.
The staff are amazing. Instructors, Admin, and everyone else really come together to help make the bootcamp experience the best it can be for everyone. There are plenty of social events, as well as meaningful and important opportunities to interact with and get to know many of Vancouver's top tech talent.
The only thing I wish had been done differently is the prep work they recommend you do before taking the course. It should be more in depth and tougher. I think students would get more out of the course if they were more prepared. Having said that, if you have any programming, coding, or comp-sci experience you will probably not need the prep. My comments are more directed at those of us without any background in tech.

When I first decided to attend LHL, I was excited, but also full of fear. That disappeared quickly when I realized that I would gain out of the program what I put into it, and that as long as I was committed to succeeding, the instructors and TA's would... Read More come in early and stay late! Super supportive bunch, and probably the best group of people I've ever met.