Before paying for an IT school or a bootcamp
Sometimes I receive calls from friends and their friends, and the question they ask is about becoming an IT professional. Most of the time, people ask about private schools and bootcamps. Often, people would call because they found some costly training, and they want to know if they should go for it or not. To all people who call me, I say the same thing repeatedly — before spending a lot of money and time on some IT school or a bootcamp, you should do the following items:
- Get some inexpensive training.
- Meet industry professionals.
- Meet someone who has completed the school/bootcamp that you are planning to take.
Get some inexpensive training
First, you should buy some inexpensive training online. There are websites like Udemy where you can purchase some courses for around $20. It is better if you know people who can recommend some courses that they took. But if you don’t have such people around you, read reviews of the course, watch the preview, and if you seem to like the trainer — buy the course and complete it. This won’t take months to finish and won’t cost you much money, but you will feel what you want to go for.
If you liked the course, buy some more inexpensive courses. Finish them, and if you like what you did as part of the course — continue to the next step.
Meet industry professionals
The goal is to hear about your future career from other people, from people that you have around you. Find some industry professionals who work in the area where you plan to start your career. Ideally, the more people you find — the better. But I usually suggest finding at least three people. It is also a good idea to find people that are of different age. This will help you to hear various perspectives. It might be beneficial to compare and contrast the information you receive from multiple people on the same subject.
Meet those people and talk to them about their jobs. Here are some ideas of what you can ask:
- What do you like about your job?
- What do you not like about your job?
- What hard/soft skills should someone in your field have?
- What is your day look like?
- What are the tasks that take most of the workday?
- How does your job affect your health?
- What advice can you give to someone new in the industry?
- Can you suggest any books or training material that might be handy?
- Ask how they got into position, what drew them to this field, which school they went to, etc.?
- If possible, talk about their pay.
You got the idea. Meet real people, talk to them, figure out as much information as possible. You can Google question ideas to gather as much information as possible. I know some people who went to school, paid money but hated the job when they started working — you can lower the risk by simply talking to people who are already in the field.
When meeting the people, ask them if you can shadow them at work for a day. My brother-in-law wanted to become a respiratory technician. He went and shadowed our other relative for a couple of days, which helped him understand that he is interested and wants to pursue that career.
In some cases, there might be a possibility to volunteer for some time.
Meet someone who has completed the school/bootcamp that you are planning to take
The idea is simple — you need to hear from people who already went through the program you are trying to finish. By talking to such people, you can figure out tons of information.
- How did they like the curriculum?
- Did trainers deliver materials in an easy-to-understand manner?
- How much time did the student spend doing homework?
- How often would a student research something on their own because they didn’t get it in the class?
- From what they know, how many students ended up finding a job?
Again, the idea is simple — don’t just blindly go to school/bootcamp, but find people who have already gone through the same school. The more people you see, the more information you will gather, the lower the risk of going into a low-quality school.
Blessings with your journey!
