I see little difference between this and a community college degree. Community college CS associates can teach you everything you need to keep yourself up to date on basic algorithms and enough theory to get you ready for industry. It has the added benefit of also transitioning into a 4yr degree if you need it. All for about $20k. Some of the best engineers I know took 2 years at CC and then moved to a 4 year degree.
It really depends on the quality of the CC and it's faculty. I was a Physics major attending a branch university that merged with the local community college. The Phys dept was fantastic, though a single focus. The CS department was a joke.
I learned more about software on my own and by working with some of the physicists who specialized in data analysis that I did in any of my CS classes. Many of the CS junior/senior level CS students couldn't do anything real-world. Couldn't hand-optimize code. They also couldn't get anywhere without a fancy IDE that did everything for them.
The faculty wasn't very good. Some of them may have been OK at implementing the things they taught, but most of them seemed to follow the "if you can't do, teach" philosophy.
Had an argument with one of the faculty members about the viability of Python as a useful language. They dismissed it as anything more useful than a scripting language, and likened it to an uppity BASH substitute. I argued that when used properly, it is a very dynamic language with many uses.
All in all, the faculty was all over the board. There was a particular faculty member who was fairly skilled with machine learning and NLP. Until he went on vacation, joined a cult, wiped the NLP research server, and went around campus spouting how the planets were going to align the following December and life as we know it would end.
> Many of the CS junior/senior level CS students couldn't do anything real-world. Couldn't hand-optimize code. They also couldn't get anywhere without a fancy IDE that did everything for them.
So the student body wasn't top notch, which is perhaps to be expected at a CC (no entrance exams), but how was the faculty?
I'm a community college transfer, and seeing that 20k always reminds me how nice the California Community College system is. Completing an AS is 5K max, assuming you don't get 100% tuition covered which a large percentage do via BOG.
The best bootcamps are actually quite selective. This helps because it creates the kind of environment conducive to pair programming and learning. Community colleges are not very selective.
