Are the Skillcrush classes worth it?
April 27, 2014 9:58 PM   Subscribe

That's basically it - I'm not finding any reviews online. Has anyone else taken it?

It was recommended to someone recently on the Green, and I'm thinking about taking the Developer series. Did you think it was worth the cost? Any recommendations about getting the most out of it? It is more expensive than both community college (in my state, at least) and other online DIY education resources (CodeAcademy, Lynda, etc), so I'm both intrigued and somewhat anxious about plonking down the cash.

Will pop back in later and answer relevant questions or memail me.
posted by jrobin276 to Work & Money (4 answers total) 2 users marked this as a favorite
 
I haven't plonked down cash for any coding courses because I'm not switching careers to become a developer; I'm just dabbling.

As I've been playing around with several free intros here and there, for me personally, I just liked the vibe of the free Skillcrush 10-day teaser.

They have pretty layouts and chatty explanations, so it feels like oh, I'm just playing around, and hey, look, I learned something. Even better, the chatty explanations don't assume I'm a bro-grammer or a 12-year-old.

The poster in that thread was a 35-year-old woman who described herself as dabbling in different fields. I thought she might enjoy the Skillcrush vibe, as I did.

If money is really tight, maybe you could get by with a [Coding Language] for Dummies book and a lot of personal effort. If you want more handholding/fun, it'll cost more.
posted by Bentobox Humperdinck at 7:56 AM on April 28, 2014


I think the big question, and it's usually the big question, is not so much "is it worth $400" as "is it actually going to get anyone a real job doing X". Which seems a little questionable, at least at the pay rates they're citing, but the fact that you evidently walk out of it with a letter of recommendation and a portfolio is kind of interesting and make that just a smidge more probable than Codecademy. On the other hand, I'm pretty sure the same material would require nine credit hours and about $1500 at the community college kind of level here--if you can do the same for less than that in a real classroom I'd absolutely do that instead. (I'm just a dabbler, too, but did look at career switching at one point.)
posted by Sequence at 8:56 AM on April 28, 2014


I'm taking the web developer track at Skillcrush. I also heard of it because it was recommended to someone here. I'm about halfway through the JavaScript portion of the course. I feel like I've learned more about HTML and CSS from skillcrush than from a college course I took a couple of years ago. This course requires more independent thought versus the college course I took where I just followed along with the textbook. In Skillcrush, we're working on a portfolio and, while they do give you examples of layouts, it's up to the student to create the layout with no follow the steps instructions. There's also access to a community board where students can post questions and help each other out. I would recommend it. Also, you don't have to pay all the money up front but can set it up through paypal to deduct on a monthly basis.
posted by hazel79 at 12:11 PM on April 28, 2014


hazel79, do you feel confident that you can get a job/work immediately after the track? Is there a lot of support from Skillcrush in this area? I'm heavily considering the developer track as well because I want to fasttrack switching careers, but like the OP, I'm a little hesitant about the cost.
posted by a.non...muse at 6:06 PM on May 3, 2014


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