#DBCShutdown response from Deep Dive Coding
By Andrea Sisneros-Wichman
Original Post Date: July 14, 2017
The news that Dev Bootcamp is winding down operations and will graduate its final class in December 2017 comes as tough news to all of us in the coding bootcamp industry. As we’ve come to learn, it takes a lot of effort and resources to successfully manage a coding bootcamp. I know, because I’ve been managing the Deep Dive Coding Bootcamps for three years. In August 2014, Central New Mexico Community College (CNM) acquired Deep Dive Coders, a coding bootcamp that had recently been established in Albuquerque, NM. As a manager of non-credit IT training programs, I was brought in to integrate Deep Dive Coders into CNM in partnership with the founder of Deep Dive Coders, John Mierzwa, and we became known as the Deep Dive Coding Bootcamp. (Deepdivecoding.com)
Deep Dive Coding immediately grew and became more successful as part of a community college than it ever was as a private industry. As the largest community college in the state with over 30,000 students, CNM has strong partnerships within Albuquerque, and was able to utilize those partnerships and resources to ensure the immediate success of Deep Dive. Since then, we’ve expanded to three different coding bootcamps, have graduated nearly 200 students, and most of those graduates have gone on to get awesome, high-paying jobs, and they’ve contributed to the economic development of New Mexico.
Bootcamps like Dev Bootcamp have been a model for us all along. They operate in big cities, where the market for potential students and employers is huge. There’s no way Albuquerque can compete with cities like San Francisco, but the idea of serving that many students has always been appealing. Dev Bootcamp cared about high-quality, immersive coding training while also focusing on soft skills. It was a well-rounded program, we admired what they accomplished, and it’s sad to see them go. It’s interesting that a bootcamp that charges over $10K can’t make it, when our much more affordable bootcamp is doing very well.
Why are we successful? It’s all about strategic partnerships. We have the support of a large community college. Our bootcamp employees are employees of the college. We have the support of well-established college departments such as marketing and outreach, CNM Connect (student success coaching), human resources, information technology, and an amazing business office who all support our bootcamps in one way or another. Our college has partnerships with other organizations who are contributing to the success of the program. The W.K. Kellogg Foundation in particular has granted us funds to help pay tuition for individuals who can’t afford it, including child care and tutoring costs. They also give us money to incentivize employers to take a chance on hiring our graduates as interns, or to subsidize the first contract for our graduates who start a company. They also pay the salary of our Career Coach, who teaches the soft skills and works with employers to help with job placement.
As part of a community college, we were able to get our bootcamps approved for GI Bill benefits, which is an amazing opportunity for our Veterans. We’re a partner with TechHire, who is helping to offset student tuition and payed for the development and instructor salary for our newest bootcamp that focuses on Java, Android, and Salesforce technology. We’re able to leverage resources to provide professional development opportunities for instructors and staff. We even have an AmeriCorps volunteer, who helps with social media marketing, student advisement, and administrative tasks.
These strategic partnerships mean everything to us. We couldn’t be successful without them, and they are the reason that we’re able to change the lives of so many students who may have never otherwise had the resources to become web developers.
