1871 CEO Howard Tullman Welcomes New Designation Class

How Designation is bringing the bootcamp model to design

Sam Dewey

on Sep 15th, 2015

Photo via Designation Labs

By the numbers, DESIGNATION — a UX/UI design bootcamp based out of 1871 — has a pretty good thing going.

In less than two years, they’ve graduated over a hundred students and have a staggering 95 percent success rate when it comes to placing jobs for recent alumni. They’ve cranked out 10 classes (that average 15 students a pop) in an intense, 12-week program that often leads to 70-hour work weeks.

And remarkably — in a male-dominated industry — two-thirds of their graduates are women.

Those numbers, which have caught the attention of applicants, might remind you of the explosive rate at which coding bootcamps caught on in popularity. As one of the few options to quickly learn UI/UX in Chicago, DESIGNATION is leaning on the bootcamp structure to establish itself as the leader of the pack.

DESIGNATION co-founder and CEO Aaron Fazulak said that more than anything else, that structure helps set them apart. Here’s how it works:

After six weeks of virtual prep to make sure each student has a foundational understanding of design, participants arrive in Chicago and hit the ground running. During their first six weeks on site, students sprint to master their design chops, from HTML and CSS to front-end development. Thanks to a partnership with 1871, DESIGNATION pairs students with real-life clients during the last half of the program, giving them hands-on experience with live client work.

“Instead of the fake grocery store or the fake online coffee shop that you might have created in college, you’re actually working with real users with real problems,” Fazulak said. “In turn, the startup community is further supported because they don’t have to front $5,000 to $10,000 in cash. Instead they’re getting pro-bono, professional level work for free.”

An on-staff creative director and project manager work to ensure that outcomes are strong and meet client expectations.

The bootcamp, whose inaugural classes came primarily from the Chicagoland area, has seen a reversal in student demographics as word has spread. During the first year, as much as 70 percent of students came from the Chicagoland area, whereas today, that number is down to 30 percent.

Fazulak said students have come from countries like Ireland, Germany, the Philippines, and Australia.

“There’s something unique about our curriculum, our track record, and the diversity we offer that’s making the commute to Chicago for three months worth it,” he said.

Won You, a partner and curriculum director at DESIGNATION, said they re-assess the program's efficacy in order to offer the most up-to-date curriculum as possible. 

"Every six weeks, we aggregate feedback from the students and designers in the community and benchmark it against our curriculum and make the necessary changes," he said. "We can be nimble with the structure of our program and maintain the most relevant curriculum. We are always innovating and improving our program to teach the world's next generation of designers."

Designation cohorts start every six weeks, and they are currently accepting applications.

WELCOME DESIGNATION TO 1871

DESIGNATION COMING TO 1871

Should you enroll in a coding boot camp?

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MANUEL MARTINEZTroy Leach left construction for computers, enrolling last year in Dev Bootcamp's 10-week program.

Troy Leach moved to Chicago last year in search of glamour and fortune, much the way aspiring starlets beeline it to Hollywood. Except Leach, 46, is no starlet. After working construction in Colorado for the past 29 years—“My body hurts,” he says to explain his decision to quit—he was lured here by a computer programming training academy called Dev Bootcamp and the potential of a new, high-paying career after graduation.

It was, admittedly, a risk. Leach did not know much about programming or Chicago. But last year, he was accepted into Dev Bootcamp's intensive 10-week school in River North. In exchange for his $12,000 tuition (now $12,700), the academy promised to put career-switchers like Leach and hobbyists through 80-hour weeks to ready them for junior developer jobs at tech companies.

It's a tall order, converting novices into professionals in a field that can take years to master. But Dev Bootcamp claims to have it all figured out. It says more than 1,000 students nationwide have graduated since the program was launched in 2012 and 90 percent have found developer jobs within six months.

In Chicago, Dev Bootcamp and at least seven other nontraditional programs have sprung up since 2011, capitalizing on today's extraordinary demand for developers. Code.org, a Seattle nonprofit, estimates that each year the U.S. creates about 100,000 more tech jobs than computer-science graduates. “It's such an area of demand right now that we're finding our clients just want to see (a candidate's) work—the portfolio and thought process—and they're less interested in a traditional degree,” says Rosemary Walker, manager of the Chicago office of Creative Circle, a recruiter that places Web designers and developers.

Yet graduating from a coding academy hardly guarantees a soaring career. Veteran techies agree that no one—not even the smartest student at the most effective, immersive school—can become a full-fledged software developer or digital designer in 90 days. That means the long-term success of boot camp alumni depends on strong mentorship and on-the-job training, and such handholding often is in short supply at high-growth startups.

ILLUSTRATION: CHI BIRMINGHAM

Meanwhile, some industry experts predict that the demand for developers will level out. That would undercut starting salaries and diminish the appeal of candidates with only a few months' training.

To be fair, boot camps don't claim to churn out pros: “You come out as a dabbler, but then you can pick what to build on,” says Jim Jacoby, a Chicago user-interface and user-experience designer who advises a design-focused Chicago boot camp called Designation.

What they do promise: a head start that will enable graduates to learn more easily on the job, like a culinary school grad at a fine-dining restaurant. These are sexy, newfangled trade schools for high-paying, white-collar jobs, and if their grads can climb the ladder over time, this model could not only address the tech industry's staffing shortage but pose another challenge to traditional higher education.

The coding boot camp phenomenon is not confined to Chicago. Around the country, 241 such schools have sprouted in the past five years, according to Course Report, a boot camp-review site. Boot camps churned out 6,000 graduates nationwide last year; the typical graduate is a 29-year-old man who is getting into programming but already working in a technical field or at a startup. Course Report's research indicates a 75 percent job-placement rate nationally, with graduates earning an average starting salary of about $75,000.

Most boot camps are private companies that don't disclose revenue. As their market grows, some have become more than a conduit between aspiring programmers and tech companies—a few have turned into hot startups themselves. Last year, test-prep company Kaplan bought Dev Bootcamp for an undisclosed amount. In January, one San Francisco-based boot camp, Hack Reactor, acquired another, Makersquare, also for an undisclosed sum.

“It was the wild, Wild West all last year, and now you're going to see major consolidation,” says Aaron Fazulak, co-founder of Designation.

Dev Bootcamp co-founder Dave Hoover, who was a senior programmer at Chicago-based Groupon during its explosive ascent, says the boom reminds him of daily deals' heyday: “It's not a complex business model, and it's a model with pretty good cash flow and a two-sided market with students and employers,” he says. “And now they're popping up everywhere."

Tech firms as a rule de-emphasize academic credentials in favor of skills and portfolio projects, and while the boot camps aren't cheap, their tuition and time commitment are a fraction of those of universities or even community colleges. If you can get started in three months, then get paid to continue learning on the job, well, why not? Another selling point is flexibility. Part of the boot camp pitch to employers is if they suddenly need specialists in a particular programming language or framework, the schools can quickly revise their curriculums.

For Leach, the prospect of an in-demand, highly paid job—entry-level Web developers can earn $80,000, and Web designers can earn $60,000—was a compelling draw. “I know the world is moving in this direction,” he says. “Making a crapload of money is intriguing, too.”

But after moving to Chicago last March with his wife and starting classes at Dev Bootcamp, he soon hit a roadblock. He failed the test to advance beyond the program's first three-week phase, retook the course and failed again. He left the program and toyed with the idea of moving back to Colorado. (Dev Bootcamp students who fail an assessment may retake that phase at no cost. About 5 percent of students leave after twice failing an assessment.)

But he soon realized that Chicago offered other options and enrolled in January in Anyone Can Learn To Code, which holds classes at River North tech incubator 1871. For $9,000, the 12-week program offers night and weekend classes that allow students to hold a day job. (Leach paid $8,000.) To afford the training, Leach landed a $9-an-hour job working at O'Hare International Airport as a baggage handler. It was a far cry from his $60,000 construction salary, but this time around, he's getting the hang of coding. And, he says, “I've got this whole new spark. I enjoy it.” On his off days, he says he spends 14 to 15 hours practicing what he's learning.

What's not entirely clear is how boot camp-trained developers will fare over the course of their careers. Alumni “are still just a year or two out, so one of the things we have yet to see is the career trajectory and whether they're advancing and getting promotions,” says New York-based Course Report co-founder Liz Eggleston.

Some in the sector foresee nothing but blue sky. Boot camps are “here to stay,” says Anna Lindow, general manager of campus education at General Assembly, a New York-based boot camp that opened a Chicago facility last fall.

Chicago recruiter Rosemary Walker agrees: “This is the future of education. The apprenticeship model is cost-effective for people looking to enter the industry, as well as for employers.”

But while boot camps may threaten two-year and four-year colleges, today's outsize job-placement percentages won't last, others in the tech sector warn. At some point, the rising supply of coders will match demand, which is expected to flatten out. “There is a huge misalignment right now, and this money won't last,” says Michelle Joseph, CEO of People Foundry, a consulting firm that helps venture-backed startups build their teams.

What's more, Joseph says that the sexy, well-funded startups she represents are poor fits for boot-camp grads. That's because developers at such companies often work quickly, under pressure and with little supervision. Not only is that a tough environment for a would-be apprentice; it's not great for the startup, either. “You don't know what they don't know until the product doesn't work,” Joseph says.

“I'd be afraid of somebody coming in here (from a boot camp) because they'd be hacking out code and creating problems I would have to go back and fix,” says Kamil Chmielewski, director of software at Rithmio, a Chicago-based wearable-technology startup. “I've been coding for 10 years, and only now have I really started to understand what will result from each decision I make.”

VINCENT CABANSAGStudents in Starter League’s Web development class

Probably the best known of Chicago-based bootcamps, and one of the early pioneers, is Starter League, which eschews job-placement promises and is now emphasizing a longer, nine-month program that focuses on broad entrepreneurship training. Co-founder Mike McGee says he worries, too, that the market is overheated.

McGee predicts that many 90-day boot camp grads will be disappointed not only by the job market but in the job itself. “Why would you quit your job, cash out your 401(k) and come to a boot camp just to get a crappy job at the end of it?” he says.

But a crappy job is still a job. Claire Jencks walked away from the San Francisco National Maritime Park Association last year to spend eight weeks and $7,000 on tuition (rates have since increased) to learn coding at Chicago's Mobile Makers Academy in River North. Today she is earning more than $60,000 as an associate software developer at financial giant Capital One in San Francisco.

“I struggle with the sense that I'm not good enough and everyone else is better than me,” says Jencks, who opted to attend the coding academy in lieu of grad school and got a job less than a month after graduation. “I'm also learning that all beginning engineers are kind of making it up as they go along.” Larger companies with formal on-the-job training programs, such as Capital One or Chicago-based electronic payment-processor Braintree, acquired by PayPal in 2013, can take the time to mentor junior developers. Some startups are welcoming homes, too. Sprout Social, which manages social media for clients, has hired five Dev Bootcamp-trained engineers in the past year as well as five computer science grads with four-year degrees. All 10 are being mentored together.

The university-trained coders have a better grasp of programming theory, says Jim Conti, Chicago-based Sprout Social's director of talent. But he likes the mix. “The fact that both are coming into similar roles makes for greater diversity and strength.”

If he hacks it this time, Leach will enter the job market April 19.

Designer Bootcamp DESIGNATION Partners With 1871 to Connect Students With Startups

Designer Bootcamp DESIGNATION Partners

 With 1871 to Connect Students With Startups

Jim Dallke - Staff Writer

08/22/14 @3:31pm in Tech

A Chicago design bootcamp that launched earlier this year has recently partnered with 1871 to give its students access to startups in need of front-end website development help.

With a focus on job placement, DESIGNATION works with aspiring designers who learn a full-stack of design skills, including user experience research, interaction design, user interface design, and front-end development (HTML/CSS/JS).

DESIGNATION founder Kevin Yun took some time for a Q&A with Chicago Inno to tell us more about his company, the recent partnership with 1871, and why students should drop the $6,000 to take the course.

Q: How did DESIGNATION get its start, and how does the bootcamp work?

A: We were originally running part-time design classes at Manifest Digital since the summer of 2013. After two cohorts and a ton of feedback from aspiring students who wanted more, as well as companies interested in hiring our students, we knew we needed to ramp up. On January 2014, we went full-time, fully-immersive style, and became the first bootcamp to focus purely on full-stack digital design education and placement.

Our 12-week, in-person bootcamp is broken down into 4 phases:

- Virtual Phase (6 weeks virtual): Students build up their skills in Adobe software, learn simple syntax and semantics of front-end code, and get introduced to UX.

- Design Immersion (4 weeks in-person): Students spend their mornings working in teams to research, build, and practice their skills in different areas of design.

- Projects (6 weeks in-person): Students work on live client projects, building up pieces for their portfolio and polishing their resumes. We also start to make introductions to Hiring Partner companies.

- Post-Graduate: Students graduate and we stay connected with every single one of our alumni who are looking to get a job, until they find one. We have a recruitment network, DESIGNATION Black, that is set up to ensure graduate success, whether that's with job opportunities, apprenticeships/internships, and/or contract work.

Q: Why is it beneficial for people to take the classes?

A: Students at DESIGNATION are exposed to the full-stack of design, which we boil down to UX research, interaction design, UI design, and front-end development (HTML/CSS/JS). We graduated our first class of 20 students on June 26, and since then 13 out of 15 students looking for employment got a job. These numbers are continuing to increase as well, as improvement is visible from cohort to cohort. We also ask all our students to expect up to 8 months to find work after graduating.

Q: How does the partnership with 1871 work? 

A: We just partnered up with 1871 in mid August, and rolled out projects with their startups last week. Our students will work in teams for a month and a half, helping startups with everything from UX research, to UI high fidelity comps, and front-end coding. We've found that real live portfolio pieces are tremendously valuable when our graduates start to interview for jobs. We've also partnered with Founder Institute, but their classes won't start for another month.

We also have a standard RFP template that any company can request.

Q: What makes you guys different from other similar design classes? 

A: We are the first full-stack design bootcamp built to help any aspiring designer find a job by teaching them specific skills. There's a ton of overlap between technology, UX, design, and programming -- we've created a curriculum where you are expected to build up a T-shaped skill set in UX, UI, and coding. It's not expected that our students learn everything, but students naturally gravitate towards a specialization (usually in UI technical skills, or coding).

There are some other bootcamps that are starting to offer a full-immersion design program now, so that's great to see that others are understanding that this is a working model.

Q: Why should someone sign up for DESIGNATION? 

A:When you participate in DESIGNATION, you become part of the lifelong DESIGNATION network. For however long it takes for you to find a job, we will work with you to make it happen. Our program is perfect for people who possess a natural curiosity about the way things work, and are constantly looking for ways to make them better.