Since January, I have been teaching a commercial AI engineering course. During a recent session, one of the students told me that they made a mistake signing up. It had nothing to do with my teaching methods, they just said it wasn’t for them.
This got me thinking. What is the actual value of such courses? Who are they for? Can they help anyone?
Companies offering these courses often present them as an easy way to switch to a high-earning career. Neither of these points is universally true.
Learning to code is hard
Students attenting commercial courses have various backgrounds and goals. Many have a manual, relatively low-paying job and they hope that learning to code will allow them to turn their lives around.
Many of these folks think that learning to code is akin to learning to operate some sort of industrial machinery or that programmers just sit all day and don’t do much. Misleading marketing by companies offering coding courses hardly helps to set the record straight.
Software engineering requires a mindset very different from manual repetitive labor. Most importantly, software engineering is about solving problems, and problem-solving requires abstract thinking similar to that used in mathematics. As software engineers, we don’t work with stuff you can touch. We work with ideas.
Learning how to properly work with ideas takes a long time. And it’s not for everyone. I believe that if you want to become a software engineer, you need to have at least some predisposition. I am not saying you have to be a genius, but certain inborn character traits make some poeple more suited for the job then others.
You also need to possess some preliminary knowledge. For example, you should know how to use a computer at least at an intermediate level. That’s more than just opening a web browser and posting on social media. Can you work with Excel formulas? Can you update or install an operating system? Can you perform basic system administrator tasks, like installing new software on your computer or removing unnecessary files? When buying a new laptop, do you understand what the specs mean? If you want to learn to code, you should have answered positively on at least some of these questions.
You should also consider your preferred style of work. Do you like being outside? Do you like to move? Do you like to work with physical tools and materials? Coding is the opposite of that. Software engineers spend most of their workday sitting on an office chair in front of a computer screen. Some people are fine with it, others see it as torture.
Advertised salaries are misleading
Some software engineers are paid really well. But not all. Salaries advertised by companies offering coding courses are what maybe the top 5% of engineers get. These are the best of the best. They have tons of experience and often exceptional talent.
More realistically, a junior software engineer in my country can expect a salary somewhere near the national average; not bad for a fresh college graduate, but still a far cry from what the ads say.
The exact amount of money you’ll earn shouldn’t even be your main concern. A few years ago, the demand for software engineers was much higher than the supply. Companies hired anyone who showed at least some skill. But since then, the situation has changed drastically. Tech companies are laying off lots of workers, demand after new hires is low, and the number of university and commercial course graduates has increased, which means more competition. You are competing not only against other graduates but also against seasoned veterans who, for whatever reason, lost their previous job.
And like it or not, people with experience or at least a university degree have an advantage over someone who attended a coding bootcamp.
Success is not guaranteed
If you read this far, you might start to think that turning your career around by attending a commercial coding course is an impossible feat. I wouldn’t say so. I just think that if you are an average student attending such a course, your chances are lower than the company offering the course wants you to believe.
According to a survey conducted by Forbes, about 31 percent of coding bootcamp graduates found a job in 3 months or less after finishing the course. Czechitas, a Czech organization focused on getting more women into the IT industry, said in its annual report that 8280 participants finished at least one course lasting 4 or more hours in 2023. 389 women found a job thanks to their help. This is less than 5% of all participants.
I think this number is a lower bound, and the courses are more efficient than that. A 4-hour course is not enough to change your career, so I would only consider significantly longer courses. It’s also unclear what the number 389 captures. Many women likely found a job by themselves without Czechitas’ help. The course helped them, but they are not captured in the statistics. Still, I think the real number is reliably below 50%.
Considering both the Forbes survey and the Czechitas annual report, I’d say the odds are not that bad. But they are far from guaranteed success.
Who can coding courses help?
I think there are groups of people who are especially suited to benefit from commercial coding courses.
If you have or are currently getting a college degree in a field with at least some quantitative elements, for example, natural sciences, engineering, or finance, and you want to steer your career in a different direction, then you can gain a lot from attending such a course. I know many people with physics or finance degrees who later became software engineers or data scientists.
The second group that can benefit from commercial courses is professionals established in their fields. Learning to code will help them grow even more. If you know how to code, you can automate boring tasks, analyze data in novel ways, or create apps that other people in your field can use.
If you don’t belong to these two groups, you don’t necessarily have to give up your dream. But realize that things are probably much harder than advertisements say. You’ll have to work hard, deal with frustration, be willing to change your thinking style, and accept that success is not guaranteed.
If you are considering a commercial coding course, ask yourself these questions:
- Do I enjoy solving logical riddles? Am I at least mildly good at it?
- Do I have at least some intermediate knowledge about computers?
- Am I willing to spend my day in an office looking at a computer screen?
If you are unsure if coding is something you’ll enjoy doing, I recommend you start with very short introductory courses or even free online tutorials on platforms like YouTube. Avoid courses that last half a year or longer and require 10+ hours of your time each week.