Training provider Le Wagon is among several firms that are offering technology boot camps. PHOTO: LE WAGON
SINGAPORE: Technology enthusiast Danish Hisham proves his younger self wrong with each passing day at his first tech job as a product manager at digital start-up Affinite Solutions.
He overcame his self-doubt over his lack of coding expertise, picking up enough knowledge in coding and industry practices through an intensive course to even manage a team of coders upon taking up the role last November.
Danish, 28, taught himself basic coding through free online video tutorials while pursuing a degree in a totally unrelated field – international relations – at the University of London from 2018 to 2021.
“I felt all university students should understand a bit of technology, so I did a couple of basic coding projects, like a Web script to automatically fill in forms.
“I didn’t go too much further, as I didn’t feel I was smart enough to code as a full-time job,” he said, adding that he soon hit a wall with unsolvable problems.
Sensing that he needed more structured guidance and peer support, he signed up for a nine-week boot camp from July to September 2022 with training provider Le Wagon.
Boot camps, like the one Danish attended in Web development, refer to intensive training courses, often in technology, that seek to rapidly gear up beginners for new careers.
Students receive live instruction from an instructor either online or in classrooms, building original projects from scratch that are evaluated by peers, industry experts and their instructors. This differs from other types of online courses that rely mostly on pre-recorded videos.
Boot camps work on a compressed timeline spanning mere weeks rather than years, as with more traditional courses like a university degree, and are catching on among job seekers.
The quick turnaround is a feature of the Infocomm Media Development Authority’s Tech Immersion and Placement Programme (TIPP), which aims to build a pool of industry-ready, entry-level infocomm technology professionals for Singapore’s vibrant tech sector.
Under the scheme, Singaporeans can receive up to 90% in government subsidies for any of the 10 boot camp courses offered by three providers: Le Wagon, General Assembly and Rocket Academy. Upon graduation, they must work in a tech role such as data analyst, mobile app developer, or user experience designer.
Le Wagon offers two boot camps, one culminating in a certificate in web development and the other in data science, said Melvin Lee, its city manager here.
Since these courses began in 2019, 300 students in Singapore have graduated with a certificate in web development and another 80 in data science, with 76% of the total number receiving the TIPP grant, said Lee.
About nine in 10 of Le Wagon’s boot camp graduates here secured roles in the tech industry within six months of completion, he added.
Rocket Academy has been offering a boot camp course in software engineering since late 2020. Participants can choose between a four-month full-time course and an eight-month part-time version.
About 150 have graduated from the boot camp, with over 90% finding work as software engineers “within six months of actively applying”, said the firm’s chief executive Neo Kai Yuan. — The Straits Times/ANN
