

CNBC Investigates Why Some Students Choose Hack Reactor Over College

Owen Poindexter

CNBC Investigates Why Some Students Choose Hack Reactor Over College's Image

CNBC spent the day at Hack Reactor, learning about our course and getting to know some of our students and alumni. News anchor Aditi Roy explored what makes our program so successful, and why some students even choose Hack Reactor over college. She also caught up with Cofounder Shawn Drost, who challenged conventional notions of how quickly students can learn.

Drost compares our program to learning a foreign language by immersing yourself in that country. Our students would find that an apt comparison--they live and breathe coding 70+ hours a week for three solid months. This means that they don’t just learn new tools, they learn to think like a software engineer.

Roy also chatted with recent grad Muhsin “Moose” Abdul-Musawwir, who recently joined Esurance as a software engineer, and current students Wayne Adams and Tabitha Blagdon. Blagdon echoes a common sentiment among students in the second half of our program, saying that she’s “amazed at what I can do today.”

The attention from mainstream outlets like CNBC shows that coding bootcamps are increasingly prominent in higher education. More students like Abdul-Musawwir are considering them as a complement or even an alternative to a traditional four-year degree, especially career-focused students who see education primarily as a way to prepare for the job market. Our graduates typically earn back the Hack Reactor tuition within 10 weeks of accepting a job. Compare this to the vast majority of 4-year institutions where students take years, even decades, to pay back student loans.

None of this is to disparage traditional higher education and its important place in our society--only that coding bootcamps are forcing their way into the conversation with their incredible student outcomes.

Ready to take the next step in your career? Apply to our program.

Read more:

Two Days in the Life at Hack Reactor

A Question to Ask Every Coding Bootcamp: How Do You Calculate Your Outcome Stats?

Why This Student Chose a Coding Bootcamp Over Finishing His CS Degree