According to a WSJ article[1] a few days ago about Flatiron's $5.5 million funding round, "More than 98% of its students get jobs through the Flatiron School’s placement efforts."
It's hard to criticize someone for asking for help (you have to do what you have to do), but if the Flatiron School is truly this successful at preparing attendees for real-world development and helping close to 100% of them find work after just four months (as opposed to four years), I think it's to be expected that some folks are going to be less empathetic.
Interestingly, despite Flatiron's $12,000 tuition, the WSJ article says "The school’s student acceptance rate is less than 8%." That suggests they're not just accepting anybody who can pay; ostensibly they are filtering for ability/accomplishment. If this is the case, and the placement figures are accurate, there's no reason Flatiron (and programs like it) couldn't make their money on the back-end. Assume that graduates are placed in entry-level positions paying $80,000 on average. A 20% placement fee would earn Flatiron $16,000, $4,000 more per student than tuition. If you assume a class size of 30, and a 98% placement rate, you're looking at an additional $116,000 in revenue per graduating class.
Yes, there's risk with this model, but if these schools are truly capable of placing nearly all of their students in in-demand development jobs after just four months, the risk seems modest. After all, when the market turns, the pool of people willing to pay $12,000 for a four month program is going to dry up anyway.
Ponying up $12k shows some amount of initiative, as does applying, and sticking through the course.
I know we're getting off-topic here--
Generally, I'm all for having more people who are qualified to write code, but I'm opposed to For-Profit Education systems as I believe incentives aren't aligned.
Right now, Flatiron needs to establish itself as credible, and worthy of your tuition and time, by separating itself from the other would-be "L2Code Schools." So it's in their best interest to be highly selective.
But what happens when they hit critical mass? The risk of turning out like the Art Institute, where they no longer care about the quality of applicants, and are instead focused on revenues.
What if they already get a placement fee? That would mean they make money on the front and backend, which if they dropped their tuition fees, would drop their income.
Comments
According to a WSJ article[1] a few days ago about Flatiron's $5.5 million funding round, "More than 98% of its students get jobs through the Flatiron School’s placement efforts."
It's hard to criticize someone for asking for help (you have to do what you have to do), but if the Flatiron School is truly this successful at preparing attendees for real-world development and helping close to 100% of them find work after just four months (as opposed to four years), I think it's to be expected that some folks are going to be less empathetic.
Interestingly, despite Flatiron's $12,000 tuition, the WSJ article says "The school’s student acceptance rate is less than 8%." That suggests they're not just accepting anybody who can pay; ostensibly they are filtering for ability/accomplishment. If this is the case, and the placement figures are accurate, there's no reason Flatiron (and programs like it) couldn't make their money on the back-end. Assume that graduates are placed in entry-level positions paying $80,000 on average. A 20% placement fee would earn Flatiron $16,000, $4,000 more per student than tuition. If you assume a class size of 30, and a 98% placement rate, you're looking at an additional $116,000 in revenue per graduating class.
Yes, there's risk with this model, but if these schools are truly capable of placing nearly all of their students in in-demand development jobs after just four months, the risk seems modest. After all, when the market turns, the pool of people willing to pay $12,000 for a four month program is going to dry up anyway.
[1] http://blogs.wsj.com/venturecapital/2014/04/09/flatiron-scho...
Ponying up $12k shows some amount of initiative, as does applying, and sticking through the course.
I know we're getting off-topic here--
Generally, I'm all for having more people who are qualified to write code, but I'm opposed to For-Profit Education systems as I believe incentives aren't aligned.
Right now, Flatiron needs to establish itself as credible, and worthy of your tuition and time, by separating itself from the other would-be "L2Code Schools." So it's in their best interest to be highly selective.
But what happens when they hit critical mass? The risk of turning out like the Art Institute, where they no longer care about the quality of applicants, and are instead focused on revenues.
What if they already get a placement fee? That would mean they make money on the front and backend, which if they dropped their tuition fees, would drop their income.