Milwaukee software development bootcamp devCodeCamp Inc. has introduced a new tuition program based on students’ future earnings.
devCodeCamp offers a full-time, 12-week full-stack web development course at Ward 4 in Milwaukee. The organization says 90% of its students find employment after graduation.
devCodeCamp’s new Student Investment Program is an income share agreement in which students attend devCodeCamp without paying the $17,800 tuition, and then pay the school once they are making a salary of more than $40,000. The payments constitute 15% of their income for three years, not to exceed $30,000, and would be stopped if the student gets laid off or can’t find employment that pays above the threshold.
The program is open to U.S. citizens 18 or older who have a high school or GED, a credit score higher than 550, no defaults, no bankruptcies, no student loan debt greater than $30,000, and no total debt greater than $40,000 (excluding home mortgages).
devCodeCamp announced it is offering the ISA to help students avoid debt. It is the sixth program in the nation to offer an ISA, said Paul Jirovetz, vice president of operations.
“It opens up an opportunity for people who otherwise couldn’t get a loan, but that doesn’t mean they can’t excel at a program like this,” Jirovetz said. “It also removes some of the fear for an individual leaving their job” to pursue a career in software engineering.
“At devCodeCamp, we believe our students should be able to become expert software engineers without falling into crippling debt,” said Michael Terrill, director of instruction. “With the Student Investment Program, we’re trading a quality education for an equity stake in our students’ future earnings. We invest in our students, because we’re confident they’ll succeed. This puts the student and devCodeCamp into a positive alignment.”
Established in 2015, the company offers its program about once a month, to eight or 10 students at a time. Class sizes are intentionally small to allow for more one-on-one training, Terrill said. The course covers JavaScript, Git/Github, SQL, HTML, C#, .NET, Visual Studio and CSS.
“There’s a lot of companies in the southeast Wisconsin area that they employ a lot of people who do these technologies, which is why we teach it,” Terrill said.
