{"id":339992,"date":"2017-05-04T03:59:25","date_gmt":"2017-05-03T19:59:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/techcrunch.com\/?p=1484903"},"modified":"2017-05-04T03:59:25","modified_gmt":"2017-05-03T19:59:25","slug":"inside-devmountains-sweet-code-school","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/inside-devmountains-sweet-code-school\/","title":{"rendered":"Inside DevMountain\u2019s sweet code school"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Next Story<\/p>\n

Nav raises $13 million to help small businesses with credit\u00a0scores<\/h4>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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This is the story of how a candy factory by the name of Startup became one of the few accredited code schools for startups 140 years later in the heart of Provo, Utah.<\/p>\n

Factory machinery\u00a0was the killer app of the mid-nineteenth\u00a0century, speeding up the process and lowering costs for many upstarts of the day and they paved the way for a slew of candy companies to pop up around that time. In the year 1830, a man by the actual name of William Startup had hopped on the trend in Manchester, England.<\/p>\n

Thanks to these new technological innovations, Startup was able to create\u00a0a hard candy treat he called \u201cAmerican cough candy,\u201d hoping he\u2019d one day be able to sell it across the sea. Though Startup never made it to America, his son William Daw Startup wound up following a pretty young woman named Hagar Hicks to Utah during the great Mormon migration. He\u2019d joined the religion through a friend, met Hagar and his fate was sealed. Startup jr. married Hagar in Salt Lake City and soon after established his own candy factory 45 miles southward on the industrial outskirts of the newly budding town of Provo, right next to the hide and fur plant.<\/p>\n

Now we here<\/h2>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Around 140 years later, DevMountain<\/a> converted the so-appropriately-named Startup Building into a coding school for young entrepreneurs. Though you can still see sugar sap marks throughout some of the ceiling and walls where factory workers tossed products to and fro, the only thing made inside the building\u2019s exposed brick walls these days are websites and iOS apps.<\/p>\n

Students who come to the school will find themselves surrounded by a backdrop of gargantuan mountain peaks and a sleepy suburb of older homes and newer apartment buildings built for students studying at the nearby Brigham Young University. But not much else is happening around that area. A train sometimes stops across the road where sits Provo\u2019s commuter rail station and the Startup family still runs a candy store nestled into a crevice of the school\u2019s first floor but the hours are odd and there\u2019s not much nightlife near the place (there are three bars in the entire city).<\/p>\n

Co-founder Tyler Richards says that\u2019s a good thing, actually. It keeps the students focused on what they\u2019re really here for.<\/p>\n

Work<\/h2>\n

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Peek into DevMountain on any afternoon while class is in session and you\u2019ll see about a\u00a0hundred students eagerly listening, laptops open and a series of neon lines of code popping up against black backdrops as their teacher leads the discussion\u00a0in one of the many rooms, named after certain ski parks along the Wasatch Front.<\/p>\n

Students take breaks in between classes to play ping pong or foosball\u00a0and get a fresh soda from the installed fountain on the second floor\u00a0of the three-story building. Soda, like many<\/a> confectionary treats, is very popular<\/a> in this part of the world.<\/p>\n

Though DevMountain\u2019s main campus is in Provo, it also has offices in Salt Lake City, Phoenix, Arizona, and Dallas, Texas. But finding a place where you can\u00a0focus on the work seems like a pretty good idea if you are going to go to one of these schools. Code camps can be grueling and often require students to sit in class or work on projects from morning to night. DevMountain is no exception with its 12-week training course. Although\u00a0Richards did point out that\u00a0many students are able to get away on weekends and go skiing, snowboarding, hiking, and many other outdoor activities as well as explore the (trust me, breathtaking<\/a>) five national parks Utah has to offer.<\/p>\n

Nothings into somethings<\/h2>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

So it\u2019s tough\u00a0work but does DevMountain measure up? Code schools can have a stigma attached for not helping new developers find a job after going through the curriculum or of simply taking people\u2019s money.<\/p>\n

DevMountain aims to be one of the better code schools and says it has placed at least 80-85 percent of its students in jobs within the first three months with local tech companies like Qualtrics and Adobe as well as some of the larger tech firms in Silicon Valley.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s also one of the lucky few to get snatched up by a bigger organization for its efforts \u2014 Capella, a Minneapolis-based online education platform, purchased<\/a> the school for $20 million almost one year ago to the day.<\/p>\n

Baby, I like your style<\/h2>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Something else unique to DevMountain is that, unlike other code schools, the low-cost and readily available real estate in Provo enables the school to offer students free housing during their three-month stay. It has kept that promise of free housing for all four of its locations. Tuition costs hover around $10,900 for a full-time student but that\u2019s pretty much less than rent in San Francisco so one could argue it\u2019s cheaper to put yourself through a DevMountain boot camp\u00a0than stay in SF at your current job if you are thinking of changing careers or brushing up on your code skills.<\/p>\n

I sat down with some of the students, teachers and the other co-founders to discuss the difference between what DevMountain offers and other code camps that have popped up over the last few years. Check out my interview with Sharp and his colleagues in the video above.<\/p>\n

*This article is part of a larger series focusing on the Utah tech scene. We\u2019re going to be sprinkling several of these articles and videos throughout the TechCrunch newsfeed for the next couple of weeks, so strap on your ski boots and stay tuned as we guide you through the \u201cSilicon Slopes\u201d!<\/em><\/p>\n

Featured Image: Felicia Williams<\/small> <\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\"\" Factory machinery\u00a0was the killer app of the mid-nineteenth\u00a0century, speeding up the process and lowering costs for many upstarts of the day and they paved the way for a slew of candy companies to pop up around that time. In the year 1830, a man by the actual name of William Startup had hopped on the trend in Manchester, England. Thanks to these new technological innovations, Startup was able… Read More<\/a><\/p>\n

\n<\/img><\/a> <\/img><\/a> <\/img><\/a> <\/img><\/a> <\/img><\/a> <\/img><\/a>\n<\/div>\n

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