Outsized Opportunities, CIRR and Other Stats That Matter

CIRR’s 2022 full-year members reports are now live and we wanted to take a moment to share our thoughts on the results, which are a testament to the tenacity of our alums, who are succeeding in today’s uniquely difficult market.

Ultimately, Codesmith was never about the immediate outcomes so much as the broader capacities we instill in folks, which deliver the outcomes that truly motivate us - which are lifelong outcomes of continuous career growth, whether that be moving swiftly into leadership roles, solving problems through entrepreneurship, or even for professional self-enrichment.

“Data provided by CIRR helped me identify those with the best outcomes and come up with a shortlist. If a bootcamp didn’t want to be represented in the data—it was a red flag. I believe every educational institution should have transparent outcomes, especially for “non-traditional” institutions."

Marc Burnie, Software Engineer at Amazon Web Services

To us, this value is ensuring residents leave with the capacities that serve them best in a field where the finest engineers can adapt to new technologies and assume the much-needed role of shepherding complex societal problems from ideation to implementation.  

They include the ability to teach oneself new languages, as modern engineers must often work in languages outside of JavaScript, and technical communication, the ability to talk through code and explain it to non-technical team members that SWEs increasingly interface with.

CEO and Co-Founder, Will Sentance, says that "when preparing for Codesmith you have the ‘Hard Parts’ workshops designed to give a complete mental model of how programming languages really work (into advanced stuff like ‘lexical scoping’ or ‘async I/O’). 

“But the reality is that your job after Codesmith won’t have a ‘Hard Parts’ workshop on the technology it uses. We instill the approaches and resilience to develop your own ‘Hard Parts’ when you join a new team with its unique tech - taught with a pedagogy that doesn’t hand you the answer but teaches you how to learn any new thing.

The outcomes (we look at some of the nuances of them later in this post) are really about highlighting the pedagogy of the program. Teaching these capacities over skills is ultimately the source of the outsized opportunities for our grads. 

“We know that it can be a difficult journey at Codesmith, and quite a contrast to the pre-program experience, now 8+ years in you can see the pedagogy works - via the promotion trajectory and leadership of alumni years after graduating,” Will says.

“But in the early days, we had to show it worked - now! - to support that approach. So outcomes in the first year after graduation were a good way to show residents that “it’s worth it” when they’re struggling in the admittedly difficult program and building their resilience as engineers. 

“It was important to show that it pays off with truly autonomous roles (‘mid-level' software engineers who offer value without hand-holding) and the fulfillment you get after this difficult program.”

Codesmith’s engineering instructors even use outcomes and alumni journeys to inspire residents through the course, where it’s common to hit blocks, and remind them where their hard work will take them.

Chacta Brice, FTRI Engineering Instructor, says “during family dinners, I’ll read out the recent hires from the prior week, and I follow it up by saying trust the process, don’t give up, and soon I’ll be reading your name out during a family dinner.”

Given that, what stats included in CIRR do we look at in Codesmith? 

Annie Zadikoff, Codesmith’s Director of Outcomes, explains that “each time a grad accepts an offer after the program, we collect information on their role, including base salary, title, and start date, which we share with CIRR. 

“But we also collect information that paints a broader picture. This can include tech stack, primary stack focus (front-end, back-end, full-stack), and additional compensation, as bonuses and stock options also contribute significantly to a total compensation package. We then also survey at regular intervals on their career trajectory beyond.”

We think about Codesmith in terms of a pedagogy to build autonomous engineers working with contemporary tech, in an inclusive and curated community, who achieve outsized outcomes in leadership, impact, and career trajectory.

Autonomous Engineers

Title Mix

We want to see mostly Software Engineer titles (a generalist title focused across the full stack, ranging from frontend to backend) and some backend and frontend-focused roles. [SOURCE: CIRR]

Title Mix CIRR 2022-23 FTRI

Title Mix CIRR 2022-23 PTRI

% Working in a New Stack

55% of alums work using technologies not taught on our program (JavaScript and TypeScript). That’s evidence of true engineering and speaks to our emphasis on building capacities in engineers, not simply teaching them engineering skills. [SOURCE: Codesmith Graduate Job Info Form]

Codesmith Alumni Working in a New Stack 

Leadership & Impact

% Starting Own Venture

Only 1.3% from the FTRI program, but we’re expanding support for people starting their own companies and leading with their engineering experience [SOURCE: - CIRR]

% Joining Codesmith ‘For Self-Enrichment’

We really value residents who will be returning to their prior roles or non-software engineer roles with an engineering approach post-program. In 2022-23 this represented ~6% of PTRI and ~2% of FTRI graduates. These attestations must be submitted by students before starting the program to count, as part of CIRR requirements for data transparency. [SOURCE: CIRR]

% selected For Senior Software Engineer

Average of 10%+ hired as Senior Software Engineer. 11.8% from PTRI & 8.7% from FTRI, w. grads often upleveled in the interview process. [SOURCE: CIRR]

Codesmith alum and Staff Software Engineer at Moody’s Analytics Cara Dibdin said she “initially interviewed for an evergreen position, so didn't really know what to expect. But I had such great conversations with the engineering team discussing my technical experience that they decided to offer me the Senior Software Engineer role.”

% Hired By School

1.2% from PTRI and 2.8% from FTRI. It’s a low percentage, but important. We hire our instructors to lead the next generation of engineers, as they understand the pedagogical and engineering principles we’re instilling and can pass it on to new residents. [SOURCE: CIRR]

Industry Mix

We look for a breadth of industries and appreciate seeing alumni working in fields with a wide-ranging impact in society. [SOURCE: Codesmith Graduate Job Info Form]

Career Trajectory

Future Trajectory of Promotions & Compensation

Looking at the career-long achievements of alumni is one of our most important measures. It’s truly wonderful to see 100% of alumni promoted within 5 years (twice the industry average of 55%) with significant compensation increases. It’s also a useful measure of the impact they make in their teams. [SOURCE: 'Where Are They Now' survey]

Percentage of Alumni Promoted Since First Job Post-Graduation

Alumni Salary Increase (%) Year on Year

First-Year Roles

And finally, we look at the median annual base salary, with an additional eye to total compensation. [LINK: Analysis blog] [SOURCE: CIRR]

Employment Results - Employed In Field [SOURCE: CIRR]

Other CIRR Report Elements

Graduating period: 

• In the period between 1 Jan 2022 - 31 Dec 2022, there were 732 full-time graduates and 104 part-time included in the report.

Job search period: 

• Students included job searched in 2022-23 (up to late Dec 2023 for the last graduates of 2022)

• The report includes all students who enrolled in the program (836 residents).
  
  
  

"When preparing for Codesmith you have the ‘Hard Parts’ workshops designed to give a complete mental model of how programming languages really work. But the reality is that your job after Codesmith won’t have a ‘Hard Parts’ workshop on the technology it uses. We instill the approaches and resilience to develop your own ‘Hard Parts’ when you join a new team with its unique tech - taught with a pedagogy that doesn’t hand you the answer but teaches you how to learn any new thing."

Will Sentance, CEO and Co-Founder of Codesmith

Our Take On CIRR: What Our Community Asks For

As we acknowledge some of the frustrations around CIRR, you may ask why we even report to this standard at all. It’s because our community has told us emphatically that they value an organization that is committed to a program’s external reporting.

Codesmith alum, Marc Burnie, Software Engineer at AWS, says he was overwhelmed with choices when choosing a bootcamp and CIRR helped provide clarity. 

“Data provided by CIRR helped me identify those with the best outcomes and come up with a shortlist. If a bootcamp didn’t want to be represented in the data—it was a red flag,” Marc says. “I believe every educational institution should have transparent outcomes, especially for “non-traditional” institutions.

“Jumping from a different career into software requires a big leap of faith. Many people, including myself, wouldn’t dedicate the time and resources without faith in the institution. Having an independent organization to audit bootcamps was a significant factor in building the trust required to make that career change.

“Codesmith had best-in-class outcomes, but I ended up picking it because I fell in love with the community, but I wouldn’t have discovered Codesmith if it wasn’t for CIRR.”

We know CIRR has its flaws, ones that can deter programs from participating; however, it is still an organization that holds us and all programs that provide pathways to opportunity in technology to a shared standard.

In an unprecedentedly difficult job market in 2022-2023, these statistics demonstrate highly talented people offering significant value to their teams.

They result from the team and alumni’s incredibly hard work, and their support for each other over the last year, which we want to show appreciation for as we close.


Sources: 

1. CIRR: 2022-23 Full-year Members Outcomes Report
2. Codesmith Graduate Job Info Form - The data analyzed was from a survey of 500 graduates who received their first offers post-Software Engineering Immersive. The survey tracked graduates with offers from 2023 - 2024.
3. Codesmith Data from ‘Where Are They Now?’ Survey Results 2015-2024