Catalyst Full Stack Program
Catalyst is our premier, fully immersive technical training program that equips you with a cutting-edge curriculum, a dedicated instructor, and a daily schedule to accelerate you to your first job as a Full Stack Software Developer.
“Full Stack” means...
You’ll learn how to build for both the front-end and back-end of modern websites and web applications – first with JavaScript then with TypeScript – so that you’re ready for whatever the next step in your career throws your way.
Your Admissions Process
Leave your prior accolades at the door. All we care about is you.
Schedule a consult
Have questions? Can't believe what you're reading? Want to make sure we're the "real deal"? Understandable. Just schedule a call with us – we love meeting future students!
Start Catalyst Prep
We'll teach you whether you're a high school dropout or Summa Cum Laude valedictorian – you still have to purchase and complete our prep course before you can enroll.
Pick your start date
While you work through Catalyst Prep, we'll work through the finer details (instructor meet 'n' greet, paperwork, payment) so you're ready to roll on your start date.
Online done right.
This ain’t your momma’s online college course. We focus on your personal results and success instead of catering to cohorts.
Your time. Your pace.
Full-time. Part-time. Somewhere in between? You choose. We’ll be here for you, because what works for one doesn’t work for everyone.
On-the-job training, pre-job.
You’ll learn the same tools and techniques that are used in software jobs today. Not used-to-use tech from 20 years ago.
Personalized coaching.
From lab reviews to 1:1 sessions, our Catalyst student-to-instructor relationship is unmatched. Enroll in a course, find a lifelong coach.
Average? Anything but.
Let's both agree to not settle for average anymore.
Course Overview
Here's exactly what to expect from us – and what we expect from you:
Overview
Our Catalyst program specializes in training software developers with a niche focus in modern websites and web applications. As a Catalyst student, you’ll receive the absolute best that we have to offer as an educational provider – from personalized coaching and mentoring (during and after the program) to a full suite of comprehensive curriculum and supportive services.
The Catalyst Experience
This program is one-of-a-kind. It’s more than a curriculum and better than your run-of-the-mill bootcamp or college course.
Here’s what you won’t experience:
You won’t find yourself starting with 10, 20, or 30 other students all competing for the same instructor’s or TA’s time (that graduated one month before you started), and you don’t have to be in any particular location (we’re fully remote). You won’t be quizzed on arbitrary knowledge you can Google. You won’t be graded on technicalities that you’re still learning. You won’t “fail” out if you fall behind. You won’t find yourself struggling alone.
Here’s what you will experience:
You’ll pick your start date, and wherever you may be, whenever you’ve finished our super-simple admissions process, you’ll start. As a student, you’ll join daily office hours with your instructor, and you’ll see who else is currently in the same section of the curriculum as you (study buddies!). You’ll be able to schedule 1:1 coaching sessions with your instructor, and you’ll receive personalized, private code reviews for each major lab assignment from your instructor. You’ll be pushed, challenged, and (sometimes) frustrated as you inevitably struggle, but we’ll still be here to help – from start to finish (which is a job, not a certificate).
We expect a lot from our students. We treat you like an adult, not a child. We’re not going to coddle you. You don’t get points for showing up and doing the bare minimum – you have to do the work. You also don’t “get good grades” for perfection. Instead, you’ll get real experience as a budding software developer. Build your portfolio. Showcase your creativity, your work ethic, and your interests. Let us (and future employers) know who you are through what you do. If you’re signing up for our Catalyst program, you’re signing up for what will likely be the most rigorous educational experience of your life. It can be overwhelming at times, but that’s why we’re here – to help you through it.
It’s our job to make sure you land your next one. If you’re up for it, let’s catalyze your career change, together.
JavaScript, from front to back.
We focus on your fluency in JavaScript first, then introduce TypeScript, to make sure you have a solid foundation in one language.
Lectures. Labs. Repeat.
You’ll have several activities and labs to complete in order to prove your mastery of this material. It’s challenging but fun – get ready to work!
Foundations, not frameworks.
Modern web development changes daily. No one can keep up with everything, but we can build up your foundational knowledge base so you’re prepared for anything.
Novice? No matter.
We curate our curriculum with beginners in mind. Everything builds on top of previous topics, so you can go from module one to done.
Instructors
Our instructors love teaching, and our students love our instructors. We’re in this for the long haul – all you gotta do is meet us halfway.
Loitered around long enough until he got this job. Does a bit of everything as the resident Jack of all Trades.
Coffee connoisseur, D&D enthusiast, and SSBM expert. Consistently achieves 16 frames GALINT.
Cat dad to Lunatic (no, really) & Co., The One With Ubuntu, and the “Always Green!” Lab Review Queue.
Curriculum
No mysteries here. This is exactly what you’ll learn in this course.
Getting started
Learn about all the necessary onboarding info you’ll need to quickly set up all the programs and processes we use while you’re enrolled at Covalence. As you're getting started, we’ll also give you some insight into how you can get help when you need it, and what resources are available to you as a Catalyst student.
Intro to HTML, CSS, and JavaScript
No mystery here. Module 2 builds the foundations for front-end web development: HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. We'll work through simple concept labs to build your first website, style it with CSS, and add some basic functionality with JavaScript.
Intro to Bootstrap, the Document Object Model (DOM), and jQuery
Module 3 expands the foundations you set in Module 2, starting with one of the most popular CSS frameworks (Bootstrap) to allow your websites to look better than raw HTML, and then we expand our JavaScript knowledge with your first introduction to the manipulating the Document Object Model (DOM) natively and with jQuery, which is your first foray into JavaScript libraries.
Advanced JavaScript Techniques and Development
With the basics out of the way, Module 4 is where the rubber meets the road with more advanced JavaScript techniques. You'll learn all about async functions, scope, promises, closures, spread operators, template literals, and more – everything you need to know to really understand and use modern JavaScript, not just copy and paste it from Stack Overflow.
Building with the Fundamentals of React
Module 5 is all about one of the most popular JavaScript libraries in the world right now – React.js. We've been teaching it since 2018, and we keep our curriculum up to date with the latest version changes and improvements the React team has made over the past several years. We'll start simple with concepts and architecture of a React web application, and from there we'll teach you how to set up the proper Hooks, state management, and more.
Building your own server & API with Node.js and Express
Once we round out Front End Development with React, we make our way over to the server-side, still in JavaScript with Node.js and Express as our back-end framework. We'll set up routes, APIs, and start letting the data flow from the front to the back end of our applications. There's not as much "visualization" to this section of the curriculum, but we'll teach you how to figure out what's going on with plenty of console.log()'s and Postman tabs.
All of the above ... now with TypeScript
JavaScript's popularity is not always well-received with programmers and institutions that rely on more stringent (less dynamic) languages to ensure proper code etiquette and cleanliness – that's where TypeScript swoops in to save the day. It's the best parts of JavaScript with the best parts of a more strongly (or static) typed language, like C#/.NET or Java, and the best part is that it's a superset of JavaScript – which means that if you know JavaScript, learning TypeScript is pretty easy and makes your life a lot easier. So that's what we do… teach JavaScript, then rehash all of the previous module topics in TypeScript.
Add a relational database, 3rd-party APIs, & user authentication
A front-end and back-end is only as good as the data that it's showing – or retrieving from other services – so we'll teach you how to set up and manage your own relational databases with MySQL, along with some basic ETL protocols and stored procedure techniques to make your life a little easier. Our speciality isn't in database management, so this introduction is intended for web developers that need to set up Full Stack applications – or work in a team that manages their own. You'll also learn how to send transactional emails with Mailgun, process payments with Stripe, and control access to your applications with user authentication protocols.
Still skeptical?
Don't take our word for it. Take theirs:
Starting Covalence was something I was nervous about at first. I had no coding experience whatsoever before Covalence and was somewhat blindly jumping in. The pre-work had me hooked from the beginning. Tic tac toe was a huge challenge early on, but learning how to find solutions and think critically really gave me a rewarding feeling. After that, things with the program got harder on paper, but easier on the mind. Once you have the confidence in yourself, and the team at Covalence behind your back, it is hard to not succeed. The job hunting process was made much easier by the final project at Covalence. Having a full stack application to show off made landing interviews easy work.
I really enjoyed my time at Covalence. The videos were very well done, and the labs did a good job of assessing my knowledge of the material. I can’t say enough good things about the instructors. They let me know (literally every day) they were available for any questions I had. They made sure I knew the fundamentals and were positive and encouraging when I was having difficulty with some concept. They were instrumental in helping me set expectations for implementing features in projects, completing projects, and all throughout the job search experience. I felt I was well prepared for searching for jobs, and was hired within a few months.
Becoming a developer was something I had wanted to do for quite some time, but was unsure of how to get there. Having already gotten a degree in accounting, I didn't feel like going back to college was the right choice for me at this time, both for financial reasons and the time investment required. Luckily, a friend recommended Covalence to me and it sounded like the right option. Overall, I would definitely recommend the program to someone who is looking for a way to transition into the software engineering world, especially if they already have a passion for it. I'm not sure I would have ever gotten to this point on my own and for that I am very grateful for Covalence.
Covalence was, in a word: Awesome. It was the most empowering feeling to look back on what I had a accomplished over the past 3 months. Coding is hard, it just is. It takes work, especially if you’re like me and had never read a line of code before. I was constantly at the edge of my abilities. But, now that I’ve been through it, I have a much stronger mental resolve. My long-term goal is to be an iOS engineer and, thanks to everyone at Covalence, I know that what I want isn’t out of reach.
Covalence has been an invaluable and well-rounded learning experience for me. I consider myself tech-savvy, but not a gadget geek by any means, and Covalence had a great mix of easy-to-follow video lectures and labs, while also challenging me to find my own answers as I progressed through the curriculum. It became evident that this was their intention: you can’t always have the answers provided to you, so you as the developer need to go out and find them sometimes. I felt like I wasn’t simply being taught to be a developer, I was learning on my own how to be a developer.
Covalence's Catalyst program is one of the best investments I've made in my education and career. That may be a bold statement, but I'll explain why in just a moment. As someone who spent over 6 years in the mechanical engineering industry followed by a season in entrepreneurship, Covalence made the most sense for me after a post-pandemic career change.
If you do not have software experience and you want to learn how to code, this is the program for you! If you have experience and want to continue your learning, this program is for you. The full time program is a lot of work...you have to put in the time and the effort to learn. The content and course work builds upon itself seamlessly, and the instructors are there for you every step of the way.
Joining Covalence to learn how to code is one of the best decisions I've ever made. I was in retail/food service for 10+ years before deciding to learn how to code, and Covalence was exactly what I needed. The way they have their courses set up build perfectly to teach you what you need to know. The people they have teaching and meeting up with you are super helpful and knowledgeable. I would absolutely recommend Covalence to anyone interested in coding!
Covalence was one of the best choices I've made for my career. They provided training and insight into cutting edge tools for web-based software development. The instruction was excellent, and I could tell they really care about their students. They also have a vibrant online community on Discord, where instructors, fellow students, and alumni can help each other solve problems and learn, or even just chat. I was very impressed, and their Catalyst course was critical in helping me land my first job in web development. I can't recommend Covalence highly enough.
FAQs
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