We’re excited to make three major announcements:
1: Code Academy is now The Starter League.
2: We are partnering with 37signals to innovate on how to educate the next generation of problem solvers. 37signals is also taking a stake in The Starter League; our first outside investment ever, and the only one 37signals has ever made in another company.
3: We are offering two new classes: an advanced Ruby course for aspiring software developers, and a Ruby on Rails course for designers who want to learn and understand the back-end of creating web applications.
Last summer, we started building a school that would teach people how to create web applications with Ruby on Rails. We were motivated by personal pain: we wanted — no, we needed — to learn how to make our ideas real through software, and lacked the instruction, support, and community to do so.
So we set out to create the school that we always wished existed. We chose to found it right here in Chicago: a city of builders, an emerging technology hub, and the home of Ruby on Rails. We were thrilled to discover that many others here shared our vision. We couldn’t have done it without the overwhelming support from the many mentors, advisors, and our crazy inaugural class that made a huge bet on us one year ago when we had nothing.
In less than a year, we have made solving meaningful problems through software more accessible than ever. In addition to our beginner-focused Ruby on Rails Web Development course, we are now also teaching (and learning) HTML, CSS and User Experience Design. Nearly 300 students have attended Code Academy in less than 11 months, from over 25 states and 12 countries around the world.
What it means to be a Starter
However, simply “teaching people to code” was never our only purpose. We wanted to provide a path for people who wanted to start change — in their industries, in their communities, in their lives. To us, being a Starter means so much more than just being able to write code; it’s about being driven to do something meaningful with it. A Starter is an innovator, a disruptor; someone who is burning to solve problems and is willing to bust their ass to learn what they need in order to do so.
Joining a League
We are also not a place that you visit for three months to acquire a skill and then leave. You don’t just attend, graduate, and then disconnect. To be a member of The Starter League means to have earned a permanent place in a team of people dedicated to supporting one another in ongoing efforts to learn and build, to solve meaningful problems for ourselves and others.
We are not simply an academy for coders. We are a League of Starters.
Joining The Starter League means joining a group of passionate and persistent people that care deeply about adding value to the world through design, product, and business skills, in addition to coding. Just as we have with coding, we’re here to prove that these skills are not limited to a chosen few, but can be learned by anyone who is driven by a problem they want to solve, regardless of their background.
In 37signals, we have found the perfect partner to evolve our offerings to teach these concepts. Not only did they invent the technological framework that we started teaching with, but they are also the thought leaders on building innovative, sustainable, and meaningful organizations. Jason Fried, David Heinemeier Hansson and the entire 37signals team have been strongly supportive of us from day one, the possibilities of what we’ll be able to do by joining forces are limitless.
We’re so excited to head into our second year with our new partnership, brand, and offerings. We’re equally excited to see what the next year will hold for our 300+ alums — now Starter League members — as they head out and make a dent in the universe with their new skills.
With our new brand, new partnership and new offerings, today marks the beginning of a new educational movement for software thinkers and creators.
If you wish to contact the starter League, use our contact form page here.