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Comment by telephonic | Hacker News Reader

That's fair. But then why ask the student to pay, rather than the employer?

We think the incentives align better with this model. We want our students to take the best job for them, regardless of whether the company is paying recruiting fees.

As far as recruiting fees go, when employers make a decision on salaries, they look at the total employee cost. If the employer needs to pay a recruiting fee, that goes into the cost. There ain't no such thing as a free lunch, etc, etc. :-)

Maybe you should set up some sort of subcontracting scheme - that the students wouldn't have to pay taxes on the 12.5% that they pay to you.

Wouldn't that 12.5% be a business expense deductible against the gross income anyway? Ask a tax expert, but these costs are "business expenses" and should be deductible.

Why do you care so much that the student has to pay? And why insist that it's just a cheaper bootcamp? That plus the fact that your account was created an hour ago makes your negativity suspicious. Sorry if I'm wrong.

It's just unorthodox, is all. It also sets up a strange dynamic if a student can't or won't pay.

It would be even lower risk for the student if the hiring company paid, which is a standard practice -- referral fees as a percentage of the referral's first-year salary.

15%-20% is the standard.

If you don't find a job, you don't pay. And you pay in installments over 6 months (ie, 2% of your annual salary per month). This does not seem crazy. At all.

I'll agree it's so crazy its brilliant! I have been trying to self train and make it into mobile platforms for over a year now and its not as easy or speedy as I originally expected. I have very little programming experience and am looking for a more specific career change from IT break fix to mobile dev. I think this model is the perfect way out of the current long term schooling or upfront high cost boot camp that may or may not deliver. Experience is the key and this style of class seems to have lots of hands on experience. It's the perfect mix of intense focus as far as I can tell.

Seems reasonable, you're paying for retraining into what should hopefully be a better career, in as low-risk a way as possible.

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