Learn to Code
John F. Dumas
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Testimonials


► His class was instrumental in helping me get a job. The one on one format was far more efficient than a traditional classroom. While we covered most of web front end and back end basics fairly quickly, we would slow down and do a deeper dive on parts that confused or interested me. He was flexible with our meeting time and content; he was able to pivot and change the lesson plan whenever I happened to ask a "great question". I never felt like we were working through some textbook or list and every class was more like a conversation. Also, he really knows the industry. His interview tips and technical whiteboard practice helped me secure a job I love. He was always incredibly supportive and really believed in me. I highly recommend his class to anyone interested in advancing their programming prowess -- 10/10 would take class again.

S. V.


► Dumas really knows how to make learning to program into an enticing, fun challenge. What's more, he knows what it takes to succeed in the industry -- the value of well-written, well-organized, reliable, and efficient code -- and he is eager to help his students to internalize those habits. But if that suggests to you that the only people who can get anything from Dumas are those seeking to be professionals, I'll say that learning these things will make ANYONE -- professional or hobbyist -- a better programmer. I do not exaggerate when I say I never learned more in such a short amount of time about programming than I did with Dumas. I only wish I had more classes with him. (You might even see me there ;) )

L. B.


► Learning from Mr Dumas was always fun and challenging in the right way. He found ways to make sure he was giving every individual student a challenge fit for their individual needs while still delivering the needed curriculum for the day. He's got tons of real world experience and it shows - he was always able to tie our lessons into real world examples or use cases that really cemented the ideas for us. He's also really good at teaching math, so our waves of game design students sneaked in 3D math lessons where we could to help our final projects.

He's exactly the kinda guy you want to bounce ideas off of and make something great - he's a great listener, fun guy all around, and an excellent teacher.

K. C.


► John Dumas is a teacher that prides himself on not on teaching the lesson, but on helping his students truly understand, and receive something valuable from, his lessons. He plans dynamic lessons, focusing on basic concepts needed to solve real world problems, but offering challenges to those who already grasp the basic concepts and would like to test the limits of those concepts. He is always willing to help his students, and I have never seen a student that he didn't do everything he could to offer them the assistance they required.

G. B.


► John Dumas as a professor. I'm not good with testimonials, but if there's anything you take away from my statement is that yes I do recommend John Dumas wholeheartedly.

John Dumas teaches in such a way that even if you already know a lot of the source material, he can always make you look at a problem in a new light, and gives you ways to make your solution better.

Honestly the thing that I really loved about his class was doing the work and getting the verbose feedback he'd send, where he'd suggest easier more efficient routes to achieve the same result. It shows that there’s always a different way to achieve a problem, and that each person thinks of their solution from a different mindset. I found this amazing, because he didn’t just look at the end result to make sure it worked, he followed the code to see how it worked.

He's super enthusiastic about programming, which is great because I'm a lazy person, such as I've taken a month and a half to get to writing this for him. When he's teaching I want to program then and now, I want to take up whatever assignment he's given and just destroy it, if nothing else than to do so in a way that he'd find funny or interesting.

He gives such great examples, and explains them quite well. One of the ones that comes to mind is we had to ‘draw a tree’, it was just a fractal problem. You started with a line, and branched off of that line, and each successive line you did the same thing to. But he explained it perfectly, and said how he’d done it, without even mentioning code.

It may seem that I’m putting him on a pedestal of sorts, and maybe I am, but he deserves it. Honestly, he kindles a fire in you to program, and sets you down on the right path with the right tools. He’s amazing.

D. M.


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