In recent years, many coding bootcamps have appeared, such as Hack Reactor.
These coding bootcamps purport to teach the most important skills needed to find a job within the software development industry.
However, the promise to teach you these required skills within a few months, as opposed to a few years.
Given a lot of startup and even enterprise firms are embracing the Javascript ecosystem (which many of these coding bootcamps focus on), isn’t it sufficient to attend just one of these coding bootcamps to get a job?
What is the additional value in trying to obtain a full software engineering degree from a recognised University?
Unfortunately most medium to large companies today still have a bureaucratic HR process to hiring. For people who are just entering the work force with little to no work experience, those companies filter them by university education.
This is probably different in start-ups, who will more likely take the time to look at what you have actually built as a portfolio, or give you a technical test screen.
The other question is the value of a traditional university education versus a tech focused bootcamp or diploma. I think university degrees are more valued in general and more internationally recognised, so makes it easier for you to be hired if you go over seas. You also get exposed to other academic areas when studying at university which is overall intellectually stimulating and rewarding. For example the B.Sc program in UoA requires you to take general ed classes and take courses in other sciences besides your major. Personally for me, I only got into tech and computer science after taking a Compsci 101 course for fun, and then switched majors after that.
Universities will tend to teach more fundamentals and theory, rather than the latest practical tools and frameworks. Fundamentals and theory is important as a solid foundation to working in tech. But its best to augment university learning with self learning on industry trends or gaining real work experience through internships and student programs.