Tech Elevator is a code school designed to support the rapid acquisition of technology skills that can lead to meaningful careers and promotions in tech-related fields. Tech Elevator's immersive coding bootcamps in .NET and Java teach novices with little or no experience to become full stack computer programmers in just 14 weeks. Justin Driscoll fills us in on Tech Elevator's announcement to provide $1 million in scholarships to people in need. With this announcement, Tech Elevator will enable students to become the coders of the future, finding fulfilling careers in the Pittsburgh technology sector. Thanks to Comcast for powering up #50PGHSummerStories.
Transcription:
Well, stories keep on coming and I get the pleasure of keep on telling them and today's story is gonna be super fun. So I'm hanging out with a good old friend of mine, an old co worker of mine, Justin Driscoll from Tech Elevator. I don't see Justin much these days and when I do I always get excited, because Justin is always my favorite people to hang out with. So I absolutely love doing our summer 50 PGH tech stories of Comcast I get to connect with old people like Justin Driscoll, I say old people, old friends old, Justin's old. Friends me your old to me just an old friend. Exactly. It's interesting. Thanks, taking the time to be part of our show today. So glad to have you with us, man.
Thanks, Jonathan. Always a pleasure to see you always good to catch up. So thanks for having me again. Appreciate it.
Absolutely. Well, I got the news from you guys. He put a little new release out talking about tech elevator coming about a million dollars towards some scholarship programs to get to truly increase diversity throughout the tech elevator program to get more people on board to get the skills that they need. To become, you know, tech employees to be part of the wave that that's bringing us forward, man, I think that was just so cool.
Yeah, yeah, it's, uh, it's exciting. It really is. I mean, tech elevator has been around since 2015. Now and we have known there's an issue in tech, we've known that we wanted to do something we've known that you know, we have the ability as an organization to help contribute to the solution to diversify tech and, and provide opportunities for more people who are underrepresented in tech currently. And so just recently now we've launched this represent tech scholarship. And as an organization we've committed to over a million dollars to increase diversity in tech. We have in every market that we're in across the country, we're roughly seven have now to write you guys are you guys? My crazy Yep. So every market will, will have one student per cohort. So three, three students per year per market. At a minimum to begin, we wanted to start somewhere. And so this is this is kind of our first, this is kind of our first attempt at that. And so, you know, really lines up well with our, our mission, right, our mission is we elevate people, companies and communities. And so here we are, you know, we've seen, you know, a great diversity of people come through the program, not nearly it has not been nearly diverse enough, you know, which is one of the attempts of why we're, we're doing this and try to help increase those numbers. But, you know, as an organization, we've always believed that, you know, cognitive ability has is definitely distributed evenly amongst the general population, but certainly opportunity has not been And so, in order to keep elevating our mission and emphasizing our mission by elevating people, we wanted to give people who haven't heard Oracle had the opportunity to do something like tech elevator, we thought this scholarship would be a great start and hopefully be a great opportunity for somebody who has always had the cognitive ability but haven't hasn't always had a full opportunity to do.
So Justin was was it the COVID pandemic that kind of brought this to the forefront? So for a lot of folks dependent really, really started to make the inequities just really, really apparent. What was it that were you guys working thinking about this before this thing even even struck us?
I mean, I think it's kind of a combination of everything. We certainly have been taught talking, we've had analysts working, we've had projects over overtime to try to come up with solutions to how to increase our diversity and inclusion, numbers and opportunities for all people. And you know, I think COVID and, you know, the the racial injustice that's been that has happened recently and the protests and the movement that's been happening in America recently has Certainly all kind of come to a head. And, um, you know, I think the timing, you know, is good to kind of really get the message out there, the tech elevator is supports diversity and inclusion. And this scholarship is really just the first step for us to move down this road to give people who have that cognitive ability and desire and passion to do this, to give them the opportunity as well.
I mean, a million dollars. That's a big step, dude, I like that. I mean that that's literally putting your money where your mouth is on stuff like this. And so when does this actually pick off? Is this the next set of cohorts that are gonna be firing up?
Yeah. So we'll have our next set of cohorts launches September 14 across all of our markets. And so that'll be the first we'll see. Six campus so Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, Detroit, Philadelphia, in our live remote, so seven, seven students this this upcoming fall we'll have will be our first recipient of this scholarship. And so it's an 85% scholarship, though they'll still have 15% of an obligation to cover and their enrollment in the enrollment fee. But they have to go through the, they have to go through the process just like every other study.
You got to make sure you've got the cognition to handle it. So I know tech elders intense man, it's like boot camp. people cry sometimes.
And all the coding, it's intense. I mean, it's one of those things.
I do tell them in the interview, your your body may change during tech elevator, but probably not a good way. It's not like the military where you're going to lean up and get stronger physically. But we always kind of joke about that, but there's a boot camp is mentally challenging. You have to really want it to go from no technical experience to be to a entry level software developer in 14 weeks. We've done over thousand times now across all of our markets, but it is not for the faint of heart it really, I love it, man. No, it says you gotta commit to this because we're creating probably what would normally I think in the old days, probably average, it's like two or three years worth of worth of education by being crammed into 14 weeks. So it's intense.
Yes. Yeah. Intense is is is definitely I've heard it described, it's like drinking through drinking through a firehose of information, yeah, for 14 weeks because it's continually new information every single day. But we you know, those students that come and have done their research and have talked with alumni who have been successful in our program and in companies that have hired students throughout you know, from the from the cohorts, you know, they we want them to come right, we want them to do their research. We want them to come in into this eyes wide open, make sure that they know you do and if they follow that process, there's you know, we've seen a really good percentage People get jobs.
What's your typical success rate? Like these days? I know it's been really great.
Yeah, I mean, pre pre COVID. Right, our new numbers won't come out until after COVID. Pre pre COVID it's been 94% placement rate across all of our campuses. In fact, I'm wearing this shirt right now that shows our one that we celebrated our 1000 placement. So 1000 people now it's more than that. But a couple months ago, we celebrated our 1000 person. That's it. That's
a lot of people in the workforce that normally would not be in this workforce. That's amazing.
Yeah, I think that's why you know, what this represent tech scholarship, you know, that's, we want as many people as possible who are motivated and driven to do this to have the opportunity to come to tech elevator and for some, the tuition is, you know, can be a challenge or their life circumstances. I mean, ever Everybody has to kind of put things in motion in order to be able to come and do this. But we're hoping that this is one barrier that might be able to be lowered for some people, but with this with this scholarship, you know, if they are, you know, properly motivated to do this, and hopefully this financial barrier will be lowered and, and they'll be able to do it. So, we're excited for you know, I, the thing that motivates people that work in tech elevator, is the fact that those individual stories that we can point to, of how people's lives were changed. And so I can't wait for the end of 2020 to be able to point to that one person in the Pittsburgh market and say that person received the scholarship and they would have never been able to come had they not received the scholarship.
That's so cool, man. So tell me how has COVID impacted how you've been putting on your cohorts? Obviously, they're all remote right now. How's that been working? I feel like this is a good platform to go remote that Yeah, well, we're using zoom. We were using zoom to do this where we're using zoom in our classes. So whatever you know of online learning Throw that right out the window. That's what we're doing. We're doing live remote teaching every single day for three hours a day still. So if someone were to come to the tech elevator, Pittsburgh campus and attend classes when we were allowed to do that, they would they would receive three hours of instruction every day from our instructors. They're getting that now online, but they they're doing it remotely. Okay. The lecturing, our instructors are still lecturing for three hours a day, all of our pathway sessions, all of our meetings with our employers, all of our career development work that is happening throughout the afternoons is all being done on zoom, Google Hangouts. We use a tool which is really cool. I encourage your viewers to google it called Coco as soco co so Coco, one of our instructors here in Pittsburgh, Beth had used this at a prior employer, and it's been great to be able to replicate a classroom environment or an office environment. You have a little Avatar and you move them from room to room. Okay, you can zoom meetings right away. You can join study groups and launch, you can share screens. And it's a pretty, pretty cool, pretty cool tool. And so I would, that's been great. Also, like I said, zoom and Google Hangouts and everybody else's remote Jonathan. So it's been, it's been, it hasn't been as big of a leap as you would think. And the most important thing is that people are still getting jobs. You know, we while people are getting jobs slower than normal, they're getting jobs in all of our markets here in Pittsburgh included. And, you know, it's been, it's been exciting to be able to see people start remote, interview, remote, never meet, face and land that job worker job remote. I will mail you a laptop. We don't want to come in. And it's working. You know, I wouldn't say it's optimal by any stretch of the imagination.
Really, that's what it's about right now. Getting through this until we can, you know, get to this new level of what we'll call more. Those that I just loved through all this, the tech innovators stepped up and they're committing a million dollars. That's just a start to get more diversity into your cohorts and get more people you know, into these tech skills and get them the jobs that are really moving everybody forward. Justin. I love it, man. It's such a cool story. It's why I'm so glad tech elevators in Pittsburgh. I'm glad you're leading tech elevator because when you left the tech Council, I was upset but I was happy for you because I knew you'd be the guy to do some successful things over there. And that's what you're proving right now. Justin, so all the way around. Good work.
Thanks, Jonathan. Yeah, it's always good to hang out with you. And you're still continuing to to be the voice of the tech sector in Pittsburgh, which I'm glad for that.
I'll try my best I try my best and I can't do without the help from Comcast. allowing me to tell our 50 summary stories of Pittsburgh tech. Justin, you got like another 35 to go dude. It's gonna be fun. Wow. Absolutely, man. It's gonna be good. Thanks for hanging out. Let's just do it. Get it. Thanks, Jonathan. See ya.
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