Thread by @AustenAllred

A few people have mentioned we should talk about Lambda School's weaknesses and struggles. I think that's wise.

The biggest one we've had, by far, is students' inability (or unwillingness) to search for jobs after graduation.

Job hunting is hard and discouraging (1/n)

And a lot of folks from low-income backgrounds have never experienced a job hunt before. Most minimum wage jobs just have you sign paperwork and start right away.

Even with a network of career coaches, as students run low on cash and high on stress the difficulty compounds (2/n)

We rolled out Lambda Next, a fully-supported, full-time career search program.

We've never had anyone participate for more than a month without being hired. Not once.

But it's still not enough for many people. (3/n)

Compound that with the fact that many families/communities don't understand that searching for months at a time is real, and financial support dries up on the day of graduation.

It leaves the students between a rock and a hard place, and it's not necessarily their fault. (4/n)

We have some ways to fix, but in order for Lambda School to work for folks coming from lower incomes students basically have to be hired by graduation. That’s a tall order, but we can do it.

That’s what we’re working on right now.