Hartford Business Journal

14 Hartford Business Journal | January 25, 2021 | HartfordBusiness.com replaced by younger colleagues, while demand for IT and web and software development was growing and projected to continue on an upward trajectory. "As I looked at what I was going to do next, coding kept popping up in terms of the highly sought after skills," said the 46-year-old Stafford, who completed the coding program last year, and now works as a web developer at Norwalk digital advertising startup Flashtalking. "I needed to have a skill set to start at By Sean Teehan steehan@hartfordbusiness.com J eremiah Stafford spent nearly 25 years in the finance arena working for companies like Barclays and Citigroup before making a sharp turn in 2019 to work in tech, so he enrolled in the inaugural class of UConn's Coding Boot Camp. Stafford's career move may seem peculiar, but he'd seen older workers in his field eventually the ground level." UConn is the state's flagship university best- known for its traditional four- year degree and graduate-school programs, but last year it launched a six- month Coding Boot Camp certificate program in Hartford and Stamford, aimed at creating a pipeline of web developers and other techies who are in high demand here in Connecticut and elsewhere. In fact, some have blamed Connecticut's inability to attract more technology companies on its dearth of tech talent. That's a major focus of the state's new workforce development czar: enabling Connecticut to produce more tech workers to fill positions at companies like Flashtalking and Infosys, which opened a Hartford office in 2018 and has added hundreds of jobs here, with hopes to grow further. Added to its traditional degree programs, UConn sees Coding Boot Camp as a tool that could help fill that tech skills gap, said Kylene Perras, director of professional education at UConn's School of Engineering, which oversees the program. UConn Coding Boot Camp is largely geared toward working professionals looking to break into web development and IT. While Connecticut's economy struggled to grow jobs over the last decade, positions in those fields grew 25% between 2012 and 2020, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Nationally, the number of coding-centric jobs are projected to grow 22% by 2029, BLS data shows. "The amount of need in IT is pretty expansive and includes coding," said Kelli-Marie Vallieres, a former manufacturing CEO who is now head of the Lamont administration's recently-established Connecticut Workforce Unit, which handles workforce development policy in the state. "The IT industry, although they value a four-year degree, they also understand that the skill sets that they're looking for can be filled with these very specific training programs." Market-driven curriculum UConn's six-month boot camp teaches coding languages like JavaScript and HTML5 — skills pupils can use for things like software development, Perras said. Upon completion of the course, students should be proficient in "full- stack" web development, which is the ability to develop a web-based app from scratch. UConn partners with Trilogy Education Services, a New York- based technology education company that writes the program's curriculum. Trilogy was recently acquired by 2U, an ed-tech company based in Maryland. The curriculum teaches the exact skills recruiters at tech companies look for in applicants, Perras said, and should meet the needs of adults looking for a change in careers, or to upskill in order to advance in a current job. Students meet for three classes each week (totaling 13 hours per week), for a price of just under $11,500. "At UConn, we review the market- driven curriculum with our capital team, we vet instructors, and analyze different questions and Tech Talent UConn's new Coding Boot Camp aims to fill key skills gap in CT economy Jeff Auker, head of technology and innovation at Infosys' Hartford innovation hub, says his company and Connecticut tech firms in general are in need of more workers with coding skills, which UConn's new Coding Boot Camp aims to supply. Kelli-Marie Vallieres Michael Cantor HBJ PHOTO | SEAN TEEHAN

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