What is the reason for having the age restriction of 30? Does it not implicitly contribute to the existing ageism issue in tech industry. Why can't a professional working in another industry learn something new at the age of 35 or a mother who wants to come back to the workforce after her kids start going to school?

Why did they move to such an expensive area? If their goal is to provide services and help everyone why not build your university in an area like Detroit?

No one who is really interested won't go because of the location and it makes rent really cheap.

Hell, you could also have the Detroit government chip in and give you a great deal on land. What is bad for an economy about bringing some of our nations smartest programmers to a single location?

I'd love this if I could afford to go to it.

So I am to strive to become a "very valuable asset for any company" ... I guess dehumanization is bad only when it is done by noncorporation people.

Also - can we stop with teaching to code already. Assume instead of literacy and writing in schools we thought people how to flip pages on books with green covers. Or we were teaching people how to multiply only by 8.

Without the broader body of IT literacy, coding is not that useful skill. Except for future corporate drones working on waterfall.

We need to give people basic IT literacy - the critical mass of knowledge that allows them to obtain more and diverse knowledge on their own - so when faced with a problem to know how to formulate a question and where to look for solution.

The age restrictions are odd. 3 years to learn a skill seems too much. Having to apply, so it is becomes an elitist programs, seems wrong. And their web site describes having to prove your worth in a 4 week 24x7 code fest before getting final acceptance into the program, which sounds like they do not understand the concept of burnout.

There are so many ways to learn to code... the only part these guys seem to have right is "free"

> There are no school fees: running costs for the 10 first years (estimated at 20 to 50 million euros) have been personally funded by Xavier Niel. 42 will train each year one thousand students...

There are so many billionaires and millionaires in Silicon Valley who could easily fund a school like this, it simply baffles me that none of them have a tuition-free school of their own.

So Xavier Niel (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xavier_Niel French entrepreneur, do not own any US interest) is committing millions from his personal fortune to open a FREE school to teach programming and computer science in the US to student regardless of their academic background and commenters critics the initiative because the school have an age limit.

I really love 42, and I'm happy that they open a new school in US. Their curriculum is great and previous iteration have give us technical talents like the docker team.

From their site:

WELCOME TO 42,THE MOST DARING CODING UNIVERSITY. DISRUPTIVE EDUCATION. TUITION FREE. NON-PROFIT. OPEN TO ALL.

False Advertising.

"OPEN TO ALL" "42 is open to anyone who is between the ages of 18 and 30"

Perhaps someone there should attend a class on demographics.

I suspect in the land of 42, you don't exist if you are <18 or >30. Such special little snowflakes they are.

Why not call it 30? 42 is 12 years too old apparently.

Why the 18-30 age limit? Seems a bit... ageist?

I'm surprised with all the negative comments focusing on the age limit. Xavier Niel committed millions to launch the school in Paris and it was an immense success which already benefits to the whole ecosystem. What is not said in the video is the type of candidates they are looking for. In France, as education is free, traditional "excellent" high school student don't apply to 42 and prefer to secure a place in the notorious engineering schools. 42 is rather focused on giving a second chance to bright people that didn't fit into the traditional system. The test to get qualified for the 4weeks session is only about fit/culture questions: no maths, no logic, no programming. No skills required, everyone has the same chance. Although the target in the US might be different as tuition fees are a real problem there. Curious to see what type of students will go there.

I am currently 41, went to a Coding bootcamp in Bay area and after I graduated, I struggled to find a job for 6-8 months but ultimately succeeded to land one as a developer job. But I have had to drop $12k on tuition which I think it will take couple of years to pay off. The bootcamp did very little to add value to my learning skill and portfolio of projects.

I would have applied to institution like this in a heartbeat but I guess 42 would have been a no-entry for me. Why this discrimination? And also it is irony that they wont take anybody above 30 much less 40 years old but the institution is named as 42. Can anybody tell me why the organization named itself 42?

There's an already existing university in San Francisco named Holberton School running on this non-profit, peer-reviewed, project-based non traditional curriculum. If the arbitrary limit set by 42 excludes you, Holberton doesn't and diversity is actually one of their grander mandates. I have spoken with the current students and school staff: they really are getting quality training. (Disclaimer: I'm a mentor at this school)

I'd love to signup to 42, specially after E.E. to become a soft. Eng. In fact I've been looking something like this (an internship or codecamp) that will accept someone from abroad. But as always, the need for the in-person signup and test it's what deters me.

From the website:

> 42 allows students who have successfully completed the selection tests to continue their training at the Silicon Valley or Paris campuses (under the condition that they have the necessary immigration visa for their choice. The visa formalities need to be completed by the student, 42 cannot give a visa).

In the application form itself:

> If you are applying for 42 Paris you must either be a citizen of the European Union or have a valid titre de séjour while you are a student at 42.

> 42 cannot provide immigration visas for students. If you are applying for 42 Fremont you must be a citizen of the United States or have a valid green card while you are a student at 42.

What does this mean? Would 42 be able to act as a sponsor of sort if a student is successfully admitted into the program, or will this be open only to those fortunate enough to either be born in the US or EU, or have a residence permit of some sort?

This is something that looks very interesting. I wonder if this would ever come to the UK. I know France is just across the channel but there surely is massive demand for this in the UK as well.

Has there been any discussion as to what happens after Neil's funding runs out? Is the school then going to start charging tuition?

So...start a coding school in a place in the world where you are likely to find a very dense population of people who already know how to write code ?

If you can't afford to live there they have a free dorm. There is only 164 rooms, don't know how they will distribute them.

San Francisco is unmatched when it comes to accessing mentors who have been entrenched in technology.

I'm a student at Holberton School, which is project based (like Ecole 42) and community driven. For example, one of our mentors in the Deep Learning track is none other than Louis Monier who founded Alta Vista.

I hear they're not in San Francisco, but in Fremont, CA, which is somewhere around the Bay, but not technically in the Silicon Valley (it's about an hour away of public transportation from the interesting places), which explains why it's probably more affordable over there.

If you have no money and from far away you can apply and ask for the dorm. They are Free also. Only expense will be the food and what you do outside the School.

> Xavier Niel committed millions to launch the school in Paris and it was an immense success which already benefits to the whole ecosystem

Liar. Sorry, but there is no other word and I am totally fed up with the bullshit propaganda people of 42 spread everywhere every-time. And now the lies go international.

We are in Spring of 2016. The school started in Autumn of 2013, which means that nobody has even completed the program (even the shortest one) at the expected pace. So we have a handful of students out from the short curriculum, not even a single full class, and zero from the long curriculum. Reaching any kind of conclusion is absolutely, factually impossible. Thus talking about "immense success" and "benefits to the whole ecosystem" is an "immense" steaming pile of horseshit.

For American readers: don't take anything you read about 42 at face value if it seems to originate from someone from 42. We have been enduring their bullshit for a while (a long while if you take into account the previous similar 2 schools were the same indoctrination was applied), so we are accustomed to it and we can spot the obvious lies; but Yanquis should beware :-)

> Curious to see what type of students will go there.

Well, we know they'll all be between the ages 18-30.

And yes, tuition fees are a real problem here, for people of all ages. Shame he chose to limit the program to a demographic that is already welcome and advantaged in the US's technical community.

I don't understand why you are downvoted because this is a great question, and true that the top most students do not go there, they prefer engineering schools (but there is good students there).

disclosure, I am a 42 school student in Paris, first promotion