Syllabus

2019
 1. Why Holberton
Table of
contents 2. The Holberton way
3. Pathways
a. Foundations
b. Specialization
1. Why Holberton?
" There's going to be
1.4m Tech Jobs
in the next decade & only
400k trained
people to fill them. "
Courtesy: The New York Times
 Holberton is not your typical school.

You won’t see any teachers here, it’s true. Here, we

learn best by collaborating. Here, every student
becomes a mentor, because the surest way to cross the
finish line is by supporting one another.

We encourage our students to always ask why and

challenge the standards of the status quo. By
challenging ourselves and each other, we’re building a
new kind of community. Because diversity brings
resilience, we welcome many different points of view.
The only thing we won’t tolerate here is intolerance.

At Holberton, we aren’t just learning how to code.

We’re learning how to learn — together.

We’re going to rewrite the rules — for the better.

 What sets Holberton students apart

Full-stack engineers Master of soft skills Adaptable Diverse

Our curriculum covers low-level Students will not only learn Our students learn how to learn; Our students come from a variety
programming , algorithms, technical skills but build up their therefore they are able to pick up of backgrounds and experiences,
high-level programming, and soft skills through presentations, new skills and tools very quickly bringing a unique perspective to
systems engineering. technical writing, and group within any type of environment. any work environment.
Our students have a solid software projects, making them a valuable
engineering foundation — knowing asset to any team.
more than one programming
language.
Top companies hired our students

Our students have landed software engineering jobs and

internships across all industries and company sizes. See
some of the employers who have hired our students.
Success

*Average full-time salary of Year 2 graduates

working in the US (SF Campus - April 2019) Source: payscale.com
Our Campuses
 Innovation has an address

San Francisco, CA New Haven, CT Bogotá, Colombia Medellín, Colombia

Established in 2016 and located in Located in Connecticut's tech Located in the prestigious Medellín is the hub for all remote
the heart of Silicon Valley, our SF hotspot, New Haven hosts both Bogotá's "gourmet" district, Zona Tech workers who wants to join
campus is near Market St, home innovative startups and G, the city is the home of the first US companies without leaving
of Big Tech headquarters. multinational conglomerates. "unicorn" of the country, Rappi. Colombia.
Admissions
Where there's a will,
There's a way
Our selection process is based on talent and
motivation. We don't care what degrees you may or
may not have, if you have any previous programming
experience, or your ability to pay. If you possess the
curiosity, determination, and drive to succeed, then
we want you as a Holberton student.

Our automated admissions process is completely

“blind” to remove human biases. It was created
specifically to identify smart, motivated people and
doesn’t take into account previous education, work
experience, gender, ethnicity, or age. There’s also no
cost to apply - we only ask you to have a GED or high
school diploma.
Here's how it works:

● Fill out a short online form about yourself

(about 2 minutes)
● Complete small online projects and tests that
you can do at your own pace (about 2 hours)
● You’ll create your first website, from
configuring a server to writing HTML, CSS and
JavaScript (about 2 weeks)
● Complete an on-site or remote Q&A and tech
challenge.

Apply now
2. The Holberton way
No pre-course

Holberton does not expect students to come in with

previous software engineering experience (although if
you do have experience, that’s awesome too).

There is no pre-course work (that’s why you are

attending a school after all), but we do recommend
that you read through The C Programming Language
book by Kernighan and Ritchie or Programming in C
by Stephen Kochan.

The goal of reading through the book is not to deeply

understand all the concepts, but to familiarize
yourself with key terminology and content.
Coursework

We are training you to be a full-stack software

engineers in 24 months. The program will be intense.

There are no formal teachers or formal lectures.

Students are learning by creating and we rely on
peer-learning, collaboration, and industry-relevant
curriculum to guide the way.

There is no competition here at Holberton, rather

students are helping each other towards their goals.
Of course, there is also technical staff available to
answer questions and extend support, as well as
mentors who share their expertise along the way.
Soft skills

In today’s tech world, it’s not enough to be good at

technical skills, you need to be a clear communicator
as well.

We push our students to work on their public

speaking skills, to publish blog posts to online tech
communities and publications, and to speak at
conferences and meetups.

This not only prepares students to be team players

and clear communicators, but creates amazing
networking opportunities.
Professional development

We know that the skills to get a job are different from

the skills to be good at a job. From week zero, we
immerse students in professional growth and
development via workshops, projects, meetups, and
work simulations.

Whiteboarding, mock interviews, professional

networking, and more begin as soon as students start
the program so that they’re confident and competent
when the time comes to prove they’re ready for the
job.
Job search
Utilizing our networks and creating networks of your
own will provide you with the best opportunities to
find a job as a Software Engineer — to know someone
on the inside who can get your resume in front of the
right people and give you a personal
recommendation.

We are not just concerned about you finding your first

job in tech, though; we want to equip you with the
knowledge and resources to drive your job search so
that you are independently successful in the years to
come — regardless of how your interests or the
industry evolves.

You’ll learn how to build your narrative, demonstrate

your technical skills, negotiate, and navigate the
industry with confidence.
Professional advisors

Our professional advisors are the backbone of

Holberton.

They provide feedback about our curriculum, are

resources for our students, and are an endless source
of knowledge about the most current technologies
and frameworks.

They help keep the school in check to make sure we

are delivering the most relevant content to each new
cohort of students. They provide mentorship, deliver
workshops, and collaborate on projects given to
students.

This partnership with mentors across all spectrums

of the tech industry creates paramount and
unprecedented exposure for our students.
3. Pathways
How our program works
 Pathways: foundations & specializations

This syllabus is an overview of the topics, languages,

and frameworks you will learn during your 24 months at
Holberton. It is not a definitive outline and is subject to
change to fit the needs of the ever changing tech
industry.

Our program walks through the major arms of

computer science and software engineering — data
structures, algorithms, low-level and high-level
programming, Linux and UNIX system programming,
web front-end and back-end, databases, security,
system administration, and devops.

Additionally, you will develop professional skills such as

public speaking, networking, project management, and
effective communication.
3a. Foundations
Holberton teaches full-stack software engineering with a project-based approach.
The first part of our on-site intensive education covers the foundations of software
engineering, including low-level programming, DevOps, and high-level modern languages.
Low level
You will understand how programming languages and Unix systems work, “what is going
on under the hood”. This will allow you to optimize and debug anything later in your career.
You will be working with algorithms and data structures which are essential foundations
for any great Software Engineer, the type that the best companies want to hire.
 Low Level

C programming language Graphic programming Reverse engineering and security

-Compilation -SDL2 -Introduction to assembly basics

-Commenting code and following a -Isometric projection Raycasting -Disassembling
coding style standard -Buffer-overflow
-Variables, types, operators, Unix programming -Executable code injection
expressions -Tools: strings, ltrace, objdump,
-Loops, nested loops radare2, radiff2, ldd
-Unix / Linux overview
-Conditional statements
-File I/O, Memory allocation process
-Functions
-Preprocessor, macros, header files
creation and termination System calls Examples of low level projects
-Pointers, pointers to pointers, pointers
to functions, pointer arithmetic -Create your own printf function
-Arrays, multidimensional arrays Data structure and algorithms -Code from scratch a mini-shell
-Structures -Your own Maze (mini game)
-Static and dynamic libraries -Time and space complexity
-Program arguments -Arrays, structures
-Dynamic allocation -Linked lists, doubly linked lists, circular
-Virtual Memory, heap and stack linked lists (you are gonna love linked
-Binary operations lists)
-Makefiles -Stacks and queues
-Hash tables
-Recursion
-Search & sorting algorithms
-Binary trees, BST, AVL
High level
You will create a complete web service with databases, back-end, and an amazing front-end
website with the latest technologies. This project will give you all the skills to work in the best
companies in Silicon Valley such as Facebook or Dropbox. You will gain the skills to quickly
learn and adapt to new frameworks for building products or to iterate on an existing
codebase.
High Level

Python Front-End Examples of projects

-Interpretation -HTML/CSS -Create your own AirBnB website

-Commenting code -Accessibility complete with database, front-end,
-Following a coding style standard -Javascript back-end, console, and testing
-Variables, types, operators, expressions, -JQuery -Hack a website's security by scripting
loops, iterators requests
-Conditional statements (if, else, while) Object-oriented programming
-Functions
-Libraries
-Data structures -Object notation
-Exception management -Public - internal interfaces
-Class, metaclass, decorator -Inheritance
-Network requests -Data formatting (JSON/XML...)
-Application programming interface -Serialization and deserialization
scripting
Databases

-SQL language
-Relational database
-Data definition language
-Data manipulation language
-Data control language
-MySQL - SQLite
-Object-relational mapping
Sysadmin / Devops
You will build web infrastructure similar to those powering tech powerhouses like LinkedIn,
Facebook, and Google. You will architect scalable, reliable, and secure systems using web
servers, load balancers, databases, firewalls, and more. You will learn to automate your job
so that you can easily manage anything from one server or hundreds of them.
 Sysadmin / Devops

Linux / Command line Infrastructure design & Examples of projects

management
-How the Shell works
-Navigating the file system -Parsing -Build a web infrastructure like the ones
-Manipulating files -Advanced log parsing powering Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, etc.
-I/O redirections, standard input, -Advanced SSH -Learn to work at scale
standard output, pipes, filters -Set up a domain name -Develop tools for Cloud environments
-Permissions -Understanding DNS
-Job control -Set up SSL certificate
-Shell scripts -Manage web servers
-Manage load balancers
Soft skills -MySQL Primary/Replica setup
-Firewall management
-Web infrastructure design
-Organizing meetups -Monitor a web infrastructure
-Fireside chat sessions -Web stack debugging
-Attend meetups and conferences
-Technical articles
-Public speaking
-Mastering social media
-Networking
-Project management
-Conflict resolution
3b. Specializations or career track
After you acquire the foundations of software engineering, you specialize.
Students have the opportunity to go beyond the foundations with specializations that focus on exciting
emerging technologies. After acquiring the foundations, you will be able to choose from our specializations:
Machine learning, AR/VR, Low Level and algorithms or career track.
Machine Learning
 Machine Learning
Holberton’s machine learning specialization teaches the
theories behind modern-day breakthroughs in the fields of
computer vision, natural language processing, recommender
systems, autonomous driving, and more.

Students will also learn how to apply these concepts using

technologies such as Pandas, Numpy, Tensorflow, and Keras.
Throughout their nine months of study, students will dive
deep into supervised, unsupervised and reinforcement
learning, as well as the related mathematical principles.

Recent advances in this field have sparked a fourth industrial

revolution, accelerating the rate of automation and scientific
discoveries. Entering such a field now will inevitably help
shape society’s progress for decades to come.
 Unsupervised and
Machine Learning
reinforcement learning

-Principal component analysis

-Clustering
Mathematics Supervised learning
-Embeddings
-Scalars, vectors, matrices, and tensors -Multi-layered networks -Autoencoders
-The Dot product and matrix multiplication -Forward and back propagation -Bayesian optimization
-Matrix identities, inverses, and determinants -Stochastic gradient descent -Viterbi algorithm
-Normalization -Weight and bias initialization -Hidden Markov Models
-Scatter and contour plots -Monte Carlo Method
-Bias and variance tradeoff
-Line and bar graphs
-Regularization -Environment, states, agents, and
-Summation and product notation
-Hyperparameter optimization actions
-Derivatives and partial derivatives
-The chain and product rules -Convolutional neural networks -Value and policy functions
-Eigenvalues and Eigenvectors -ResNets
-Single value decomposition -Deep convolutional architectures Data management
-Marginal and conditional probabilities -Recurrent neural networks -Web scraping
-Expectation, standard deviation, variance, and -Deep recurrent architectures -Data labeling
covariance
-Probability distributions -Avoiding human bias
-Bayesian probability -SQL databases
-Mixture models -Query optimization
-Map reduce
Machine Learning
At the end of the year, students will develop a machine learning project of their choosing that
Project examples they will pitch, build, and present.

-Object Detection (‘What is in this

photo?’)

-Facial verification

-Voice recognition (‘Alexa’, ‘Hey - Siri’,

‘Cortana’, ‘Hey Google’)

-Sentiment analysis (‘What does this

person want?’, ‘What is happening in
this photo?’)

-Speech to text

-Stock predictions

-Recommender systems (Netflix

‘Recommended for you’)

-Game agents (AlphaGo)

Augmented Reality / Virtual Reality
 Augmented Reality / Virtual Reality

Holberton's Augmented Reality / Virtual Reality (AR / VR)

curriculum teaches the fundamentals of programming in
C# and developing interactive mixed reality projects in
Unity3D, the world's leading real-time game engine.

Throughout the nine months, students will learn Unity3D

concepts such as scripting, animation, UI design, creating
shaders, game testing, as well as learning UX concepts
specific to AR and VR, including immersive storytelling,
spatial audio, and user comfort.

Mixed reality is a young, evolving industry and becoming

involved now means shaping and influencing the future of
the field.
Augmented Reality / Virtual Reality

The Unity section of the AR/VR curriculum

The C# section of the AR/VR curriculum teaches the Unity software, its concepts and
covers the fundamentals of programming, workflow, as well as design principles and
data structures, algorithms, and best UI/UX considerations for mixed reality. First,
practices, as well as test-driven development students will focus on developing a complete
and introductory linear algebra. 3D game, then use their Unity skills to design a
variety of experiences for both AR and VR.

C# curriculum Unity curriculum

Some concepts covered include: Some concepts covered include:

-If/else statements, loops, functions -Unity workflow and best practices
-Data structures -Unity scripting
-Exceptions -HUD/UI design
-Structs, classes, namespaces -Animation
-Test-driven development -Audio
-Linear algebra -Lighting/rendering
-Interfaces -Shader programming
-Generics -Game testing
-Delegates, events -UX for mixed reality
-Algorithmic problem solving -Accessibility
 Augmented / Virtual Reality

A sample of some of the projects that students

will develop:

VR

- 360 Video
- On-Rails Experience
- Seated/Standing Experience
- Room Scale Experience

AR

- Marker-based Recognition
- Projection-based Application
- Location-based Application
- Face Tracking Development of the 3D game project
Augmented / Virtual Reality

At the end of the year, students will develop an

interactive mixed reality project of their choosing that
they will pitch, build, and present.

Many tech companies, large and small, are expanding

into the AR and VR space, including Amazon, Google,
Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, and Sony. While they are
most popularly known for gaming and entertainment, AR
Live coding demo of interaction in VR
and VR have been adopted outside the tech sector as
well, including the medical, auto, and construction
industries.

Jobs in the AR and VR space include application

development, mobile development, product design,
interaction design, game development, and more.

Taking a virtual reality tour of the Holberton School

space at Oakland's First Fridays
Low Level and algorithms
Low Level and algorithms

Holberton’s low-level programming specialization

allows students to dive into the complexity of the C
programming language and the Linux operating
system. Students will also be challenged with
advanced data structures and algorithms, and they
will uncover all the mechanisms behind the
Blockchain technology by building their own basic
cryptocurrency from scratch, entirely in C.

This specialization builds a great foundation if you

aim to become a fast-growing Software Engineer as it
will widely develop your understanding of “how
things work under the hood”.
Low Level and Algorithms

This first part of the low-level curriculum is an extension to

Holberton’s first year program. Students will extend their
knowledge of the C programming language and the Linux
system throughout more complex projects.

These advanced concepts include but are not limited to:

Linux and C programming

-File streams
-The Linux programming
-Interface: system calls
-Memory management
-Process tracing
-IPC:Inter-Process Communication
-The ELF file format
-Assembly with Intel x86
-The Linux filesystem
Low Level and Algorithms
Blockchain
This last part of the low-level specialization teaches students
Data Structures and Algorithms how to build their own Blockchain, and extend it to a basic
cryptocurrency. The whole project will be built from scratch
This next part of the low-level curriculum is designed
to introduce students to complex, yet widely used and entirely in C.
data structures and algorithms. Data structures and
algorithms are a means of manipulating and Blockchain is a very big trend, and it not only applies to the
transforming data. They help developers solve software industry, but to many others, such as banking,
problems in a reliable and maintainable way. health, telecommunication, and more. By the end of this big
project, students will have a strong understanding of what
These advanced data structures and algorithms
makes the Blockchain technologies so reliable and secure.
include:

Here is a non-exhaustive break down of what this project

covers:

Data structures and algorithms Blockchain

-Advanced trees
-Graphs -Cryptography in the blockchain
-Compression algorithm -The Blockchain data structures
-Pathfinding implementations in C
-Block mining
-From Blockchain to cryptocurrency
Low Level and Algorithms

After 9 months of low-level specialization, students will possess a very strong and precise knowledge of the C
programming language. The majority of the software used in the industry are built on top of the C language, and knowing
the root of a technology becomes a really valuable skill when it comes to troubleshooting issues or designing projects.
Students will also be able to rely on their deep understanding of the Linux system and its interface, giving them the best
assets to build reliable applications in the future and to stay professionally versatile.

Possible Careers / Jobs

- SRE → Strong knowledge of the Linux system = perfect for application maintenance and reliability

- Junior Blockchain Engineer → Strong understanding of the blockchain mechanisms

- Embedded SWE → Strong knowledge of C, which is widely used in embedded systems, deep understanding of
system architectures

- IoT Engineer → Same reasons as Embedded engineer, as lots of IoT devices require embedded technologies

- Game Engine Developer → Game engines are built using low-level technologies such as C/C++ and Assembly to
give developers flexibility, as they need to work closely with the hardware in order to create the most optimized
engines
Full-Stack web development
(Available Jan 2020)
Full-stack web development (Available Jan 2020)

Holberton’s web stack specialization advances the web development principles and skills introduced prior. During the
specialization, students approach and build various web applications in all the most recent frameworks.

Students will learn advanced skills in front-end and back-end development, mastering frameworks that are in high-demand
throughout the industry.

Whether it's front-end, back-end, or full-stack engineering, this curriculum prepares students to create, maintain, and
improve web applications and APIs, some of which are used every day.

By following this specialization, students will be well-versed in ReactJS, VueJS, AngularJS, SASS, responsive design,
Accessibility, Rails, Go, NodeJS, NoSQL, MySQL advanced, Elasticsearch, Redis, OAuth, and more.

The last 2 months are dedicated to building a personal web project on the technology of a student's choice.
Career Track
Career Track: Career Sprint & On-the-job training
After the foundations, if a student chooses to seek employment, they will first complete a career sprint to better prepare for
the road ahead and then, find employment.

Career sprint: Designed to keep students accountable during the job search process. The career sprint helps students build
processes and get connected to resources that will be helpful throughout the entirety of their professional careers. Once
completed, students will be fully prepared for their first work opportunities.

On-the-job training: Once a student finds a full-time employment opportunity meeting all of our criteria, and invests a
specified duration of commitment to it, they are then considered a graduate. Continued support from Holberton during this
phase of a student’s journey helps build lasting skills.

Career sprint On-the-job training

-"Plan Your Prep" project clarifying
Student Objectives and Key Results -Apply knowledge and technical skills in a
(OKRs) work environment
-Workshops:
-Demonstrate professional skills in the
-Resume preparation
work environment
-Networking practice
-Mock interviews
-Contribute technically to their team
-Negotiation
-Application weekly report & monitoring -Develop strong networking relationships
Ready to define
your future?
Start your application now by
following the links below:
USA
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