District Arts & Education

Based on a California model, Holberton New Haven is a rigorous, two-year fullstack software engineering education made more accessible for people from all walks of life through unique program components:

• No upfront tuition -  graduates don’t pay for their education until they land their first job making over $40,000 per year, after which they pay a sliding scale based on their income (17% of their base salary for ~3 years after-graduation)

• an accessible application, with no prerequisites, an open problem-solving assessment and blind admissions

• collaborative project-based peer-learning (rather than classroom lectures) that delivers a hands-on education based in team collaboration that reflects the industry work environment and fosters important professional skills (communication, collaboration, project management, adaptability, resilience and time management)

As a non-profit, District Arts & Education is able to offer the Holberton education and additional programming with cheaper, more flexible options for students. CTNext funding supports the launch costs of the program's initial cohorts, to seed the organization for full financial sustainability through the income share agreement and future funders.

Holberton Students

The first seven students graduated at the end of 2020 and five have already accepted job offers (with an average starting salary of $72,000). 44 students are currently enrolled, with a new cohort scheduled to begin this spring.

Of Holberton’s students:

• 27% are New Haven area residents

• 48% are from Connecticut

• 46.04% identify as a person of color or part of a racial minority group

• 13.58% identify as female 

• 11.11% identify as part of the LGBTQ community 

• 6.35% identify as having a disability 

Last year, NHIC and DAE launched a pilot Life Stipend Program to support students financially while they are attending the school full-time.

In 2021, with Innovation Places support, DAE is also launching Project Transformer, a pre-application program for New Haven youth to increase the number of successful local applications to tech-centered higher education programs, like Holberton.