Employees with the coding bootcamp Codeup reported that they had been laid off Friday, just hours after CEO Jason Straughan announced he was stepping down.
Two former employees told the San Antonio Report that when staff were told of the layoffs Friday, they learned that the company would shut down once the last students had completed their certificates.
“Layoff stories are never fun to hear or tell,” Leslie Torres wrote on LinkedIn Friday afternoon. “Unfortunately, this time around I am on the telling side of the story.”
Torres, who worked as a placement specialist, called Codeup “one of the most fulfilling positions I have ever had the pleasure to take.”
On Facebook, Kenneth Howell, an instructor with Codeup, said he learned on Friday that “Codeup will no longer be operating … and I will need to transition into a new job sooner rather than later.”
Straughan, a founder of Codeup along with Michael Girdley and Chris Turner, did not mention layoffs or the for-profit school’s future in his post on LinkedIn and X. He noted only that he would be stepping down as CEO and would be “supporting the team at Codeup any way I can.”
Straughan confirmed in a text that he had stepped down as CEO, and referred additional questions to Dori Salisbury. Girdley, who also declined to comment, directed inquiries to Salisbury, “as she is the CEO.”
Salisbury did not immediately respond to an email requesting comment Friday afternoon.
Codeup laid off roughly a quarter of its staff in October, just weeks after moving into its new home on the North Side.
Earlier this month, Codeup announced an open house at the new location.
Codeup, founded in 2013, offers certificates in data science, cloud administration and web development. It employed 124 people when its offices were located downtown at 600 Navarro St., according to a company profile on PitchBook.
“Our lens at Codeup has always been to make every decision by asking, ‘What’s best for students?’ It’s never led us astray,” Straughan wrote in his post. “The company needs different leadership for the next phase of the journey in service to our students.”
According to an employee who was laid off Friday, current students will be able to finish their certificate programs, and the school will wind down after that. This person, who asked that their name be withheld to protect future job prospects, said that Friday’s layoffs included most of the company’s leadership and placement team and that instructors would stay until their students completed the program.
The demise of Codeup comes as the tech industry has been roiled by layoffs and the bootcamp space has become crowded with competitors. With the tighter job market have come robust discussions about the value of bootcamps.
The company does not list its tuition on its website, but it can be found on the website for Ready to Work, San Antonio’s taxpayer-funded workforce development program. It shows that Codeup’s 20-week data science program costs $31,250, its 20-week full stack web development program $27,500 and 15-week cloud administration program $17,000.
