It used to be that learning Drupal guaranteed a lot of blood sweat and tears locating the right documentation for your needs and finding help among an informal network of Drupalers.  Throughout the years, it has become simpler to find help through programs like Drupal Core Mentoring and a growing number of options for formal training. Over the next few weeks, the Drupal Association is spotlighting three different ways companies and individuals are training new Drupal talent.

Programs are popping up left and right to help train aspiring Drupal developers and grow the Drupal community. Experienced developers benefit from these programs, too-- and employers get matched with developers with the right skills, goals, and passions for the company. When it comes to many Drupal training programs, everybody wins.

One increasingly popular option is crash-course training, which offers a relatively short, focused and intensive program to learn Drupal quickly. One such program is Tech Bootcamps, which aims to help people learn dramatically increase the available pool of qualified Drupal developers in the next few years.

"I’m just trying to do my part for the world of Drupal,” said Joe DiDonato, the founder of Tech Bootcamps. "One of the things I learned when I was running Oracle’s Americas Education was that unless we could turn out a huge workforce of qualified individuals, the technology wouldn’t survive against competitors.”

Having seen firsthand how companies use technologies where talent is most readily available, and having seen great technologies suffer because of a talent gap, DiDonato made up his mind: "We can’t let that happen to Drupal.”

Thus he came up with Tech Bootcamps, a training program to turn both experienced programmers and absolute beginners into qualified Junior Drupal Developers in only eight weeks. The cost is $6,000 for the course.

"I’ve been very vocal about colleges and universities not turning out students with the credentials to fill the high-tech jobs that are open out there,” said DiDonato. "We think that we provide a unique approach for people interested in transitioning to the web developer career field. Our mission is to make that transition affordable and quick; and we will go the extra mile to help them find jobs.”

Though the first batch of alumni have yet to graduate, DiDonato’s program is already gaining attention for its efforts. Brave for Veterans, Inc, a Boston non-profit corporation dedicated to helping veterans seeking employment in the technology sector, has partnered up with the program to help veterans go through the bootcamp and find employment. Meanwhile, DiDonato has already fielded several requests from companies “extremely interested in interviewing ALL successful graduates…  for both independent contractor and permanent positions.”

The value of programs like DiDonato’s is that it helps match developers with the right companies, ensuring that aspiring developers can find the positions that are optimal for them. However, Tech Bootcamps isn’t the only option. Other intensive training options exist to help aspiring developers get a foot in the door. A two-week apprenticeship program called OpenDrupal, which is run by Happy Computers out of their London, England office, helps to give young developers a leg up.

“My training company was hosting the monthly Drupal user group meeting and we noticed that companies needed young people,” said Henry Stewart, CEO of Happy Computers.

After speaking with several Drupal companies and shops, the Happy Computers team got together with local developers and started figuring out a way to train more Drupal talent and build the community. They decided to put together an intensive Drupal Apprenticeship program, and, with help from a number of Drupal developers, they built the course and began searching for talent.

“I helped out (with the rest of the OpenDrupal group) by building the curriculum more (see OpenDrupal Foundation), acting as an industry advisor and liaising with the Drupal community,” said Hedley Smith of London’s Agile Collective.

“The program is an official UK Apprenticeship programme and as such the Apprentices will eventually earn a nationally recognized qualification.” For the apprenticeship, the program brought in mentors from the Drupal community to work with the group.

“We had a two week intensive program. The community was very supportive-- every day for two weeks, a professional Drupal developer came out, taught the students, and gave them advice,” Hedley explained.

“I did a few days, as well as some of the other OpenDrupal members-- Crispin of White Fuse, Chandeep Khosa of Imagine Creative, James Lefrere, and some others from the Drupal community (Vamory and Vijaya of CapGemini),” agreed Smith. “I found mentoring to be invaluable to both the participants and the mentor, helping young people learn gives you a new perspective and is a good opportunity for both people to develop.”

The program culminated in the Apprentices attending DrupalCamp London 2014, where they showcased their Drupal websites.

“None of them had ever been to anything like this before, and getting that expose and interaction with the community was good for them and for raising awareness,” said Smith. “They showcased their Drupal websites that they'd been working on over the past two weeks - this went really well and the room was buzzing with people, both sides keen to ask questions and talk!

“All of the websites the Apprentices had produced were impressive, and the rate at which they'd learnt was incredible. Some were creating their own themes, integrating jQuery plugins and all seemed familiar with Drupal and key contributed modules.”

“The great thing about the community is that they’ve been all about helping young people get into work, asking how can we help recruit more people,” said Stewart. “If you look at a lot of big companies, to get in you have to have a degree, but these kids haven’t gotten through university. However, they have a keenness for coding and they really are excited.”

According to Stewart, everyone benefits from the program.

“Through apprenticeships, the kids get opportunities, and coding companies get bigger,” he said. “Everyone wins.”

“I am very proud of the scheme but don’t myself deserve any of the credit – it is Sheena Morris, Hedley Smith, Pat Kelman, and the Drupal community who deserve the credit,” he added. “I just set up the business to make a difference.”

Image credit to coleydude on Flickr.