It's hard to criticize someone for asking for help (you have to do what you have to do), but if the Flatiron School is truly this successful at preparing attendees for real-world development and helping close to 100% of them find work after just four months (as opposed to four years), I think it's to be expected that some folks are going to be less empathetic.
Interestingly, despite Flatiron's $12,000 tuition, the WSJ article says "The school’s student acceptance rate is less than 8%." That suggests they're not just accepting anybody who can pay; ostensibly they are filtering for ability/accomplishment. If this is the case, and the placement figures are accurate, there's no reason Flatiron (and programs like it) couldn't make their money on the back-end. Assume that graduates are placed in entry-level positions paying $80,000 on average. A 20% placement fee would earn Flatiron $16,000, $4,000 more per student than tuition. If you assume a class size of 30, and a 98% placement rate, you're looking at an additional $116,000 in revenue per graduating class.
Yes, there's risk with this model, but if these schools are truly capable of placing nearly all of their students in in-demand development jobs after just four months, the risk seems modest. After all, when the market turns, the pool of people willing to pay $12,000 for a four month program is going to dry up anyway.
[1] http://blogs.wsj.com/venturecapital/2014/04/09/flatiron-scho...
