Five Years of Cohorts

A Letter from Leon & Grace

Here’s how it all started—

COVID had just hit.

While Grace was about to start the world’s fastest-growing design community—without even knowing it—I wrote a little article for fun about how working full-time while studying part-time to pay my own tuition ended up helping me land interviews at Apple, Google, and Amazon… as a sophomore.
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It unexpectedly hit ~100k views.

People shared it everywhere.

Within a month, over 100 super-talented HCI and design students across the U.S. reached out asking the same thing:

“How do I get experience when everyone wants experience, but no one gives it?”

And that’s when it clicked.

In design, real work experience + insane craft is everything.

It bridges the gap between school and the industry.

You can try to fake it—but even if you get past imposter syndrome, you won’t get past a sharp recruiter.

You can put your friend’s startup on your resume—but if the project never ships or isn’t sexy to you, it won’t help much.

So back then, with new HCI programs on the rise everywhere, with our high-quality work experience, your early career simply isn’t enough to stand out.

So, almost 5 years ago, we decided to build something to bridge that gap.

It was scrappy as hell, we started recording and teaching from our basement with a green screen.

Five of us. No pay. No plan.

Just a belief that this mattered.

Jason went from a comms degree to UXR at Disney, then Google.

Kerstin, who mentored him, went from Informatics to Google internship to senior researcher at TikTok.

Hannah—an international student who barely spoke English when she arrived—now killing it at Epic Games.

Shang, who pivoted from industrial design into product at Amazon.

And me—juggling design and school, just trying to help those 100 students who reached out on LinkedIn.

The only thing we had in common? We had nothing in common.

Different paths. Different skills. Same dream.

That’s the magic of UX.

So we ran the first cohort purely virtual.

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3–5 students. Free.

One fake startup craeted after a mix of a big tech internship & a learning capstone.

But we did it differently—

We designed and asked the design students to think about how to ship it. We included a PM. A tech lead.

Students learned constraints, pushback, prioritization, and delivery.

We brought in senior mentors from Google and Airbnb to review the work—and they were seriously impressed.

Every single student got interviews at Amazon or Microsoft that year.

(Maybe partly because of the COVID hiring boom—but we knew we were onto something.)

So we ran it again with 3 members, now paid. This time, $2k–$6k tution depending on 1:1 needs. 

Again: success. One went to Apple. One to TikTok. One to Google.

Those alumni? They came back as coaches or to help us vet students now.

We ran 100 live, recorded sessions over ten weeks, bringing in hiring managers and industry experts. Everything was documented, shared, and driven by us, new students, and the past students who got offers at big tech we now call alumni

That was the beginning of the ten week UXGO advanced class.

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We never wanted to be just another bootcamp.

So, how was UXGO and. the ten week cohort getting more unique?

Well forget fake projects, classes & theories. No more redesigning your friend’s website, mocking up apps that go nowhere, or taking useless online classes to try to get a certificate.

We went all-in on real startups, real stakes.

See now - over the first few years, every ten weeks, we ran 500 live sessions—recorded, shared, and packed with hiring managers, industry experts, and alumni who had already landed offers at big tech. Everything we did was documented, tested, and iterated. Classic UX style. Thousands of 1:1s and workshops later, we weren’t just teaching—we were prototyping the future of career-building.

So we noticed something…

A pattern.

Our coaches and alumni started making what we called “predictions.”

Give us a week or two with a student, and we could tell—with 70-80% accuracy—if they’d land a job.

It wasn’t about GPA. It wasn’t about past experience.

It was… the vibe.

How they showed up. How they built. How they handled feedback when things got messy (because they always do).
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So we refined the model - We called it mutual selection.

We didn’t just pick startups—we started picking students too.

Yeah, we made the “bad” business decision:

Cut tuition by 30%, shrink cohorts by 50%, and hand out grants like candy.

Why? Because we only wanted people we believed could win.

We still welcomed beginners—but only those joining for the right reasons, who understood the challenges ahead. If you weren’t ready to grind and stay ambitious, we’d tell you upfront. We’d waitlist you, and if you proved us wrong? We’d gladly bring you back, no ego.

Too many folks were running to UX because they “couldn’t code” or thought it was a quick cash grab.

That’s not who makes it—and we weren’t afraid to give them the reality check.

Could we have just taken everyone’s money?

Sure. But if we’re bringing in serious founders, they deserve hungry, competitive talent. Besides trust us, you want us to screen and team match everyone, not just accpt anyone to be your team mate.

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Becuase of our dedicaiton something wild happened—

Startups didn’t just mentor our students.

They hired them. We are now creating work opprutnites, not just training.

Founders like Johnny (Harvard MBA) told us,

“Out of 150 applicants, the only one I remembered was the cohort member I actually built with.”

That’s when we knew—this wasn’t education.

This was real-world trial by fire.
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We kept the formula simple start up after start up, cohort after cohort:

5 students + 2 big tech coaches + 1 founder + dev team.

Zero fluff.

Coaches weren’t hosting coffee chats—they were in the trenches, shipping product.

Coaches became leads. Leads became managers. Some became heads of design—like me.

We all grew together. Stayed small. Stayed dangerously outcome-driven.

And word got out.

Grace from Design Buddies saw the same vision. We merged forces.

Now? That little Discord she built—yeah, it’s pushing 100K members.

Today, 100+ join our cohorts yearly, selected from 1000+ applications. We interview 10 students a month—no matter their background—giving everyone a fair shot at building top-tier experience.

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We still haven’t spent a dime on marketing.

Because when you build real, people notice.

And that’s how we turned “not a bootcamp” into something way better.

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What Changed Over the Years?

We rebuild the cohort every year—on purpose.

Yes, really. All materials, content, and structure.

Why you ask, that sounds like a huge waste of $? 

Well, did you not pay attention to this article haha, because we’re product designers and we care about craft.

This isn’t a course. It’s our product & great products iterate.

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2024 was our biggest evolution yet:

• Removed 1:1 coaching → added weekly founder reviews + team-based workshops
  
  Mirrors how real product teams operate
  
  
• Introduced team leads
  
  So members can go deep in motion, systems, storytelling, etc.
  
  
• Doubled down on design systems + UITK
  
  The tools startups actually hire for
  
  
• Went all-in on AI
  
  Agents. OODA loops. RAG. Prompt workflows. We teach what’s real—faster than we can write it down
  
  
• Opened weekly job-hunting workshops
  
  Resume, portfolio, storytelling—open to current members and alumni
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But Isn’t the Market Worse Now? Does It Still Work?

Short answer: yes—but it depends on you.

We don’t sell fake guarantees.

We believe in word-of-mouth, radical transparency, and mutual selection.

Everyone is interviewed by alumni. Anyone can DM current students to ask about the experience.

Here’s the real talk:

UX is hard to break into.

But once you’re in? It’s the most creatively fulfilling career you’ll ever have.

Don’t do it for the money. Don’t do it because you hate coding.

Do it because this is your life’s work—and you just need that first real shot.

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This is for the hungry.

As hungry as we were when we were in your shoes, not long ago.

What we offer is real opportunity.

And real work experience you can speak to with confidence.

“I shipped that.”

“I built that.”

Not “I got a certificate.”

We vet every applicant.

If we feel like you’re not ready? We will refund your deposit.

We’ll invite you to observe. Or re-apply later.

Because this is a space you have to earn. And that’s what makes it special.

Some Numbers from 2024:

• 60% of job-ready grads got interviews within 2 months
  
  
• Half of those landed offers—often directly with their cohort founder
  
  
• Shoutouts to:
  
  
  
  • Niki (with Homies)
    
    
  • Maria (stealth AI co)
    
    
  • Manvi, Sylvia, Eric, Sophia → now at Google, Meta, Coinbase, Amazon
    
    

Over half of those who received offers were international students on OPT.

We know how much more stressful that is—we’re really proud to support them.

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So, What’s Next?

Cohort 19 is already underway.

Cohort 20 will be our biggest yet—launching live at the CoCreate Conference with our largest demo day ever.

Here’s what we’re focusing on:

• More In-Person Energy
  
  Working with sponsors to help more members join kickoff + demo day in SF.
  
  
• Stricter Founder Selection
  
  Prioritizing founders with strong track records, product vision, consistent mentorship, and openness to hiring.
  
  
• Better Scholarship Access
  
  5 full + 10 partial scholarships last year. In 2025, founders can now contribute to grants too.
  
  
• And Yes… Commitment Matters
  
  There’s always someone who interviews well, pays tuition… then vanishes. We’re not trying to become a capstone project—we dont want to give out grades, we want to motivate not punish.
  
  

Final Thoughts

It’s been five years.

Thousands of members.

Too many success stories to even upload.

As Minh, an alum turned team member, put it:

“Weird flex, but we actually have too many real stories. It’s too much content.”

We’re still learning.

We’re not trying to be the biggest.

We just want to stay real, cool, and genuinely impactful.

If you care about craft…

If you’re ready to build the one project that changes everything—

You belong here.

We charge a fraction of what bootcamps do, pay our coaches more than we should, and spend way too many hours on every project with a 3:5 coach/alumni to student ratio.

We’ve turned down many acquisition & investment offers. We make our “competitors” very angry.

Because yeah—frankly our model doesn’t always make sense on paper, but not everything needs to be optimized for profit.

Some things are built for legacy.

That’s what this cohort is.

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Not just a 10-week program tucked inside UXGO or Design Buddies—this is its own thing.

A space where world-class founders, hungry designers, and thoughtful big tech coaches come together to build real products and real careers.

That’s why we gave it its own name: CoCreate.

Let’s CREATE the best experience for both product and you —together.

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Last year, Grace and I both left our full-time jobs—me at Shopify, her at Electronic Arts—to go all-in.

Now, we’ve got 30+ big tech coaches and alumni here to help you succeed.

See you in Cohort 20.

If you haven’t signed up yet—go for it.

And if you’re applying for a future one—good luck. We’re cheering for you.

– Leon & Grace alongside the whole team

Co-founders, UXGO, Design Buddies, and now… CoCreate 💜

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