Income Share Agreements and the Indie Coding Bootcamp with Trevor Page

Trevor Page discovered he had a knack for teaching when the junior programmers he mentored got up to speed faster than anyone expected. His managers noticed; Trevor noticed too. He started a blog, then a podcast, then YouTube videos, then online courses. Eventually he launched a full six-month Java bootcamp through Coders Campus, charging $9,800 — competitive with much larger coding bootcamps. The bootcamp serves three avatar types: "Graduate Greg" (CS degree holders who struggle to land jobs), "IT Ivan" (dev-adjacent workers who want to become developers), and "Career Change Carrie" (people leaving unrelated fields). Each gets an immersive experience with daily calls, one-on-one support, Slack channels, and a full career services package including resume help, LinkedIn profile reviews, and interview preparation. Trevor even partnered with a former Google recruiter who created a course on making resumes stand out. Revenue grew from $34K in 2019 to $75K in 2020 to $360K+ in 2021, when he brought in a business partner.

The biggest growth lever wasn't marketing — it was a financing model called income share agreements (ISAs). Students pay a small deposit (5-10% of tuition), then take the full bootcamp at no additional cost. Once they graduate and get employed, they begin making payments toward the tuition through a third-party ISA provider. "Students love it," Trevor says, "because we essentially don't get paid unless they get paid. And the goal of the bootcamp is to get them a job as a coder. So our values and our goals together are very much in alignment. If I can't do it, if I can't get them a job, I don't get paid." Trevor's team interviewed 14 different ISA companies before finding one aligned with their values. Since introducing ISAs in June 2021, they generated roughly $220K in to-be-collected revenue in just three months — nearly doubling their cash-collected revenue. The model levels the playing field for students who can't pay upfront while creating powerful alignment between the bootcamp's success and the student's career outcome.

Trevor is candid about his biggest unsolved challenge: roughly 20% of students struggle with motivation. He can tell within the first week who will succeed and who won't — and it's not always who you'd expect. He shares the story of one student who seemed perfect on the sales call: hit rock bottom, downsized apartment, passionate declaration of commitment. "I thought, Oh my God, this is perfect. This guy is going to succeed. He's going to be a great story. He's been my toughest student, I can't motivate the guy." When students fall behind, they stop showing up to daily calls out of embarrassment. Trevor tried mixing cohorts so struggling students wouldn't feel behind relative to their peers, but it didn't work. He's experimenting with separate groups for students who are behind, a standalone course on how to think like a coder and ask for help effectively, and more one-on-one check-ins. Student-led Saturday study halls have shown some promise. The real insight: the challenge isn't always about understanding code — it's about communication skills and motivation, which is why Trevor half-jokes that he needs a life coach on staff.