A lot has happened since HackerYou launched on June 6th, 2012. For our birthday, I thought it would be fun to look back at some of the amazing things that have happened since we opened our doors. In August 2011, Ladies Learning Code was created. Less than a year later, the same team launched HackerYou. We started out by offering part-time web development courses out of Toronto's Centre for Social Innovation at Bloor and Bathurst. Here's our original press release from when we launched. Our first sold-out part-time course kicked off in September 2012, led by Wes Bos. Two years later, in 2014, we moved into 7000 square feet of space at Queen & Spadina. This gave us the room we needed to launch our most ambitious program to date: our full-time front-end bootcamp. Cohort 1 kicked off in January 2014, and we've run four cohorts a year since then. Our current cohort is our 10th, and they'll be ready to go out into the working world soon. (You can come check out their Demo Night and all the great things they've been working on by RSVP'ing here)! In 2014, we also expanded our part-time course offerings to include topics like JavaScript and design, both of which were popular with alumni of our part-time web development courses. 
In 2015 we grew again, through leasing another 5000+ square feet right next door to our existing space. This space gave us two more classrooms, and allowed us to create an Alumni Lounge, a space for HackerYou alumni to work, hang and connect. It's also allowed us to expand our community by providing rental spaces for other organizations when we're not using them for our own purposes. We lovingly (and semi-jokingly) refer to the new space next door to HackerYou as "HackerTwo". If you're one of HackerYou's amazing alumni, you can actually become a member of the HackerTwo space - there are lots of benefits to becoming a member, and different plans to suit your needs. Working in a collaborative environment doesn't have to stop when your course is over. The community we've built over the last four years is a tight one, and we love any excuse to spend time together. 
Speaking of spending time together, in 2015 we also launched HackerYou Camp, an annual retreat for HackerYou alumni. Last year, 60 people joined us, and this year we've secured a bigger space that can accommodate up to 80. In 2016, we're continuing to expand. We've added part-time courses courses on SEO (search engine optimization), UX (user experience) design, and soon we'll be launching our first part-time full-stack course, as well as a part-time web development course that will run once a week on Saturdays. You asked for it, so we're making it happen! I'm really proud of what we've been able to do in the past four years, and it wouldn't be possible without my amazing team, and our instructors, mentors, alumni and community partners. Thank you for helping us build this great community. Happy birthday to us!