Our Network Just Got A Lot Bigger

Today, General Assembly is making a couple of big announcements.

First, we have closed on our company’s first acquisition — Canadian tech and design career accelerator, Bitmaker. We’ve known the folks at Bitmaker for a long time and I’ve been incredibly impressed with the way their CEO, Andrew Mawer, has built his Toronto-based organization. I’ve watched him lead his team and grow their community to become Canada’s largest career accelerator, and I’m so excited to have them be part of GA as we continue to pursue our long-term vision around education-to-employment.

As a bonus upside, we now also have the option of moving to Canada if Trump wins the U.S. election.

Second, we are announcing the largest expansion of our campus footprint in GA’s history — we are increasing our number of campuses by over 60%. Our ongoing mission is to impact people’s careers and more broadly solve the talent needs of employers everywhere. We see big opportunities to leverage our burgeoning online communities and audiences with new campuses that are closer to the biggest pockets of potential students, just outside of traditional urban hotspots more commonly associated with the tech sector.

This is a big deal. It represents a lot of work and innovation from our teams all over the world who worked tirelessly to create the blended education model that will support this expansion. I’m truly thrilled that now, more people will be able to experience our campuses and community all over the world.

Here at GA, when we talk about growth, it’s always a part of a much larger discussion around how we can best connect education-to-employment and how we can build one of the strongest alumni networks ever created. With both the acquisition of Bitmaker and our physical footprint expansion, we are significantly increasing opportunities for our students and alumni to connect, regardless of where they live. This also enables us to respond to the rapidly changing and growing talent needs of employers.

The numbers that we’ve accomplished to date are truly astounding. Over 350,000 people have come to our campuses over the past 5 years. We have more than 35,000 course alumni, all with the kinds of skills that employers need most, all growing and improving in their careers. And this doesn’t count the more than 15,000 employees of Fortune 500 companies who have engaged with GA as a part of our enterprise education programs.

The GA team will continue to work hard to ensure our new campuses and expanded community enjoy quality experiences and maintain the mission we were founded upon.

The appetite to learn new skills, and pursue one’s dream job has never been greater — and we only see it growing in the years to come.

Join us in celebrating our acquisition and new cities.

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