The Campus

So many of you have been asking us about our new campus... nah, I'm kidding, nobody is really thinking about classrooms or offices nowadays, because we tend to assume that every form of interpersonal interaction has been banned into the online space (and to our homes at the same time). Yet, as a firm believer in the superior value of in-person education I am very excited to walk you through our new location and tell you about what you should expect when joining Pipeline Academy.

Writing about the place we’ve picked for our bootcamp feels somehow like a strange episode of MTV Cribs: the camera is too shaky, the tour feels like an exercise in humblebragging, and ultimately I'm just showing you stuff I don't own. Nevertheless…

Let me give you the tour: The Kiez

Let's start with the area, which is favourite to a lot of people in Berlin. The campus is located on the western end of Kreuzberg at Gneisenaustraße 27, close to Mehringdamm. This neighbourhood is defined by the variety of cozy parks, friendly streets and various international restaurants, which turns going out for lunch from an ordeal to a real highlight every single day. Historic spots like Gräfekiez, Viktoriapark, Tempelhofer Feld are just a few walking minutes away, and the ever-changing Bergmannstraße with the Marheineke Markthalle is even closer offering more options for grabbing groceries and food. (If you'd like to get a vivid feel for how this Kiez has been evolving, go check out Gerd Nowakowski's lovely piece in the Tagesspiegel about it - in German.)

Getting there should not be a problem for anyone, there are plenty of designated bike lanes in the surrounding area and public transport options are also plentiful. The closest stop right across the street is U7 Gneisenaustraße, but you can also take the U6 to Mehringdamm or the buses 140 and M19. This means that wherever you are commuting from within the city, it should be easy and hassle-free.

come on in: The campus

The area has a very rich history, and most of the surrounding buildings that survived the war are under heritage preservation. This is what went down behind these walls in the past 120 years:

"Der Wohn- und Fabrikkomplex in der Gneisenaustraße 27 wurde im Jahr 1900 errichtet. In früheren Jahren befanden sich hier unter anderem kleinere und größere Fabriken wie eine Messinglinienfabrik und Schriftgießerei, die Armaturen-Apparate-Fabrik Preschona von A. Meyer oder eine Lampenfabrik (alle 1943). Von 1949 bis 2013 diente das fünfgeschossige Gebäude als Produktionsstätte der Firma ROKA Robert Karst GmbH & Co. KG, die Steckverbindungen für die Autoindustrie fertigte, die danach einen neuen Standort bezog."

The building with the old facade is still visible on Google Street View.

The campus has been established 2015 when the generous renovation of the magnificent old industrial building has been completed. Our partner and host, the CIEE Global Institute has transformed the building into a "full-fledged “vertical campus” where living, academic classes, dining and socializing co-exist, creating a state-of-the-art interdisciplinary space. Functioning as a community incubator, the integration of the campus encourages learning both inside and outside of the classroom and facilitates connections that are vital to open exchange and debate."

Here is the part where I gladly refer you to Chris Mosier's photographs on ArchDaily, the photos above are their courtesy. I think they give you a better idea about how it feels to hang out on campus than I could ever do it justice.

The generous dorm on the site is available for our future students, so in case you don't have a place to stay in Berlin and would like to avoid the potential pitfalls of finding an apartment for the three months of the bootcamp, you can get an affordable all-inclusive student apartment at a really cool location. Just hit us up for more info.

Where the magic happens: The classroom

Our classroom offers a versatile and flexible learning environment for our students, it allows us to adjust the setting according to the different requirements defined by the changing didactic methods we apply throughout the 12-weeks of the data engineering bootcamp program. You can find us behind the bright yellow doors right next to the green Ampelmann.

Although the classroom is being used as a streaming studio at the moment for delivering a professional online experience to our students (I am writing this March 10th, 2021), we have the option to host in-person 1-on-1 sessions with our participants who ask for extra support. Both Daniel and I are eagerly waiting to have the whole class around and to finally working together in a non-virtual setting, but health and safety come first.

Exciting times are ahead of us, and we’re glad to have found a place that supports the launch of our small yet ambitious endeavour of building up Pipeline Academy. This is the part when the tour ends, but instead of saying goodbye, I’d like to take the opportunity to invite you to say hi if you are around!

Don't forget, if you'd like to get serious about a newly evolved profession that is likely to become an essential mainstay of the digital/data/innovation economy, an enabler of sustainable digital product development, you can always join our data engineering training with a Bildungsgutschein from the AfA basically free of charge.