Salary is not a monotonic mapping of developer productivity. Besides, given the general increase of salaries across the board and the poor raise-negotiating skills of coders in general, it isn't hard to imagine the 25% of salaries under hers were mostly of an older un-altered vintage for underperforming programmers.

I'm just curious, why is there a perception that coders are poor raise-negotiators in general?

Just going off my own admittedly limited personal experience combined with the observations of many around me - but we tend to have very limited ability and information to articulate our business value within our own organizations. It's easier to look at the messages in our LinkedIn inbox and see how switching jobs can give us a bigger and better raise than engaging in a socially-awkward conversation about our own worth. But just empirically, I see many coders far more brilliant and hard working than I am languish at low salaries because they actually stick around a company for several years and merely take small raises proposed by management at levels calculated only to avoid insult.

For most programmers I've met it is a "calling" in a certain sense - many of us would be doing these things for fun anyway, you are only really paying us for the 20% of the time that we are really engaged in true drudgery and "Charlie work". I share a sentiment with several other programmer friends that we still can't quite believe we are paid (and paid well) to create things and play with computers all day.

Probably a lot, also there is a tendency to switch jobs if an employer won't raise.

Denver developer here. I've participated in the hiring process at several orgs, and I think that with a combination of basic-level skills and a good handle on salary negotiation this is entirely doable. I'm continually shocked at the skill level of people that apply - we don't even do Fizz-buzz level of interview questions, and we constantly have people unable to solve the whiteboard questions. Anyone with aptitude can get in.

I can't speak for other areas, but it's amazingly hard to find someone who can code that isn't already gainfully employed.

(I too hate whiteboard questions, and we are working on eliminating that from our onsite interview)

How easy is it to find a decent job with good mentorship and pay without a cs degree? I'm currently a non-traditional student studying computer science, and while I'm enjoying the program, I enjoy work more. Also the education is incredibly costly if I include $80k a year in lost income. I also have family in the Denver area.

I have a decent enough resume where I know I would be able to get interviews, and definitely enough experience to pass Fizz-buzz level interviews. But I also know I need improvement in several areas before I think I'm a competent developer. So fit is very important to me. I don't want to last six or seven months at a job and then end up looking for a new one without a cs degree. So on my end it looks like internships are a better fit right now.

It's hard to say. We've hired people where I work currently with little experience outside of college. Not at $80k of course. I would say that with a little bit of AngularJS and some backend (C#/Java) you could get $60k-$80k anywhere in town.

There are tons of recruiters in the area and companies are always looking for quick learners with some demonstrated talent. We aren't currently hiring, but I could put you in contact with our company recruiter if you are interested.

(EDIT: removed contact email after reply from _userThrowaway)

I find it extremely believable that someone with ambition and drive could do better than many developers who are coasting off a CS degree.

This and tech stacks change so often that someone with 3-6 months of javascript exp could be more effective than 2-5 years with java.

Developers make tech stacks, not the other way around.

I don't doubt Galvanize's success in producing talent above the 25th percentile. I used to work in Denver, and while there are some great folk there, there also are a lot of mediocre folk just cruising through the large corporations. 25th percentile is a low standard to beat. I also used to work for Jim Deters, who founded Galvanize. It was long, long ago, but based on that experience, I do not doubt his success at building a good organization with good results. Even when we were all young and flawed, he still had put together a pretty great team to work with.

That math degree is incredibly important in terms of his actual knowledge and perceived value.

My gut tells me it's not exactly a challenge to outcompete the bottom 25% of anything. In my experience, breaking into a new career at all is the hardest part. Once you're in, it's not like you are automatically stuck at the bottom of the food chain.