One Month

Whoever said, “those who can’t, teach,” never met One Month Rails co-founders Mattan Griffel and Chris Castiglione. The men behind the top two classes at both Skillshare and General Assembly aren’t just talented teachers — they’re talented programmers, too.

“The pinnacle of learning is teaching,” Griffel says. “You really have to understand something if you want to explain it to a beginner.”

Griffel’s One Month Rail class is the most popular course to hit Skillshare, and he’s teamed up with Castiglione to take it to the next level.

Castiglione is an e-learning superstar in his own right, with more than a decade of programming experience and 60+ code-related General Assembly courses under his belt. (He has taught at Columbia University, the University of Amsterdam, and SXSW, too.)

"I've spent tons of money and hours trying to learn how to code. This was the first class that actually gave me the foundation I needed," says One Month Rails grad Keisha Manning. “This class is invaluable.”

Castiglione realized the real monetary value in what he was doing when he discovered GA was making $100,000 from the classes he designed for $10,000.

How One Month Rails Works

One Month Rails helps students “get it live” in 30 days or less using on-demand video lessons and practical exercises. But there’s more to One Month Rails than just rails: The site will offer classes in Ruby, Lean Marketing, HTML & CSS, and APIs, and plans to add Python, Javascript, Node.js, UX/UI, Java, and iOS within the next year.

Support is available via email and live chat, and everyone gets lifetime access to the course material, so you don’t have to finish One Month Rails in one month.

Self-Taught Teacher

The clock was ticking when Griffel decided to learn to teach himself how to code — the Y Combinator application deadline was 30 days away, and he had a month to take his idea from concept to reality, which meant learning how to code ASAP.

Determined, he spent 8 hours a day pouring over whatever teach-yourself-to-code resources he could find.

He spent a week completing his first online tutorial, but couldn’t remember a thing when he was done. Later, it took him three days to fix a bug — “I almost cried,” he says — and he almost cried again when he fixed it.

“It was that amazing,” he says of his feeling of accomplishment.

Despite all odds, Griffel persevered, and met his deadline, but ultimately had his first application to Y Combinator turned down. It was an excruciating process, but Griffel realized something: There was a massive void in the teach-yourself-to-code market — and he knew just how to fill it.

“I was amazed at how easy it was to actually code, but also how hard it was to learn using most of the online guides I found,” he recalls. “In a way, One Month Rails is me teaching people to code the way I wish I could have learned it myself.”

Too Big To Fail

When Griffel made his Skillshare debut in November 2013, his class broke several records — most sign-ups for a single class; most successful class overall, etc. — and broke the site altogether.

The Skillshare servers were overloaded when 2,000 students enrolled in the first One Month Rails class. “They hadn’t planned for that level of scale,” Griffel says with a laugh.

Still, the course was a smashing success.

“Even though everything broke, students still loved it,” he says.

But as the class became more and more successful, Griffel found himself wanting to do things beyond Skillshare’s capabilities. He started talking to other e-teachers, and met his match — Castiglione — across the digital aisle at General Assembly.

Together, Griffel and Castiglione have helped One Month Rails grow 120% month-over-month, from $1,160 in April to $50,000 in August.

“folks are super willing to pay for Classes that teach actual skills they need for their jobs,” Griffel observes. “This is the future of learning.”