Every graduate has a public reference letter at builtinireland.ie that names the cohort, the project, the role, and the specific work shipped — with a live link to that work.
Three roles, three projects, three different paths in.
“I had no idea what a terminal was before this. Now I have a Python scraper running on a live Irish news site and a reference letter that names exactly what it does.”
What Aoife shippedA scraper for the Carlow Nationalist RSS feed, outputting clean JSON into the localnews.ie manifest pipeline. Formatting for three Carlow town pages. Four weeks, zero prior coding experience.
“I’d been navigating Irish life admin for two years as a newcomer. Writing these guides was the most useful thing I’ve done with that knowledge — and now there’s a reference letter linking to all four pages.”
What Santhosha shippedFour explainer pages on myid.ie covering PPS number applications, provisional licence steps, and Eircode lookups. All four indexed within a week of going live. 1,200–1,800 words each, written from firsthand experience.
“Four weeks of phone calls and Google Maps. Not glamorous. But the reference says I verified 72 venues for a live Irish directory and links straight to them — that’s something real I can show.”
What Marta shippedVerified opening hours, music schedules, and GAA screening info for 72 County Kerry pubs on pubhub.ie. Every entry sourced, phone-checked, and tagged. One county, complete.
When your reference letter goes live at builtinireland.ie/references/<you> at the end of your cohort, a card for you is added to this page automatically. It takes the same format as the cards above: your name, your role, what you shipped, and links to both your reference and your live work.
If you’d rather not appear publicly on this wall, email hello@theacademy.ie after graduation. Your reference letter stays live; you just won’t be on this page.
County Carlow on localnews.ie. Eight to ten people, six roles, four weeks. Kicks off when we have eight confirmed members.
Apply now →