AdminXP.com: Certification versus School

Certification versus School

On Internet you can find a lot of speculations that relate to the question if it's better to study a full-time school, to pay a course or to study at home for getting some of the certifications. None of those speculations is leading, they are all influenced by many factors.
The certification is an easier way to get a document proving your qualification, abilities and skills. - There exist a lot of people who are specialists for Software, Hardware or networks although they did not gain their knowledge at school. So, it often happens that the firms seeking computer specialists have to face a difficult question if the person applying for the job has the necessary knowledge. Of course, a higher education is an advantage, but considering continually improving and still new and new SW and HW the certification is the best way to improve the qualification and skills and to get the document about these necessary abilities. That is the reason why some certificates are often so much and specially valued in most companies.

Factors influencing decision for study

Type of school, instruction quality and curriculum content and extent - Technical schools and IT oriented colleges are leading here.
Kind of certification - There exists an invaluable advantage - the possibility of choosing specific certifications that the employer requires from the technical workers. Grading is also possible - e. g. if the employer needs an administrator for stations with Windows 2000 Pro, the MCP (Microsoft Certified Professional) exam for Windows 2000 Professional will suffice, in case a network administrator is required, the MCSE (Microsoft Certified System Engineer) degree is more suitable - in this case the candidate must pass 7 different exams. Database administrators can gain MCDBA (Microsoft Certified Database Administrator) degree proving basic necessary knowledge for administration and design of databases on SQL Servers. There are also degrees for network specialists by Cisco or 3Com companies, or exams in general knowledge about networks and hardware called A+, Server+ or Netwok+, all by Comptia.
Education extent - Certification goes usually deep into the problem in the particular field. A lot of schools deal with rather general and technical information concerning several products and fields.
Time - Despite the studying at university is also possible evenings, the certification can be more suitable for the employer as regards time. One of the other reasons is that the employer cannot take advantage of all the knowledge that the candidate gains at school; it can be an advantage for the student as regards gaining larger knowledge, but not always in the necessary depth.
Price - Price is related to time. Certification costs are being much lower (but not always - some special courses + exams cost quite a lot of money).
Teachers vs. self-studying - Studying with teachers is much more effective (in spite of this a lot of individuals manage to learn more than at university just by help of self-studying, but mostly it lasts much time; everything depends on dedicated time and many other factors.)
Employment - The certification can have much higher value for technicians than for businessmen. Such a businessman needs some technical knowledge or skills for the field he/she is making the business in, but the general information gained at university can also be applied here. Programmers at university learn great amount of programming languages, while the certification can specialize in one of them (in case of programming it is largely depended on the type of school).
Up-to-date information - According to the type of school / certification program / teachers
the up-to-date information need not be required and taught (to the detriment of the students).
Standardization of knowledge - While the knowledge requirements for the certification are 100% determined, the curriculum extent at universities is free to determine or choose (sometimes to the detriment and sometimes in favour of the students).
Arduousness of gaining the knowledge - Again, according to the type of university or certification - The certification can be mastered by help of books, but practice and necessary practical experience can be missing. It concern especially the students learning from questions and answers without any practicing, gaining skills and other general experience; the certification exams can be passed this way, but then it perverts the opinion of the certification. This kind of learning is offered by networks such as Braindumps; the firms providing certifications do not like those networks at all, because despite they provide information and experience of other people they can also contain errors and lower the motivation of detailed studying of problems.
Practice / School / Certification - It cannot be unequivocally said what solution is more favourable. It depends largely on requirements, experience and education of the person who makes the recruitment. Sometimes one of the possibilities is sufficient, all of them or a combination of two of them is a great advantage. Recent MCSE certification for Windows 2000 will probably have a higher value than a university finished 10 years ago. Of course, the both together is the best way.
Extra information - When a graduate passes the exams successfully he/she often gets besides the certificate also a range of other advantages from the producer, e. g. when you finish MCSE by Microsoft you will gain: 1. Access to secured areas of www pages containing valuable technical information and information about products. 2. Invitation to bean feasts, 3. Product discounts, magazine subscriptions.
Competitive advantages for firms - Firms employing several certified specialists can provide
over-standard services.
Firms appointed as Microsoft Certified Partner - Centers must employ several MCP (MCSE) professionals. Advantage - providing exams, schooling and possibility of selling license contracts in Select program.
Authorized service centers (A+Authorized Service Center) must employ at least 50 % of their technicians with A+ certificate.

Structure of the Certification Process

Producer of an IT product (Software or Hardware) prepares the questions and answers for the product.
In cooperation with another firm providing tests and connection to test centers the producer makes software with database of questions and answers. - The firm providing tests (the most famous is Sylvan Prometric) gives the software for the particular certification to the test center.
The test center gives the test to the candidate. (The firm must ensure proper course of the test and avoid cheating, therefore the test takes place in the test centre and under special conditions; a computer is used). After the test the candidate is informed about his/her results that are given to the firm providing tests which gives the results to the IT product producer. The producer issues the certificate and sends it to the candidate's address (possibly to the test center).