Advice, Vendor Specific or Neutral?

FillAwful

A little background: I am in pursuit of my B.A. in CIS: Network Security. I will have enough credits to be a Junior in April. At this point I am concentrating on gaining certifications to prove my skills along with my degree. The school gives us 5 vouchers to use for tests, so I am obsessed with using them wisely.

I recently passed Security+ and am ready to begin my next cert but cannot decide where to go. I know it has to do with what really interests me and truthfully, I have always been a Windows guru so the client/server side of networking seems appealing to me. Also, bear in mind that I am primarily looking at Department of Defense as far as jobs. We have a lot of DOD jobs in this area.

My question is should I take Network+, which I could pass quickly with just a few weeks of brushing up on cabling specifics, sub-netting, and ports. Or should I just buckle down and start an MCSA track. I have experience with client/server and AD but the task of studying for a Microsoft cert is more arduous.

TL;DR

Pad my resume with Net+ or buckle down for MCSA?

5ekurity

Look at the job descriptions for your area and see what certification shows up more in searches - Net+ or MCSA/MCSE - and go from there.

In my experience - I was never 'hired' for a job because I had Net+ - I was, however, given salary increases and organizational movement due to my MCSE.

joelsfood

My general advice overall is to cert vendor specific, but back it up with broad experience. I think your MCSA/MCSE will be more useful certification wise (it will tick HR requirements on a job search better), but broad experience will get you through the hiring interview better