CCNA value

Well, I just wanted to share a few thoughts of mine with the rest of you.

I am currently studying for my ICND and I'm spending lots of time (re)reading different books (I have about 5), practicing with real Cisco gear and what have you. I love networking and I hope to make it to CCIE one day...

But there is one problem. I believe the CCNA certs aren't valued too much because of the enormous amount of "paper CCNAs". You all know what I mean - there are people who get certified just by memorizing a bunch of questions/sims and they don't even know what DLCI stands for. I believe besides cheating, this causes companies not to weight the CCNA certification that much, because "everyone has CCNA now". I just wished that Cisco could change the questions on these exams every month (for example), so that there could be no possible cheating in this aspect.

I don't know if I'm right...but that's just the way I feel...

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Comments

Netstudent

you are right and this concerns us all. But if you love networking, then treat CCNA as a mere stepping stone to professional level certs. Have your goals set beyond CCNA. The IT industry is growing in complexity, so those paper CCNA's will weed out. You are aware of the problem, now you just have to make yourself more marketable and skilled with upper level certs.

r_durant

It maybe true that we can't do much about the paper certs, but to go where you want to go, CCIE...one can't fluff their way through that, and as Netstudent said...the industry will take care of the paper certs when it comes down to the nitty gritty....don't let it be a deterrent...It won't deter me from being a CCIE, when we get there, we'll know we worked hard to achieve what we have...

And there are companies that do make candidates troubleshoot some lab problem or the other, so it might make companies tighten up there selection criteria...

dtlokee

Most people with a paper cert get figured ot very quickly, if they even make it through the hiring process, do't let that deter you. It is to your advantage if you know what you're doing

mmreed

m0rpheus wrote:

Well, I just wanted to share a few thoughts of mine with the rest of you.

I am currently studying for my ICND and I'm spending lots of time (re)reading different books (I have about 5), practicing with real Cisco gear and what have you. I love networking and I hope to make it to CCIE one day...

But there is one problem. I believe the CCNA certs aren't valued too much because of the enormous amount of "paper CCNAs". You all know what I mean - there are people who get certified just by memorizing a bunch of questions/sims and they don't even know what DLCI stands for. I believe besides cheating, this causes companies not to weight the CCNA certification that much, because "everyone has CCNA now". I just wished that Cisco could change the questions on these exams every month (for example), so that there could be no possible cheating in this aspect.

I don't know if I'm right...but that's just the way I feel...

I think part of the problem (to what degree is unknown) is that Cisco is pushing CCNA at the high school level. I have met several high school seniors that got their CCNA through the Net Academy programs in their junior or senior year of HS. I personally feel this devalues the CCNA cert. I do not begrudge anyone the education, but realistically in real world, a cert that is hel by a number of people with zero experience, and barely out of high school gives the impression of a lesser value skillset/cert.

The CCNA is a strong cert that should be valued higher in the marketplace. But it is not. It is viewed (my opinion) as a very entry cert to the entire IT field... while it is an entry cert for Cisco - you surely would not have an entry person with zero experience configuring routers etc... they would be more help desk and break fix PC guys...

Im kinda rambling, but my point is that I think Cisco has helped devalue the cert by pushing it to the high schools.

Its great for students to get the exposure to tech, but I think they would be better served with a net+ and A+ track instead, and leave configuring routers and advanced lan/wan tech to people that have put in their time and have some experience under their belts.

jojopramos

I agree on mmreed but my advise is just study hard and pass the CCNA. If you have enough knowledge, you will be benefitted as compare to the paper cert guys....

szkizzer

m0rpheus wrote:

Well, I just wanted to share a few thoughts of mine with the rest of you.

I am currently studying for my ICND and I'm spending lots of time (re)reading different books (I have about 5), practicing with real Cisco gear and what have you. I love networking and I hope to make it to CCIE one day...

But there is one problem. I believe the CCNA certs aren't valued too much because of the enormous amount of "paper CCNAs". You all know what I mean - there are people who get certified just by memorizing a bunch of questions/sims and they don't even know what DLCI stands for. I believe besides cheating, this causes companies not to weight the CCNA certification that much, because "everyone has CCNA now". I just wished that Cisco could change the questions on these exams every month (for example), so that there could be no possible cheating in this aspect.

I don't know if I'm right...but that's just the way I feel...

hmmm. bud i disagree with ya on that one. Personally this "paper CCNA" deal is more so related to word of mouth kind of exposure. If I asked you to name 10 peps you knew who had a Paper CCNA - would you be able to do it?

The thing is - there are far less Paper CCNA's than most people believe to be. But most people believe in them in the first place because - they read of Paper CCNA somewhere - change their belief about CCNA in a second - lower the CCNA standard and then permanently change their viewpoint to : CCNA has been devalued. Ive seen this far too many times. Someone here probably reads about "paper CCNA" somewhere and goes on and reposts somewhere - their altered viewpoint about "paper ccna" and in turn this spreads like a viral disease - and soon in a community - everyone believe that CCNA is a easy A$$ cert that everyone has.

I just came outa high school buddy - and believe me there was no one in my entire graduating class that had so much as a clue to what a CCNA is. From how I see it - at that age - everyone wants to party and have fun (w/e that is) and smoke weed and "chill". No one possible ahs the energy/time/will to go through and follow through with a CCNA - not even the geekheads. Personally, people give nerds/geeks too much credit - they are all hype - half of them dont have clue on what TCP/IP is ... and the remaining - spend their time playing games.

Ive come to this country from far far away - 12,000+ miles to be exact. I believe in bettering myself and not worrying about who has paper CCNA and what not. Frankly, I dont even worry about paper CCNA's - cause they possibly cannot be a threat to me. NOT EVEN A SINGLE bit. Why? Well its simple - if you dont know the stuff, you dont last long in the first place - get fired and you basically pack it up in the IT industry. As for the cheaters - the only reason they **** in the first place in to get to more money FAST - emphasis on fast . When they fail the first time - they have already wasted enough time - that they quit that route and change careers to try that shortcut once again - hopefully with better luck.

Im pursuing CCNA - and its been two months that Ive been out of high school. Why Im going for CCNA you might ask - well because Im not a newbie and by no means am I a person with Zero Experience. Im 18 and Ive done more tech work than some people that college sophs. Ive taught Office 2003 Courses at my Local Public Library (15+ people) - and Ive done helpdesk work repairing library computers at another library. And for two years in a row (10th and 11th grade) - I worked with head Tech at my high school repairing vandalised puters during summer time. Ive only focused on bettering myself - and the rest is cake. I started studying VB.NET and Linux in 10th grade and have worked with it every since. I even worked as a freelancer doing HW and working on FTP software for people. And now I know enough to compile a custom kernel for my own laptop.

So, my advice -- dont worry about Paper CCNA's because if you have worked hard to get that CCNA - it will pay off you. But by no means should you get a CCNA stop everything and then depend on CCNA to get you ahead(And if it doesn't then, work harder - dont whine). You should keep bettering yourself and in notime will you leave cheaters, dumpers, paper ccna's in the rear view mirror. Employers dont want people with credentials alone - they want someone with passion for tech, and professional skills, and all around better character of a person. Cheaters can get all the cheated certs - but they never manage to get past the interview in the first place because its very easy to see - who's in it for money and who's in it for the love of it.

JohnDouglas

well said szkizzer. lets stop moaning and get on with studying!

networker050184

I just came outa high school buddy - and believe me there was no one in my entire graduating class that had so much as a clue to what a CCNA is

My highschool had the Cisco program. You do all the classes then you go take the certification. not a lot of people did it. I started the program but unfortunatley my family moved and my new school didn't have the program. I think these people who go through this prgram and achieve their certification are a lot more prepared for a job then a lot of the people who get their CCNA with out ever even touching a router or switch. These students get daily exposure to REAL equipment, labs and school networks. This will prepare you far better than reading a cert guide and memorizing the stuff for the test. If any thing this training would bring up the value of the CCNA since the students getting it would be well trained and have plenty lab experience compared to a lot of the people here that have their CCNA and have no exposure to a networking enviroment.

FANDKMCC

Coming from a telecomms engineering background i would have to disagree that this cert is losing value. If anything, this cert has become even harder to achieve over the last 12-18 months or so. I failed it last week with an 809 and at least 10 of the questions required solid troubleshooting skills backed up with sound subject knowledge. Not something you pick up just from studying braindumps!! One of my buddies was on a CCNA course last month and the Cisco trainers told him that they thought only about 20% of test takers were passing at the moment.
I'll give it another shot next week and hopefully nail it!!

cheers

mikearama

If there's any test for which dumping alone will not work, it's the CCNA.

Personally, I think the CCNA is the only entry level cert that still carries weight.

M0rpheus... if you feel strongly that the CCNA is not valued, please don't waste your time studying to get it. I, on the other hand, value my CCNA like there's no tomorrow, and spent two months studying/practicing to get it. AND, it was the ONLY reason that my resume got short-listed for interviews... leading to a contract. Valuable? I think so.

totts

I worked in a NOC for 8 years mainly firefighting with 1st/2nd line support. The CCNA was well respected in the industry and the only people who really put it down were the people who should have had it but didn't. This is the first time I've heard of 'paper CCNAs'. Believe me, if they do exist, they will be weeded out. I agree with the last posts... crack on!

dtlokee

It's no secret that the CCNA has gotten more difficult since it's inception in 1998. There are people who passed it when it was an easier exam (in 1998 I had 5-6 questions on the difference between cut-through, fragment free and store and forward switching

). These people will still claim CCNA on their resume even though it is not vaild anymore, or in some cases they have maintained it by passing a professional level test (again using ****) I have interviewed hundreds of canidates over the years with a CCNA, and I will tell you the only reason they were in front of me was they had a CCNA. Without the CCNA I would ot have even called them for an interview. Notice I said "called them for an interview", not "hired them on the spot." The CCNA will get you an interview, it then becomes your interviewing skill and technical ability that lands the job. The guy with a paper cert will be weeded out.

It's the professionals that hold the certifications that define the certification, not the other way around.

jediknight

I totally agree with the paper CCNA's being weeded out. In my opinion now, it is extremely difficult to pass the CCNA by memorizing **** and the testing format truly does force you to have an understanding of the topics at hand. When you are finally called in for that interview, it will be determined quickly that you are not CCNA material if you just memorized ****. You have to think; if they called you in because you have a CCNA, you can bet that they are going to drill you on it. Cisco does a good job in keeping their exams up to date (becoming more difficult) as well as having people recertify therefore increasing the value of this cert.

Long story short, this is still an extremely valuable cert and will open doors for you if you truly earned it. Don't get discouraged.

m0rpheus

Mikearama, you misinterpreted my words. I don't think CCNA is a waste of time. I study CCNA every spare moment that I have. I was just expressing my opinion about the "paper CCNAs" - that's all.

Pash

Let me just say, sometimes I think its very hard to distinguish between these so called "paper certs" and lack of practice or experience. I passed my CCNA in december last year, please understand that I spent a good solid 3 months studying my arse off, and a few weeks of real equipment time at my training college. I had no real prior IT experience. I started my new job within a few weeks of passing my CCNA, with the prospect of setting up a unique switch environment for a customer. Which I completed with very few problems, because the material was fresh on my mind. I am fortunate in a way that I work in an enviroment where I get to work with all sorts of diffetent vendor equipment, everything from cisco, juniper, bluecoat, nortel networks, NEC, HP and loads of new NAC solutions. It is great, but at the same time very annoying, I have valid CCNA and I get to touch Cisco equipment about 5% of my job. My colleagues dig at me jokingly "oi cisco boy, you should know how to set up an access list", truth being, unless you are doing this stuff reguarly, you will forget.

So also, what I am saying is, and as others have said before, take the CCNA as what it is, an introduction to networking, some of the stuff you wont forget, it will be VERY important to you in years to come in IT. You shouldnt care if its a paper cert to some others, even if they get lucky they still cheated....concentrate on yourself, work hard, be yourself and someone will hire you, plain and simple. It is your stepping stone to further experiences, dont take it as the most important thing you will do in IT. if you love cisco, and you end up in a job where you play with cisco equipment all day, then that is great!

Cheers,

sprkymrk

(Disregard - Just passing through...)

mikej412

This thread is cleaned up from this afternoon.

From the Paper certs, or Paper degrees thread

mikej412 wrote:

sprkymrk wrote:

If you can DO, then no you're probably not a paper cert. Notice I used the term "hands-on" experience, not "paid" experience.

I'd agree with that.

I'm not sure I'd call someone who dumped their way to a certification "paper" -- since their certificate isn't really worth the paper its printed on.

12beatechie

m0rpheus wrote:

Well, I just wanted to share a few thoughts of mine with the rest of you.

I am currently studying for my ICND and I'm spending lots of time (re)reading different books (I have about 5), practicing with real Cisco gear and what have you. I love networking and I hope to make it to CCIE one day...

But there is one problem. I believe the CCNA certs aren't valued too much because of the enormous amount of "paper CCNAs". You all know what I mean - there are people who get certified just by memorizing a bunch of questions/sims and they don't even know what DLCI stands for. I believe besides cheating, this causes companies not to weight the CCNA certification that much, because "everyone has CCNA now". I just wished that Cisco could change the questions on these exams every month (for example), so that there could be no possible cheating in this aspect.

I don't know if I'm right...but that's just the way I feel...

I somewhat agreed with you. I have a live example here: One of my co-worker who barely configures a router "happened" to pass CCNA last 2 weeks as oppose to me who configures routers day in and day out like a mass production and I am still working on my CCNA. From time to time, that co-worker has to consult me for questions regarding things like access-lists and so forth. Trust me, it all comes down to the practical experience. You have to be confident in yourself and most importantly know the stuff. I am sure that those who have "paper CCNAs" will be weeded out very soon!

networker050184

If you don't think the CCNA is valued just try to look for any type of networking job where a CCNA isn't required, highly desireable or a big plus. This doesn't mean a CCNA is your meal ticket (you still need experience to go along with it), but it is still very highly looked upon in the industry.