Certification worth it?

james3302

Say there are 1 million people out there with a Bachelors degree in Computer Science/Comuter Information Systems. I am now lumped in with them. If I get a MCSD.Net or a Java Cert I will then be lumped into a pile of 750,000 people. Sure I will be competing with less people for jobs, but still there are sooo many people out there with certs how are we going to differentiate outselves from each other. I have no work experience, I have been told no work experience and certs are not a good idea. But isn't it good to stay updated even when unemployed/underemployed. I am looking towards getting a MCSD.Net with the SQL Server 2000 elective and a Java cert or two. I am also hoping to volunteer for some open source projects to try to make up for me not having any work experience. I am also trying right now to get a help desk/tech support job towards Atlanta. I have worked tech support/customer support for 1 year and 2 months.

/usr

Are there a million people with bachelors in Compute Science/related fields? That just seems high, considering the percentage of people overall that have any type of bachelors is somewhat low.

2lazybutsmart

You know what I believe, just get as many credentials as you can and wait for your chance. If you think you're competing with a million people, you're gonna go crazy and you'll never accomplish anything. Every person in that million is subject to the same competition you're facing from the remaining 999K.

I haven't done my bachelors, yet I have a job. But I'm not saying you shouldn't have a bachelor’s degree because I'm really trying to say it's becoming a determining factor day after day. This is because there are just so many people out there with technical certifications. So the dividing line for determining whether this person is really educated or just a piece of joke is to look at his academic achievements.

Go on with your MCSD.net, you'll find it very helpful. And experience; ah... read the IT Jobs forum (the first post). You'll find some nice information about ways to get experience.

And don't worry about retirement, discontinuation, etc. It's your job to stay with the trend. But that doesn't mean you'll lose the job if your cert doesn't have premier status anymore. Employers don't really care about that. They'll hire someone else and try to get rid if you when they migrate to a new technology. Yet, who really knows....

Best of Luck.
2lbs.