Cheapest path to VCP?

EM64T

I was planning on taking the VCP exam in February but after doing some quick research it looks like I'll need to take an instructor led class. According the VMware EDU website I might be spending in excess of $3K to get this party started. I was hoping to do this all self-study.

Am I reading everything correctly or is there a cheaper method to attain the VCP410?

vCole

The class is mandatory to obtain the certification.

EM64T

Is it possible to take the exam before taking the mandatory class?

MentholMoose

You can take the exam at any time, but even if you pass you still need the course to be certified.

This thread seems to come up regularly. I understand where you're coming from since I was in the same situation. For the course, the cheapest option is to get your employer to pay for it. If that's not possible, and it certainly wasn't for me, the next closest thing to free is probably the VMware Academy Program.

The VMware IT Academy Program is designed to introduce students to VMware technologies and equip them with VMware technical skills to compliment their chosen fields of study. VMware will provide selected academic institutions with course materials developed by VMware for this purpose. By instituting this program, VMware seeks to create a collaborative relationship with academic institutions whereby their students may obtain the VMware Certified Professional (VCP) status and other VMware certifications.

Schools offering the VMware courses must offer them as regular semester or quarter length courses, so the cost should be the same as any course they offer. Of course being a regular college course, it is graded and you have to pass, so you will have to attend the lectures, probably do some homework, and likely take a midterm and final. There is a list of participating schools at the link above, though only a few offer any of the courses so far.

If you pass the course then you get credit for it with VMware, and you get a voucher for 70% off the VCP410 exam (so about US $50 for the exam). The total cost will vary by school, of course, since tuition and fees certainly vary, but it's possible to get a good deal. For example, I took the ICM course at a community college, and the total cost of the course and exam was over 90% cheaper than just the regularly priced course through VMware. You can even recover some of that by selling the course materials on eBay when you're done (they are the official ICM materials).

QHalo

22869 VMware vSPHERE 4: Configuration and Management | UC Santa Cruz Extension

EM64T

Thanks Moose, that helps a bit. Seeing as I'm on an aggressive certification path enrolling in college classes will take too much time. My current employer will pay for the training but will only forgive 25% of the cost per year I am employed AFTER receiving the training. As the whole point of getting certified is to move on to another job I'll need to balance out if it's worth getting the VCP and buying out the remainder on the training with my current employer.

EM64T

QHalo wrote: »

22869 VMware vSPHERE 4: Configuration and Management | UC Santa Cruz Extension

Hmmm, online might work out all things considered. Four months is a load of time though.

JDMurray

QHalo wrote: »

22869 VMware vSPHERE 4: Configuration and Management | UC Santa Cruz Extension

I wish that I could find a UC or CSU (or extension program) in Southern California that offers VMware IT Academy Program vSphere 4 classes. I'd assume CSU Fullerton Extension would, but no such luck.

Amco

QHalo wrote: »

22869 VMware vSPHERE 4: Configuration and Management | UC Santa Cruz Extension

Excellent, I might just sign up for this course.

MentholMoose

JDMurray wrote: »

I wish that I could find a UC or CSU (or extension program) in Southern California that offers VMware IT Academy Program vSphere 4 classes. I'd assume CSU Fullerton Extension would, but no such luck.

UCSC Extension may be an option. It's completely online. IIRC the cost was around $1000 for early registration for Fall 2010. If your goal is to do it in person, I've heard Irvine Valley College is trying to offer the course soon. Being a community college, it would be CHEAP. I will inquire again and let you know. Also, Coleman University in San Diego has offered the course in the past (but maybe that's too far south). I don't know what the cost would be there, though.

JDMurray

MentholMoose wrote: »

I've heard Irvine Valley College is trying to offer the course soon. Being a community college, it would be CHEAP.

IVC advertises a VMware class, but there's no mention of it in their catalog or schedule. Coastline Community College also has a VMware class, but the description doesn't indicate v3 or v4. I have a suspicion it's not part of the VMware Academy program, and CCC just had an instructor throw a VMware class together as part of a certificate program. I'd like to take a VMware class in a school where they have a good hands-on VMware lab.

MentholMoose

JDMurray wrote: »

IVC advertises a VMware class, but there's no mention of it in their catalog or schedule. Coastline Community College also has a VMware class, but the description doesn't indicate v3 or v4. I have a suspicion it's not part of the VMware Academy program, and CCC just had an instructor throw a VMware class together as part of a certificate program. I'd like to take a VMware class in a school where they have a good hands-on VMware lab.

Earlier this year I contacted the professor at IVC who's apparently handling this and he said they were aiming for Spring 2011, but I guess it didn't happen. I emailed him today asking for confirmation. It may still happen, with the messed up economy and budget uncertainty everywhere you never know.

The CCC courses indeed don't appear to be through VAP as far as I can tell, and the profs never replied to my emails, so I didn't mention it. I hear you about the lab, it's really a critical aspect of the course. Building a lab suitable for the VMware courses isn't cheap, so I bet that is a roadblock for some schools right now.

JDMurray

MentholMoose wrote: »

Building a lab suitable for the VMware courses isn't cheap, so I bet that is a roadblock for some schools right now.

It looks like CSU Fullerton and CSPU Pomona would be the best-equipped schools for this sort of thing. Maybe VMware isn't marketing (and discounting) their Academy Program hard enough to get these schools to budget for it in this tight economy. Probably in another two years we'll see some decent VMware classes offered in The OC.

nhan.ng

I was in the VMware sPhere 4.0 at Coastline Community College. When i said "was" meaning i dropped out at the last minutes as my work was putting too much stress for me and i just couldn't get home in time for the class.

Basically this is their first semester teaching the course, the instructor is very knowledgeable, and the class was packed. So packed that they had to create a 2nd class and it was also full. The school didn't know what type of machines they would need so they just use whatever they have on hand, couple dell/hp servers and workstations. The instructor got an approval to build/order his own lab equipments for all the students to use, but too bad it didn't get delivered on time for me to see it before i dropped the course.

To answer the question, they're not on the Vmware Academy yet, but next semester they will be. I'll be back for it, as i'm sure all of his old students will come back to sit in a Vmware Certified's class, plus all the new one.

best of all, class was 26 dollars a unit

JDMurray

nhan.ng wrote: »

To answer the question, they're not on the Vmware Academy yet, but next semester they will be. I'll be back for it, as i'm sure all of his old students will come back to sit in a Vmware Certified's class, plus all the new one.

Excellent! Thanks for the input. I think I know the instructor, Eric Chen. I remember him as the Cisco and Linux instructor at CCC from 5+ years ago. He's a real good guy.

nhan.ng wrote: »

best of all, class was 26 dollars a unit

Oh yeah. I'm taking the full series of Computer Forensics classes at Cypress College for the same reason.

nhan.ng

yes, that him. Real good guy

tbgree00

I'm going to sign up for that UCSC course I think. It's a great price and it will be great in the job I'm looking at or any future job opportunities. If anyone else is in and gets any good stuff for referrals I'll do that, otherwise I'll sign up the traditional way.

Amco

tbgree00 wrote: »

I'm going to sign up for that UCSC course I think. It's a great price and it will be great in the job I'm looking at or any future job opportunities. If anyone else is in and gets any good stuff for referrals I'll do that, otherwise I'll sign up the traditional way.

Are you taking the one in January? I'm seriously considering it if I can come up with the cash

tbgree00

Yeah I'll do the one in January. I got severance when I lost my job and tax returns will come before the end of the class so I should be fine to afford it. It seems pretty great, I just wonder about the pacing. Like is it all recorded and i can do 5 classes per week or if i have to wait for the live class to be recorded to do it on demand.

MentholMoose

It's online only, so no live class to record the lecture. However I think the lectures may be released on a schedule due to a VMware requirement on their Academy Program (they limit the hours per week of instruction). I posted about the UCSC course when I heard about it earlier this year and I think some forum members took it, so hopefully they can give some feedback.

tbgree00

The class is now in wait list. I didn't register early enough and am pretty bummed out about maybe not getting to take it.

Amco

tbgree00 wrote: »

The class is now in wait list. I didn't register early enough and am pretty bummed out about maybe not getting to take it.

Are you planning on taking the one a few months from January?

tdean

ok, im confused. the list says these are "some" of the schools that participate, what about the others?... isnt there a way to type in a zip code to find out which is closest? i dont see anything in the Boston area....

MentholMoose

tdean wrote: »

ok, im confused. the list says these are "some" of the schools that participate, what about the others?...

Well all the schools listed are participating in the Academy program, but the program is more than just the courses, so not all of the participants offer them. Also keep in mind that at most educational institutions, it is a big deal to create a course, and budgets are constrained almost everywhere, so it takes a lot of time (from inquiring about the course at various schools, I found that it can take a year if not more).

tdean wrote: »

isnt there a way to type in a zip code to find out which is closest? i dont see anything in the Boston area....

Unfortunately, not that I know of.

JBrown

MentholMoose wrote: »

Well all the schools listed are participating in the Academy program, but the program is more than just the courses, so not all of the participants offer them. Also keep in mind that at most educational institutions, it is a big deal to create a course, and budgets are constrained almost everywhere, so it takes a lot of time (from inquiring about the course at various schools, I found that it can take a year if not more).


Unfortunately, not that I know of.

You hit the nail in the head. Our college was accepted into the VMWare IT academy. There is huge but in there, hardware requirements for the lab. We in a process of going through production servers refresh cycle and don't think that we can afford to setup a whole new lab with ~15 servers at $3.5k a pop plus a SAN on top of that, besides, this lab will be idling most of the time. Basically not much of a return on our investment. Unless non-matriculated students willing to pay ~$500 per credit x 3 credits per course Wishful thinking.

MentholMoose

I hear you on that, it really seems pointless for every student to have an expensive server dedicated to them. I wonder if VMware would mind if you used VMware Workstation to run a virtual vSphere environment for the course. A desktop with a quad core CPU, 16GB of RAM, and two hard drives can run an adequate vSphere environment, including a virtual SAN/NAS (e.g. running OpenFiler), and won't break the bank (easily under $2K each complete with monitor).

The main problem with that is you can't currently run 64-bit VMs on a virtualized ESX host, so for example you couldn't lab VDR for the course, but I don't know if that is really a deal killer. Also I don't know if they have students teaming up to do labs for a reason, or if that is just done to save resources and they don't mind students doing labs solo.

scott28tt

I work for a VATC in the UK, and the hardware requirements laid down to us by VMware are very specific, I would assume that the requirements for Academy program members are the same or very similar. They exclude the use of running vSphere in VMs on VMware Workstation. Some courses also have their own specific hardware requirements, and rules around students sharing lab equipment.

Scott.

xzyan

yeah , I am waiting for Eric Chen next class. could not get in spring, may be ccc will have an introductory class first and then you should be able to take the VCP with Eric Chen.

518

subscribed. Interesting alternative path to VCP

tdean wrote: »

ok, im confused. the list says these are "some" of the schools that participate, what about the others?... isnt there a way to type in a zip code to find out which is closest? i dont see anything in the Boston area....

They must have added the list after you posted this question, but here are the participants:

Participants

still no way to filter by zip code tho.

Madison Park Technical Vocational High School, Boston, MA

UCSC early enrollment is $927

JDMurray

I just noticed that the Summer 2011 session for Eric Chen's CST C220 VMware vSphere course at Coastline Community College in Garden Grove, CA is open for enrollment starting May 16th (continuing students) and May 23rd (new and returning students).

It's an 8-week course that meets on Monday nights starting June 13th. It's 3.0 units at $26/unit, so you aren't gonna find a more inexpensive, brick-and-mortar-with-lab VMware training deal anywhere. And quoted from the course page:

Upon completion of this course, students can take the examination to become a VMware Certified Professional. This course may be taken four times. Graded or Pass/No Pass option.


I probably won't make it in, as I am a "returning student" and must take the later registration date, but I'm gonna try.

qwertyiop

JDMurray wrote: »

I just noticed that the Summer 2011 session for Eric Chen's CST C220 VMware vSphere course at Coastline Community College in Garden Grove, CA is open for enrollment starting May 16th (continuing students) and May 23rd (new and returning students).

It's an 8-week course that meets on Monday nights starting June 13th. It's 3.0 units at $26/unit, so you aren't gonna find a more inexpensive, brick-and-mortar-with-lab VMware training deal anywhere. And quoted from the course page:

Upon completion of this course, students can take the examination to become a VMware Certified Professional. This course may be taken four times. Graded or Pass/No Pass option.


I probably won't make it in, as I am a "returning student" and must take the later registration date, but I'm gonna try.

Wow, now that is cheap. Thats makes me wish that I was living in that area. Why cant one of the online classes be priced like that?