A question about the new Microsoft Technology Associate (MTA) certification

nosh

Do you need to be a student attending a training course/college/university to do the MTA certification exam or can you self study at home with a textbook?I seem to be finding conflicting information about this new exam on the microsoft site.

crrussell3

From what I can tell, you are right. There doesn't seem to be very good information out there about it. You can self study, but since the exams and/or vouchers are only available from a school, they might dictate that you take their classes in order to take the exam or receive a voucher.

Also since it is an academic exam, you will need to be a student in order to take it to begin with.

cyberguypr

Based on the below from M$ website it seems this is only for academic use.

Audience: Students, technology educators, and entry-level IT staff of accredited academic institutions

The institution administering the test must have an MTA Campus license.

The MTA Campus License includes 1,000 exams per year, which your institution can deliver to registered students, faculty, and staff.

jbm45

I agree with the other posts. MTA exams are only for academic use and your institution must be licensed to administer them to students.

I was lucky enough to be at a student AITP conference in Orlando earlier this year were MS was allowing all participants to take any of the MTA exams we wanted to.

In my opinion I thought they were easy tests as long as you had some knowledge already. My advice would be to look into CompTIA exams.

certidave

You are right that the MTA Exams are only available to students.

What this means:
- You need to have a valid student ID to take the exam
- You will need to get a voucher (pretty cheap) from shop.certiport.com to take the test
- You will need to find a testing center close to you on www.certiport.com and arrange a time with the local public testing center you selecte to take your exam

What this doesn't mean:
- Your school doesn't have to offer this program for you to take the test
- The organization that proctors your test does not have to have an MTA license in place to offer you this test (as long as you're a student)

As to the other questions about this exam, I thought it would be good to add some insight here. The MTA program was developed to fill an entry-level need into IT education and credentialing. It is intended for Advanced high school CTE courses and level 100 & 200 classes in college.

There are many out there who have taken the MTA exam, already holding MCTS and MCITP certs. There is no question they will think it is easy. For someone preparing for an MCTS exam, MTA tests are a perfect milestone to solidify the foundational knowledge needed to advance to more advanced courses of study. One of the contestants in Microsoft Career Factor used MTA in this way, and it helped him prepare better for his MCTS Win 7 exam.

I hope this helps.

MTA exams are designed to prep students for the more advanced Microsoft technology certs within an academic setting.