WGU and Becoming a Network Engineer

njclay2004

Hello, all!

I have been riding the Help Desk for a few years now. After waffling on what I want my career path to be, I've ultimately decided that I'd like to go on a Network Engineering/Administration track.

Enter WGU. I know a bunch of people that are already in the school - what concerns me is that a majority of them come in with heavy experience in Network Engineering.

Would this be a good choice for me, a person with no real Network Administration/Engineering experience?

wrwarwick

Don't get discouraged if you don't have any Network Engineering experience. I started off on a similar path as you - worked on a help desk for a while and was introduced to WGU from other members of the help desk. I would say go for it - one thing you gain is work experience while you get your degree, which some people do not get to experience.

I just completed my degree a few weeks ago and also landed a design/implementation network engineering position - so yes, you can do many things with the knowledge gained from WGU.

Depending on where you would like to go you may need to further your studies beyond what WGU offers. For example, I am headed down the Cisco (and eventually Juniper, etc) route of network engineering. WGU offers the CCNA, which, as we all know, is a great entry into Cisco networking. Luckily, I have started studying for the CCNP: RS exams, which contains a lot of knowledge that employers look for. When I see a job posting that requires X amount of experience and a CCNA, a lot of times they want someone with a much higher knowledge set than CCNA level. It's almost as if the CCNA is there just to validate a base set of skills or to help the company attain Cisco partner status. I bring this up because the job I landed had a lot of CCNP level questions in the interview, but only the CCNA was required for the position.

All in all, WGU is not a bad choice. Get your degree, continue to get experience, but don't stop once you have finished at WGU.