CCENT/CCNA Studies (Self Study vs Cisco Academy college course)

aglo1984

Hi, I am looking to start up studying for my CCNA and I'm not exactly sure what the best way to study is. I have a home lab set up consisting on 2 switches and 2 routers, CBT Nuggets, Todd Lammle's CCNA 7th edition book and Wendell Odom's ICND 1 3rd edition book (I am going to purchase ICND 2 as well) and I plan on doing a minimum of 10 hours per week (maybe closer to 15 - 20 hrs depending on my week). As you can see I think I'm all good to go with self study but today I noticed that my local college (UK) offers a CCNA Cisco academy network program evening course over 32 weeks starting September 2012. Now the course will set me back the nice sum of £900 but I wasn't sure if it was worth holding off the studies until September and doing a proper course or will I be just as well starting my studies myself and invest the cash in my self studies? I don't have any hands on experience but I have looked at CCNA material casually towards the end of last year so I'm not starting at 0% more like 1%

If anyone has done the academy course though a UK college I would love to know if they are better than self learning with the consideration of the price tag attached to it. Also if self study is the way to go is my 10hrs minimum per week a good structure or should I increase it and what realistic deadline should I set for the CCENT and CCNA (prefer working to deadline as then I am less inclined to be lazy but I don't want to be unrealistic as I actually want to learn the material.) ?

If anyone can help in anyway with any info on Self Study vs Cisco Academy that would be awesome. Also if there is anything I'm missing for self study please let me know as that would be a great help!

zrockstar

What's your current networking experience, and do you have any other certs yet, namely CCENT or N+?

shodown

I think the academy is best for your foundational learning, your other studies in the future will be better off with a good foundational base.

aglo1984

I am starting completely from scratch! Been in administration since I left school and I wanted to do something different.

zrockstar

Then yes, you should definitely go to the academy. Even if you have to sell your current equipment to fund it, as you will get access to their lab and to packet tracer. There is a TON of material in the subject, and you will learn a lot from through your instructor's personal experience and through working with other people as well. It would be very daunting just starting out to dive into CCNA alone. I would recommend between now and September to go for your CompTIA A+ and N+ certs. Those you can easily self study for if you have the time and aptitude. Remember, CCNA is the world as Cisco sees it, but CompTIA is vendor neutral, so it is going to give you a good baseline to start off in your education.

aglo1984

Thanks for your advice. I won't need to sell my lab as I can pay it up over the course of the 32 weeks so its not awful just didn't want to pay £900 for something that wasn't recommended but I shall contact the college about more information and take it from there. I think what I will probably do is once I've spoken to the college I will either study the N+ or just make a start on the CCNA material so I have some background knowledge before I start a class and then I can properly develop my skills by doing the course.

zrockstar

Sounds like a great plan! I would still recommend going for the N+ over prestudying for the CCNA for two reasons: 1. Employers are going to want you to have it anyways, and 2. Most N+ subjects coincide with CCNA material, just not as deep. The N+ will give you a little knowledge about a lot of things, you will dig much, much deeper into those subjects in the CCNA, but the CCNA material will ultimately make more sense because of the broadness of the N+. Don't overlook it!