Training for your CompTIA A+ has four specialist sections – you’ll have to qualify in just two sectors to be competent in A+. This is why, most colleges restrict their A+ to just two of the 4 sectors. We think this is too much of a compromise – certainly you’ll have the qualification, but training on all 4 will give you greater confidence in your working life, where gaps in your knowledge will expose weaknesses. That’s the reason why you deserve training in everything.
Alongside being taught how to build and fix computers, trainees involved in this training will have instruction on how to work in antistatic conditions, along with remote access, fault finding and diagnostics.
If you feel it appropriate to add Network+ training, you will additionally be able to assist with or manage networks of computers, giving you the facility to command a higher salary.
Be on the lookout that any qualifications you’re considering doing are recognised by industry and are bang up to date. ‘In-house’ exams and the certificates they come with are generally useless.
To an employer, only the top companies such as Microsoft, Adobe, CompTIA or Cisco (for instance) will get you short-listed. Nothing else will cut the mustard.
Talk to a professional consultant and we’d be amazed if they couldn’t provide you with many horror stories of students who’ve been conned by dodgy salespeople. Make sure you deal with a skilled professional who asks lots of questions to uncover the best thing for you – not for their paycheque! You need to find the very best place to start for you.
Where you have a strong background, or maybe some live experience (maybe some existing accreditation?) then it could be that your starting level will be very different from a student that is completely new to the industry.
It’s wise to consider some basic PC skills training first. This can often make the transition to higher-level learning a a little easier.
For the most part, a normal student really has no clue in what direction to head in a computing career, let alone which market they should look at getting trained in.
What is our likelihood of grasping what is involved in a particular job when it’s an alien environment to us? Most likely we don’t know someone who does that actual job anyway.
Ultimately, the right resolution really only appears from a meticulous study across many changing factors:
* Your personality can play a starring part – what things get your juices flowing, and what tasks really turn you off.
* Do you hope to accomplish a specific aspiration – for instance, working from home in the near future?
* How highly do you rate salary – is an increase your main motivator, or does job satisfaction rate further up on the scale of your priorities?
* Learning what the main Information technology types and markets are – and what differentiates them.
* Having a good look at how much time and effort that you’re going to put into it.
The bottom line is, the best way of understanding everything necessary is by means of a meeting with someone that knows the industry well enough to give you the information required.
Look at the following facts and pay great regard to them if you believe the marketing blurb about a guarantee for your exam looks like a reason to buy:
Patently it’s not free – you are paying for it – the price has simply been included in the whole thing.
People who take each progressive exam, paying as they go are much better placed to get through first time. They are conscious of what they’ve paid and revise more thoroughly to be ready for the task.
Why should you pay your training course provider at the start of the course for exam fees? Find the best deal you can at the time, rather than coughing up months or even a year or two in advance – and do it in a local testing centre – rather than possibly hours away from your area.
Big margins are secured by a number of companies that get money for exam fees in advance. A number of students don’t take them for various reasons but the company keeps the money. Believe it or not, there are training companies who rely on that fact – as that’s how they make a lot of their profit.
Many training companies will require you to sit pre-tests and prohibit you from re-taking an exam until you’ve demonstrated an excellent ability to pass – making an ‘exam guarantee’ just about worthless.
Exam fees averaged about 112 pounds in the last 12 months via VUE or Pro-metric centres in the UK. So why pay hundreds or thousands of pounds extra for ‘an Exam Guarantee’, when common sense dictates that the responsible approach is a commitment to studying and the use of authorised exam preparation tools.
(C) S. Edwards 2009. Pop over to A+ Course or learninglolly.com/IT_Certification.html.
Tags: advice, career, computer, education, games, hobbies, Home Valuation, money, self improvement, shop, software, technology, web, work
