Geoffrey, I disagree somewhat. For me what's valuable is the
learning/knowledge acquisition process. Too many folks come to see an exam
or a cert as the be-all end-all. Which is understandable, because everyone
wants a reward for all their hard work. But it's more satisfying in an
enduring kind of way to take stock of everything you made yourself learn
that you did not know before, and otherwise might not make the time to
learn. Before BSCN I didn't know jack about BGP, but now I'm better informed
and that in itself is a good thing.
Second, the availability & quality of study materials for CCNP v2 are
improved over the situation that existed for v1. That helps a lot. In
addition, it seems Cisco aimed to bring the scope of v2 questions more in
line with its official course content. That, too, helps, and I think is a
welcome development. My first exam was the old CLSC--I had 2 obscure
questions on Cat 3xxx hardware that I could not, later, find the answers to
in any published Cisco documentation. What was the point of asking such
questions?
Third, I don't think a Cisco cert will be as devalued as the perfectly
worthless MCSE cert anytime soon. I've been teaching MCSE classes for a
number of years and sometimes hear from students: "Why did you spend so much
time on the subnetting stuff, it was not on the TCP/IP exam!" Or, "I don't
have time to come to class, just tell me where I can find the Transcenders."
etc. etc. Many hiring managers are aware of this devaluation, which was
brought about by Microsoft putting Marketing above everything else. If Cisco
starts to go down that road, then we can be concerned, but not to worry yet!
Kathy "Katyusha" M.
CCNP Security
-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of
Howard C. Berkowitz
Sent: Wednesday, January 31, 2001 8:39 AM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: Lowering of standards on CCNP 2.0?
>Listmembers,
>
>I wrote the BSCN on Monday, and I must say that I was
>underwhelmed. I read Halabi and Moy's book on OSPF a
>year or so ago so they weren't exactly top of mind,
>and used the BSCN guide. Even using this guide almost
>exclusively I scored well over 900 with ten days
>study.
>
>I hope that I just got an easy batch of questions from
>the pool. It doesn't bode well for the value of this
>certification if the bar is significantly lowered. I
>hope that they put the pass up to 790 as they did with
>the ACRC. Even at this level, it would still be a
>relatively easy exam.
>
>Does anybody else feel the same way? I don't want to
>see the value of this certification which so many of
>us are spending a considerable amount of money and
>time on plummet because of a relaxing of standards.
There are several fundamental issues here.
First, contrary to popular belief, it isn't in Cisco's interest to
keep the pool of certified people small -- AS LONG AS the pools at
each level can do the job.
From Cisco's principal perspective, the first purpose of the
certification program is to facilitate Cisco's outsourcing of support
to resellers. Yes, they certifications do have other benefits, but
that is Cisco's principal corporate goal.
I honestly don't know if someone in Cisco is doing something as
rational as saying what tasks should a BSCN certificated person be
able to do, as opposed to what general knowledge such a person to
have.
But if they have, it may not be inconsistent to lower standards if
they feel the standards are getting in the way of sales and support.
>
>If so, perhaps we could write individually or as a
>group to Cisco to recommend a reevaluation of their
>passing grades/exam development. If I am way out in
>left field on this, my apologies to the list for
>lowering the s/n ratio:P
>
>Best regards,
>
>Geoffrey Zinderdine
>CCNA MCP2K CCA BLAH BLAH BLAH
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