I'm considering doing my CCNA soon and wondered if anyone could offer any advice? i've seen a number of different offers from £250-£500 going from doing a weekend to a week long course. Has anyone here done such a course? whats the best way to approach it? did you get a job? any suggestions for trainers in the manchester area?
Also interested in this/similar courses/prospects. I'll start going grey very shortly if I stay in risk management. 22 and stressed! TSB
I work with a lot of contractors who rate it quite highly, and said it is invaluable in terms of getting jobs. But then again the contractor world is very much about marketing yourself. I was Cisco CCNA certified (think it has expired now) and had it on my CV when applying for a job as an IT Consultant, and it didn't come up at all. Read into that what you will.
I'll be looking for stuff as a junior network engineer so i would imagine its much more sought after? If i could get a job that would put me through it that would be even better but i fear its difficult enough finding a job at the moment let alone training thrown in. Does £500 sound like a fair price for a week long course? I have a merit in an IT access course too but have little to no experience with networking (apart from standard router settings etc) so maybe a week would be more realistic than a weekend course.
Have a look at their pass/fail statistics, it sounds fair for a week-long course, but if the course is no good then there's no point!
Its Firebrand training, if you dont pass first time they offer you the chance to redo it "free" (its actually a reduced price). Good point though Krikkit i'll give them a call and ask what the figures are like for people who find jobs too.
A friend of mine just did Firebrand for an SQL course and he has a lot of bad words to say about them. He ultimately says that is he left feeling that the sales people promise a lot, then the teachers are absolutely crap. He did a weekend residential course, and the teacher spoke to fast (and poor english), and wouldn't allow questions. And the material was pretty poor according to him. This could just be the one teacher, but I would look carefully into it.
does anyone have any experience with commsupport for training? looks promising as they do a 6 day course in manchester
I'm doing my CCNA, as part of a college course while working (apprenticeship). I have completed the first year and passed ICND1 (CCENT), ICND2 makes it CCNA I think for a one week course, it would be an absolute mammoth task to learn and take it all in - I've gotten a+/n+ and a couple of MCPs which I found very easy in comparison. I haven't been on an intensive course like that but do they actually teach you the skills or do they teach you how to pass the exam? Also one thing to bear in mind is that Cisco exams cannot be retaken for 6 months after failing!
I started with the certs a few years ago. One thing I will say about boot camps and week long intense courses is that they dont really teach you the tech, they teach you how to pass an exam. As a result its not hard to look foolish in a new job using that tech when your found out to be "just another cert junkie". If you want to get the full benefit out of course study for it yourself. Read the material, understand it and try and get of hold of the tech. You can get hold of all the cisco software or the physical stuff (e.g. routers) from eBay. Some companies give cisco kit away when the support contract has expired.