Agreed. A CV is dangerous tool in the hands of an idiot. At my job I am at times asked to look at a particular canidate and I'm pretty sure we've picked experience over a degree about 80% of the time. I've seen some great experience and very desirably skills from some lads who has done a bit of college or an internship.
BTEC Computer Studies rant..
- Thread starter edscdk
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Agreed. A CV is dangerous tool in the hands of an idiot. At my job I am at times asked to look at a particular canidate and I'm pretty sure we've picked experience over a degree about 80% of the time. I've seen some great experience and very desirably skills from some lads who has done a bit of college or an internship.
![[TW]Fox](/data/man-of-honor/2009.png){kind=avatar}
Experience is useful but it's no guarantee.
I have nearly 15 years experience of playing first person shooters.
I am, unfortunately, pretty crap at them despite this experience.
In a one on one dual over a game of COD4, a 13 year old boy with a fraction of the experience would probably give me a complete pasting.
People seem to think experience is the key to everything. There are numerous people who are crap at something despite having done it for a very long term. Repeating something over and over again doesn't neccesarily indicate you have the capacity to learn new things.
Surely looking at 2 people who left college 10 years ago - one having a degree and 7 years experience and one having 10 years experience - at the very least the guy with the degree has a proven ability to learn new concepts to a specific standard?
I have nearly 15 years experience of playing first person shooters.
I am, unfortunately, pretty crap at them despite this experience.
In a one on one dual over a game of COD4, a 13 year old boy with a fraction of the experience would probably give me a complete pasting.
People seem to think experience is the key to everything. There are numerous people who are crap at something despite having done it for a very long term. Repeating something over and over again doesn't neccesarily indicate you have the capacity to learn new things.
Surely looking at 2 people who left college 10 years ago - one having a degree and 7 years experience and one having 10 years experience - at the very least the guy with the degree has a proven ability to learn new concepts to a specific standard?
Soldato
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A+, Fox
[TW]Fox;15127656 said:
Indeed.
Which is why I choose to do a degree, instead of being stuck on the dole fumbling around for what few low-level jobs are left. Besides, learning java, project management and in-depth microprocessor architecture is arguably a good use of time regardless of other factors.
CCNA? No, I've seen more demand for the MCSE. Many a time that I've been turned down because I lack the latter. Whether I've spent a few years doing first\second line support is irrelevant to them without the qualification to back it up...
I did the Cisco material\tests back in 2003, did it get me a better job? Hell no. Not to say the qualification is useless, but you're going to be spending a lot of time and money on CCNP\CCIE before it grabs anyone's attention by itself.
Deleted member 61728
Deleted member 61728
Im doing a BTEC national IT diploma(level 3) first year atm after doing BTEC first IT diploma which was utter pants , cant believe I went though with it.The lecturer was a really old guy who just about knew what was going on and nothing more literally.There was a networking unit planned but it ended up changing to business "help desk support".Did a hardware unit which was about as diluted,empty as it could possibly be.Now this other course seems focused not on IT like you would expect "hardware theory,software theory/projects" but business crap including delights such as "structures of business", "feasibility studies" and "project management".
Anyone else find IT courses at college getting more business rather then the good tech stuff ?
Anyone else find IT courses at college getting more business rather then the good tech stuff ?
I'm afraid project management already has its own dedicated qualifications so get used to it, that's how the industry is now
Soldato
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My girlfriend did A-Level computing, never saw as much useless information in my life
it depends on what the experience is... 10 years as a developer with experience in a lot of different areas would stand for more than 10 years of being a high school techie
also anyone want to tell us how computing at a level is like?
Depends which college. Some will be teaching you stupid stuff like how to use MS Word, others already start exploring programming at that stage.
Are you at Surrey? Did you have A Level Maths? I'm considering applying but I won't have A Level Maths, should get DDD for the BTEC though.
so I dont see why people are against btec courses, or am I missing something?
programming is also taught in btec courses; vb.net. our tutor wasn't much cop, he would be constantly asking me questions throughout the lessons because i had actually bothered to learn something outside of what was being taught to me, crazy idea, i know
My lecturers do actually know what they're talking about (although whoever in the government thought putting "key skills" into all degrees was a good idea needs a slap). Although amusingly enough one of them started using computers after I did - taught a different subject back in the day I'm guessing
Seriously though, they're obviously experienced (all of them are in their late 40s\early 50s and have been teaching for at least 10 years).
Thought I stick my 10penneth in 
I am a full time college tutor and actively engaged in getting vendor based qualifications into the academic realm and hoping to get some standards.
I only teach on course here and that gives all successfull students the MCDST (to be replaced with MCITP) and the Comptia A+ certifications when they leave.
Both these courses are fully taught by a Microsoft Certified Trainer (me)
More and more FE colleges and universities are partnering up with the likes of Microsoft, Cisco and Comptia to offer decent industry recognised quals in academia.
I can understand why some colleges dont do these as they just cannot get certified staff to work for the money they can offer.
I am a full time college tutor and actively engaged in getting vendor based qualifications into the academic realm and hoping to get some standards.
I only teach on course here and that gives all successfull students the MCDST (to be replaced with MCITP) and the Comptia A+ certifications when they leave.
Both these courses are fully taught by a Microsoft Certified Trainer (me)
More and more FE colleges and universities are partnering up with the likes of Microsoft, Cisco and Comptia to offer decent industry recognised quals in academia.
I can understand why some colleges dont do these as they just cannot get certified staff to work for the money they can offer.
Thought I stick my 10penneth in
I am a full time college tutor and actively engaged in getting vendor based qualifications into the academic realm and hoping to get some standards.
I only teach on course here and that gives all successfull students the MCDST (to be replaced with MCITP) and the Comptia A+ certifications when they leave.
Both these courses are fully taught by a Microsoft Certified Trainer (me)
More and more FE colleges and universities are partnering up with the likes of Microsoft, Cisco and Comptia to offer decent industry recognised quals in academia.
I can understand why some colleges dont do these as they just cannot get certified staff to work for the money they can offer.
The tests need to be taken at a seperate centre don't they? Or do you actually hold the exams as well?
i did a btec national in ICT general studies and yeah they can drop as long as it meets the criteria, fyi the networking part of the course was minimal to say the least..... we never took more on than this is cat 5 and this is a pc.
Im sure your lad already knows this and will probably be better off with games design as itll be better for programming & mathematics (needed for both networking and scripts etc good usefull knowledge if you ask me) and as his knowledge will no doubtfully be that of the networking module theyd of taught anyway and hed of not learned anything new
Im sure your lad already knows this and will probably be better off with games design as itll be better for programming & mathematics (needed for both networking and scripts etc good usefull knowledge if you ask me) and as his knowledge will no doubtfully be that of the networking module theyd of taught anyway and hed of not learned anything new
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Didn't your college not offer you a pathway to go on? Most (Decent) colleges should be stating the pathway to you. The college I work at we offer 3 of the 4 pathways and these are offered at First Diploma as well as National level.
Pathways are;
IT & Business
Systems Support
Software Development (Not games related)
Networking
We offer all but the networking pathway although both Systems and software do include networking modules. We also deliver the BTEC in Media Production (Games Design) and Media Production (Interactive Media).
I'm surprised how many people on here seemed to be enrolled on a BTEC IT course who don't actually know which pathway they were enrolled on. Did the college not tell you?
also anyone want to tell us how computing at a level is like?
A lot of the stuff is similar to what is taught in the first year of uni, just less in depth, you have to learn a programming language to do the projects.
we did quite a bit more than that on our course
You're never going to make decent money in IT unless you understand how it applies to business.
Exactly, project management and things like architectural designs for networks etc are the next big thing, not being a first line support tech. Large companies having their staff work from home needs a good intranet system for example. VOIP is an expanding area as well.