[consulting] Drupal Certification (was: General consultant's vent)

[Vivek Khurana]

On Sat, Aug 8, 2009 at 2:51 AM, Dries Buytaert <dries.buytaert at gmail.com>wrote:

> While I'm skeptic about certification programs myself, I also see value in
> them.   In a way, a masters degree from MIT or a PhD from Stanford is also a
> certification.  Granted, there are many examples of bad certification
> programs, but there are also examples of valuable certification programs;
> e.g. the CISCO certification program is very thorough, hands-on and valued
> by the market.
>
> All things considered, I think there is value in having Drupal
> certification programs, especially if Drupal continues to grow.  Similarly,
> I think there is value in higher education.
>
> My personal view is that the Drupal Association is _not_ the best body to
> create "the" Drupal certification program.  It's my belief that we are best
> served with allowing many organizations to create their own Drupal
> certification programs, and have the market/buyer set their value -- similar
> to how universities built reputation.  (In such a world, it is very
> important that the certification programs are labeled properly; i.e. "ACME
> Drupal certification" and not just "Drupal certification", where ACME is the
> name of the company or organization.)
>
> Competition around Drupal certification programs would be great, because it
> would likely help improve the quality of the different Drupal certification
> programs.


 I think competition among drupal certifications will loose the value of the
certification. A certification ensures that there is a central authority
which will control the quality of the certification holders. For every
certification we have one body which controls the quality of the various
certificates. IMHO the most successful certificates in open source world are
Mysql and Redhat certificates and both are controlled by one respective
companies.
 DA could become one such body that will overlook the certification content
and execution while ACME organization be responsible for creating the
framework of certification and executing it. This way we can have multiple
organizations holding the certification exams at the same time overall
quality is ensured.

regards
Vivek

-- 
The hidden harmony is better than the obvious!!
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