Attending Mcse Boot Camp Training
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I have been a computer technician for many many years. And even though I have years of experience, I never got certified with either an MCSA (Microsoft certified systems administrator) or MCSE (Microsoft certified systems engineer). So I decided I was going to attend the Mcse boot camp. There are several companies that specialize in this advanced, brutal training and they have training facilities located throughout the United States. These boot camps typically last just over two weeks and allow you to learn everything you need to pass all of your examples to become certified.
You will need to have a good background and understanding of Microsoft environments including operating systems and networks before you attempt the boot camp. There is no way you can attend these training sessions with no experience and expect to walk out being fully certified. There is just too much material that you would need to learn and to many things that you need to know in order to pass the tests. To get your MCSA, you will need to pass four exams. In order to receive your MCSE certification, you will need to pass an additional three exams, for a total of seven exams. Typically, you need to score a 70 or 80% or better in order to pass these exams.
The exams are not your typical multiple choice questions. Microsoft has made the exam even tougher by adding simulation type questions. These questions present you with a scenario that you must solve. Some questions make you read a long scenario, then apply what you think is the best solution for this particular scenario. There are also simulations that record your actions on screen and score you on the actions you take to solve a particular problem. These are particularly tricky because you may know how to answer the question you just don't know the steps involved to getting there.
The boot camp helps prepare you by teaching you everything you need to know to take the exams. The boot camps will not make you a better technician per se, because they focus on helping you to become a better test taker. They will cover all materials that you need to know in order to pass the exam. Your instructor, or instructors, will emphasize areas of the exam that you may expect to be tested on. Since the test or tests are typically around 100 questions from a possible pool of 500 questions, it is not possible for the instructor to give you the answers to the test. However, they know which topics are the most important ones and will emphasize these during class.
For example, during my boot camp, the instructor emphasized during the module on DHCP that you must authorize a scope before your DHCP server will be active. Sure enough, one of the questions on my Windows 2003 server exam dealt with authorizing a DHCP server. However, other people in the class did not have the same question. This is one unique thing about taking these exams and a large classroom full of people. Since there are so many questions from which to pull from, no one in the class will have the exact same exam. While you and your neighbor may share some of the same questions, it is highly unlikely that your exams will be identical.
My boot camp lasted 15 days and was held in a hotel. The cost for the boot camp included all of my lodging, my instruction, my training materials, breakfast and lunch, all exam fees, and 24-hour a day access to the computer lab. The computer lab was set up in a conference room inside the hotel. We began each morning at 7 a.m. with breakfast. After breakfast we had our morning training session which lasted until lunchtime. The entire class had lunch together. After lunch, we trained right through till dinnertime. Dinner was on our own. After dinner we either had exams, or we had study time. Even though the lab was open all night long, I brought my own laptop so I can study my own room. I found it useful to escape the classroom to take a break.
At the end of my two weeks, I was able to pass a couple of exams and become a Microsoft certified professional. I did not however receive my MCSA nor my MCSE. I am still working on that today. I did, however, enjoy my MCSE boot camp training.
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