Re: [Staffslug] Minutes from Keele meeting
On 23/10/2007, Chris Snow <cr.snow(a)gmail.com> wrote:
What qualifies someone to work as an IT tech in a school? I can tell
you that the patience of a saint and the hide of a rhino are two
qualities that outweigh any badge you care to name. WRT big shiny gold
badges; if the school has a MS based system then it seems to me that
an MS badge is appropriate, if you want badges that is. I suspect many
schools just don't have the time or know-how to assess individuals
aptitude so perhaps for some schools, possession of an MS gong
signifies a certain level of proficiency. This is most unfortunate. I
can tell you from personal experience in industry that badges can mean
just that or mean nothing at all. I know "boot camp" CCNPs who could
not log into a router - literally - I kid yon not! (She lasted a
month). Interesting to see that Chase Terrace Technology College want
NVQ 3 for IT Practitioners or equivalent for their new ICT tech.
(£14,787 - £17,985 woohoo) This seems a better scheme to me.
I used to work at Wolves Uni starting at the Wolverhampton campus
later at the Priorslee, Telford campus. My only qualifications were
NVQ level 2 computing. I would have been wasted having anything more.
Most of my job involved taking computers apart or helping students to
recover lost work (usually in tears because it was a dissertation and
of course they had no back up). In schools it's pretty much the same.
If there is a network problem then an outside specialist firm is
normally called in. Yes, some schools do run their own server but it
is usually nothing more complex than a print server for one or two
labs. An school IT tech actually needs to be multi disciplined in
various A/V tasks as well as computing. As far as I am aware the
various MS badges may help but so would a Red Hat or one of the newer
Open Source qualifications. More than anything experience is actually
the key, which, it could be argued is only right. Any monkey can
learn to pass an exam, it takes real skill to work out real world
problems :-)
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Kevan Farmer
Linux user #373362
Staffordshire