going back to school for network administration - good career move? (degree, jobs)
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Hi, I'm thinking of going back to school to get an associates in computer network administration. Can anyone tell me if this is a good field for jobs right now? Is it likely to withstand outsourcing? Also, will an associates (and an unrelated bachelors degree) be enough?
Erm...what do you do for work now? If youre not working in some sort of IT lackey gig, get one, get your certs. That's far less of a waste of time than just getting an associates...CNA is kind of a teach yourself thing. You really want to work towards a CCIE/JNCIE thing. You can stop in the middle, but so will your earning potential, just IMO.
I agree with the certifications thing, never pay a school to spoon feed you information to take the certification test. Years ago I paid $35 each for the A+ and Network+ books, studied them and took the tests for $150 each. Around the same time you could go to school where they would teach you the test for $2000. If you can't study the book and take the test, you probably shouldn't be in the computer field.
As for demand in the computer field, there is some demand, but you need experience you may have to take a low paying computer job until you can build up your knowledge / experience. An associates degree is pretty much worthless, if you going to college, a bachelors degree in computer science is worth a lot more.
Unless you live in an area that is absolutely saturated with IT work then I don't think you would have much luck with an AAS degree in Network Admin. Computer Science jobs are much more abundant so that might be something you want to move towards if you have the aptitude. Also best bet to avoid outsourcing is to work for a defense contractor. Most DoD jobs require US citizenship.
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