NYCPHP Meetup

[Kristina Anderson]

Mike -- 99.9% of the people posting on this list do have a university 
degree, from what I have seen!  A lot of them have MS or PhDs, even.

But, a 10- or 20-year old degree doesn't prove anything when it comes 
to current technology.  A certification in current technology proves 
that you are knowledgeable in a certain area, at least to a certain 
extent, and also quantifies the knowledge base for our profession as 
PHP programmers, which is why we are (mostly) in favor of a cert.

--Kristina (B.A., 1985) :)

> No matter how many certificates you stack on top of each other from
> Manhattan to the Moon, it STILL does not equate to a BScs degree. I
> see lots of people here bitterly complaining about legitimacy and yet
> the avoid the very thing that gives them instant credibility, the
> Degree.
> 
> My very first experience with sitting in front of a keyboard was in
> fact while I was working on my degree at a time when BScs didn't exist
> and colleges were issuing BSEE degrees for graduates who majored in
> Computer Science.
> 
> From my experience with certificates, the only people who really
> benefit from them are the companies that hype them and the test taker
> courses that teach you how to take the test and not whether the
> qualifications are solid or not.
> 
> From my perspective, have been a hiring manager for more than twenty
> years, I know from bitter experience that certificate programs are a
> LOT more marketing hype than they are a practical barometer for
> gauging what someone is suppose to know about anything. Lots of people
> can pass tests and don't know basis stuff when you set them in front 
of
> a keyboard.
> 
> Some sound advice, GET THE DEGREE! When push comes to shove that is
> what give you credibility not some pie in the sky marketing hype that
> promises the moon and delivers chopped liver.
> 
> In a hiring situation when two candidates are pretty well equally
> qualified, one with a degree and one without, almost ALWAYS the degree
> is the determining factor for who gets the job!
> 
> This whole "self governing body" sounds a lot like a scam to me to
> create a yet another bureaucratic monstrosity that has no power and
> generates a lot of useless noise. Corporate Entities are obligated to
>  do what is best for their stock holders and that is the driving force
>  for how products generated by Zend Technologies evolve. The fact that
>  they haven't become a Micro$$$ is perhaps only a matter of waiting 
for
>  the right time and has nothing at all to do with "community". 
Whenever
>  they figure out how to do a licensing gig like Micro$$$, to exploit
>  all the PHP developers on the planet, then you will discover who 
exactly the
>  "governing body" for PHP is to be sure.
> 
>  My experience with User groups is that they tend to think they are 
the
>  "driving force" for products when in reality they are, well, User 
Groups and
>  really don't have the power they think they do. They have the yearly
>  meetings and put on their conferences etc. but its the Corporation
>  roadmap that decides the directions for where the products go, not 
the user groups.
> 
> -- 
> Best regards,
>  mikesz                            mailto:mikesz at qualityadvantages.com
> 
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