What Certifications are Valuable in Today's IT?

ganjadude asks: "I am a twenty-something who took the CCNA classes back in 2001. College at the time was not an option, so I am mainly self-taught in the field. I was wondering if there were others on Slashdot who took this route, and what certifications they have found will best further their careers. Does college matter in the security field anymore, or are certifications the way to go?" What certifications would you recommend as the most pertinent in today's IT market?

Comments

Yes, college still matters

[Ankh]

A good university degree should help you to learn and reason, and will teach you stuff you don't want to learn but that will later turn out to be useful.

In some jobs, especially in larger companies, there's a ceiling, you can't be promoted above a certainl level without a degree.

And yes, if you want to be a consultant, the contacts and the prestige of being associated with a well-known university are worth an awful lot, like it or not.

In computer security you need to stay ahead. Certifications use a course curriculum which was set maybe a year, two years, even three or more years ago and updated; with a certification you'll always be behind the curve, ever so slightly. You need to learn how to be on top of reasearch, be comfortable reading research reports and know how to follow and understand citations. So there's a whole cultural thing that you may need to be part of.

Yes, all if this is vague and hazy, and all of it is long term. By the time there's a concrete need for it, by the time you lose out on a contract or are passed over for promotion, and realize you needed a degree, you won't have one :-)