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World's Youngest Microsoft Certificated Professional Is Five Years Old
HughPickens.com writes Gurvinder Gill writes at BBC that Ayan Qureshi is the world's youngest Microsoft Certified Professional after passing the tech giant's exam when he was just five years old. Qureshi's father introduced his son to computers when he was three years old. He let him play with his old computers, so he could understand hard drives and motherboards. "I found whatever I was telling him, the next day he'd remember everything I said, so I started to feed him more information," Qureshi explained. "Too much computing at this age can cause a negative effect, but in Ayan's case he has cached this opportunity." Ayan has his own computer lab at his home in Coventry, containing a computer network which he built and spends around two hours a day learning about the operating system, how to install programs, and has his own web site.
Microsoft Certified Professional (MCP) is a certification that validates IT professional and developer technical expertise through rigorous, industry-proven, and industry-recognized exams. MCP exams cover a wide range of Microsoft products, technologies, and solutions. When the boy arrived to take the Microsoft exam, the invigilators were concerned that he was too young to be a candidate. His father reassured them that Ayan would be all right on his own. "There were multiple choice questions, drag and drop questions, hotspot questions and scenario-based questions," Ayan's father told the BBC Asian Network. "The hardest challenge was explaining the language of the test to a five-year-old. But he seemed to pick it up and has a very good memory."
Microsoft Certified Professional (MCP) is a certification that validates IT professional and developer technical expertise through rigorous, industry-proven, and industry-recognized exams. MCP exams cover a wide range of Microsoft products, technologies, and solutions. When the boy arrived to take the Microsoft exam, the invigilators were concerned that he was too young to be a candidate. His father reassured them that Ayan would be all right on his own. "There were multiple choice questions, drag and drop questions, hotspot questions and scenario-based questions," Ayan's father told the BBC Asian Network. "The hardest challenge was explaining the language of the test to a five-year-old. But he seemed to pick it up and has a very good memory."
I agree with you. While he's probably a very bright kid and I would not seek to take anything away from him..... it bears comment.
My team used to refer to "MCSE" as "Make Coffee Send Errand". Mostly because of the issue you are pointing out: these guys had no skills whatsoever.
Another consultant who stuck it out.
"We are the Priests, of the Temples of Syrinx..."
The problem is that you only have to remember specific information to pass a certification. /why/ it is the way it is. Only that it is.
This doesn't mean you know
This makes the difference between IT professionals who love their work, and will find new solutions, versus the sys admin who can follow the instructions laid out before him.
You might be able to say 'FTP uses TCP' 'Voice uses UDP' Oh, you passed.
This doesn't mean that they understand that TCP sends acks for each received packet to insure each one is received in order, and if it isn't, it resends the package.
That UDP sends it blindly hoping it worked.
Or why. E.G FTP uses TCP because you're transferring files, if part of the file is missing, it's toast. So you need acknowledgement for each packet sent.
UDP is used for voice. This is because with voice, if part of it is missing you get a slight drop in quality, a blip or blurp in sound, machine like sounds or depending how long, a missed word or two.
You can still understand the conversation for the most part with minor impact. If it was TCP, people would cut out a lot more vs the odd artifact in the sound.
This isn't what happened here. It's one thing for a kid to play and learn. Here we have a father pursuing his sons MCP certification, for his own gratification. If this was about the kid, it wouldn't be in the news.
Area51 - We are watching...
There is a third option: The boy is a "paper" MCP. He knows the right answer to the questions, but doesn't understand the reasoning behind it.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
I did the exam for windows NT 4.0, it was a while ago.
But knowing about windows hampers your ability to pass the exam. If you only read the book and never touched a computer that will make that exam easy.
The questions are in multiple choice, but you need to give the 'best' answer. Most of the time three of the four answers will solve the problem.
Just keep in mind: if one of the answers is "Reinstall windows" than that is the correct 'best' answer (this was the 'best' answer of 5 of the questions on the exam), if one of the answers is 'edit the registry' than this is the 'worst' answer (even if it solved everything and is the quickest/easiest way of doing it).
MCP, however, is a pushover. You can get that by simply passing one of the MCSE tests, usually the one centered around the workstation OS.
If you can install it and do very rudimentary administration, you can get an MCP.
Still impressive at the age of 5 though.
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