Not so much of a challenge

About a month ago I mentioned that I would be going back to school this fall to pick up some web development skills, the lack of which appeared to be contibuting to my difficulty in finding a job. Well, wouldn't you just know it, no sooner had I enrolled in the web development program at the local community college, that I got, and accepted, my first job offer. Obviously, I should have applied to the college months ago -- say, for the summer session -- in order to have triggered a job offer that much earlier.

No matter. Once I accepted the job, the question became whether to go ahead with the three courses I had registered for, or forget the whole thing. In the end, I compromised, cancelling one of the courses but keeping the other two on my schedule. One (SQL) is an online course, leaving me with one evening a week that I actually have to show up on campus for the other course (Intro to Telecommunications, or something like that). My tuition is paid, though I don't have my books yet; when I last was able to check the bookstore, only one of three or four required texts was in stock. Now that I've started working, it'll probably be easier to buy them online anyway.

The last task to check off my list before classes begin was taking "challenge" tests. TCC requires all students to pass Basic Computer Literacy, plus there are four so-called "core courses" in the IST department that I have to pass. (That's assuming I ever actually take enough courses to get a certificate.) Fortunately, there are "challenge" tests offered for all of these, i.e., if you can pass the test with 70% or better, you get pass/fail credit. And as I said before, if I can't test out of Basic Computer Literacy, I'd better find a different career. So I signed up for two challenge tests (you only get two hours no matter how many you sign up for, meaning in practical terms that two is the most you can do in one session because they actually take about 40-45 minutes if you know what you're doing), and took them this morning. Each consisted of 100 multiple choice questions.

I shall not keep you in suspense any longer: I passed both of them (as you might have divined from the title of this entry), thus earning 8 credits without paying $612 tuition, plus books.

The first was Basic Computer Literacy, where I scored 95 out of 100. I don't know specifically which 5 questions I missed, but most likely they were in the section on databases (for example, I haven't a clue what a dynaset might be). There were also a couple of questions that IMHO were poorly written and ambiguous, so I may have guessed wrong at what they were driving at, and one that was beyond ambiguous -- it had no correct answer listed (and there was no "none of the above" choice). It was all heavily Windows-centric, so I guess it was fortunate I started my new job, where they use Windows machines, this week; I got in five days of practice in navigating around Windows Explorer.

The second test was Introduction to Network Services. Only got 88 on that one, but that's well more than enough to pass. My major problem was not knowing what some of the acronyms mean (like TLD and NAT). Certainly the bulk of the questions were fairly trivial (e.g., what punctuation mark separates the user name from the host name in an email address).

I believe I was the only one there who took two challenge tests, and there were still a couple of people left when I finished. I hope they were taking one of the other tests, because if Basic Computer Literacy was taking them almost two hours, they've got a real problem.

Now I just have to sign up for the next testing session so I can knock off Intro Software Design and Intro Windows XP. The final core course is PC Hardware and Troubleshooting, which includes a "hands-on" component. I'll probably want to investigate the scope of that course before attempting the test.

Classes start August 18th! Now to go shopping for my new box of Crayolas.