I had lunch with Michael earlier this week and I expressed shock that people do not research the courses they take before handing over their money. I said something like ‘is it just me that looks into these things?’ to which he said ‘Yes.’ This post is how I do that research; and why.

First, the why. In the summer of 1999 I took a pause from my budding testing career to switch tracks to become an Oracle DBA. At that time the DBA certificate a ticket to a decent entry-level position (and databases are cool). I had saved up enough money to be out of work 5 months before things got tight financially and found a local business / tech school which offered a full-time (8-4, Monday – Friday) Oracle DBA course including exam sitting fees. It was not cheap.

The week before the course was scheduled to start I was informed that it would be 6 – 10, Monday through Friday and a couple weeks longer. No problem, though had I known that I wouldn’t have opted out of a contract to be able to attend during the day. Oh well. Then the first night we (all 3 of us in the course) were told that it would be just Monday, Wednesday and Friday nights. And then a couple weeks later the instructor would start to show up late as he was involved with an Oracle Financials installation at work which wasn’t going smoothly. He eventually quit.

Eventually I started to burn through the savings too quickly and realized that this wasn’t going to end with me having a certification. I didn’t even end up writing the final exam, though I do know PL/SQL pretty well. When I asked for a refund since they were not delivering anything close to what I was initially sold they got quite rude, and of course I didn’t see a penny.

Now, I am much more aware of the whole ‘buyer beware’ thing so when I am considering taking a course, listing to a webinar or attending a conference or even attending a session at the conference I do my homework, including…

Organization

  • What is the organization sponsoring the event?
  • What is their track record?
  • Their reputation?

Instructor

  • Who is the person(s) who are delivering the content?
  • Do they have a blog?
  • A book?
  • What credentials do they have to be presenting this material?
  • Do I know them?
  • Do I know someone who knows them?
  • Are they on Linked-in?
  • What is their reputation?
  • Do they provide references to back up their claims of quality?

Material

  • Is the content going to interest me?
  • Does it conflict with my world view of things?
  • Do I get take-home materials?
  • What is the delivery method?

I can run through this list pretty quickly, and I strongly advocate anyone who is paying for education to develop their own checklists as well. Especially in tough economic times when people will be getting (unfortunately) cut from their jobs and looking to upgrade their skills. I can almost guarantee the technical schools are seeing a potential revenue spike and while there are some schools that genuinely care about the education they deliver, others are more concerned with the money they are charging.