Oracle waives Oracle University hands-on course requirement for OCP?

May 18, 2008

Oracle has been criticized on OTN for requiring hands-on courses from Oracle Corporation Partners as a requirement for an Oracle OCP certificate, ignoring an OCP candidates work experience and similar hands-on training by superior independent Oracle training providers.

The Oracle web site notes their hands-on course requirements must be from Oracle University or an Oracle partner:

"Candidates must attend their approved course through one of these providers:

- Oracle University Training Center, Oracle Authorized Education - -
- Center or Oracle Authorized Partner
- Oracle Academic Initiative
- Oracle Internet Academy
- Oracle Workforce Development Program "

According to Francisco Munoz Alvarez, Oracle has waived their hand-on course requirements for the Oracle Certified Professional (OCP) program, allowing any hands-on classes taught by an Oracle Partner Network (OPN) member, where the instructor is OCP certified.

Francisco also notes that it's not automatic, you must specifically ask, and he implies that this waiver is done on a case-by-case basis”

“I'm a Oracle OCP.OCE. I give internal training to several DBAs, and when asked by Oracle about the "hands on course requirement" they told Oracle that the course (in this case Oracle 10g DBA I, II, and Tuning) was given by a Oracle Certified professional, and Oracle accepted it. . . .

I was told from Oracle the same that Burleson said, only official training on Oracle University. I told my guys to try, when connect to prometric page to request the Hands on approval, they wrote that received the training from a OPN member and the instructor was a OCP, then 48 hours later all got their Hands on approved, without any further question.

I hope this help some people to move on with the OCP, because the cost and the quality of the course on Oracle University are very poor.”

Damir Bersinic, an Oracle Certified DBA, author and trainer, has written an excellent article about Oracle OCP educational changes in this Certcities article titled It was a money grab after all. Bersinic writes that the OCP hands-on training requirement smacks of revenue generation motives:

"I have three problems with this requirement. First, who is to say that Oracle University is the best place to acquire the necessary skills to become Oracle certified? There are other resources that can provide the same level of coverage of the exam topics and DBA roles.

Granted, Oracle's exam objectives map nicely to the courses offered (on purpose, I'm sure), but how about those organizations that decide on bringing in someone to train their people on the same topics outlined in the exam objectives using non-Oracle material or instructors?

Is the quality of their training different if the person performing the training is as qualified or better qualified than Oracle's own instructor?

Furthermore, they're not breaking any licensing rules since they are legally allowed to use their Oracle licenses to train their own staff.

My second problem relates to the reason someone may decide to use a third-party training organization to provide these in-house classes -- the cost. Oracle University classes are quite expensive.

By forcing OCP candidates to attend an Oracle University class Oracle is helping to ensure a revenue stream for its education division.

Unfortunately, it may also have the effect of discouraging potential OCP candidates from pursuing their certification past the OCA stage.

I always thought it was about getting qualified candidates out into the workforce, though it now appears the OCP certification is about filling seats in Oracle University classes.

This leads me to my third problem -- any of the Oracle University classes outlined above is valid in satisfying this requirement. Essentially, simply by sitting an Introduction to SQL you have satisfied this requirement, but have not learned any of the skills being tested on the Oracle 9i Database: Fundamentals II or the Oracle 9i Database: Performance Tuning exams, which are required to attain the OCP credential.

If Oracle wanted to introduce a course requirement and gear it towards the OCP credential, why not require that candidates attend a class corresponding to the exams required for the OCP designation specifically instead of any Oracle 9i class?"

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