RE: technical writing certification

Subject: RE: technical writing certification
From: "Swallow, William" <WSwallow -at- courion -dot- com>
To: "TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com>
Date: Wed, 12 Sep 2001 11:31:09 -0400

I haven't seen anyone looking at brainbench certifications, but I'm just one
person in this working world.

FWIW, I too took several free brainbench tests - mostly as a beta tester for
them - and found the tests not only superficial, but confusing. Of course I
naturally suck at multiple guess questions to begin with. Give me an essay
question any day. ;) Maybe that goes without saying, given my profession.

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Technical Writer
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-----Original Message-----
The problem with the Brainbench test is that it's multiple-guess. I think
there were maybe one or two questions per topic, so it wasn't exactly
comprehensive. Even if you don't know anything about a topic, if you guess
well, you can get a good score. You can answer many of the questions
successfully even if you have little experience with the topic, but read
TECHWR-L regularly. I'm not sure what the goal of the test is -- maybe to
show your overall familiarity with concepts in the field -- but it doesn't
measure you against a defined set of accepted industry standards, which is
what I think of when I think of "certification." In fact, I have no idea who
developed the test.

Also, I have no idea how Brainbench is regarded among employers. Has anyone
out there found Brainbench scores to be useful in a job search or for career
advancement?

I took the test (and 10 others) when it was free, but I wouldn't pay for it
now without knowing how it would benefit me.

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