Well folks, I'm literally shaking and my head is pounding, but I was in a state of disbelief when I saw "Pass" on my score report.
For me, like many of you, I started off with
@Lee McWhorter's Train the Trainer series. But I had to put study on hold after that because I was finishing up Cloud+. So I got the book opened in April and started in, but then, I had to do my preps for Project+ 005 beta and for the TTT series. I ran through the Project+ CertMaster materials for 005 thoroughly, before taking the beta, with the long wait to October before knowing if I had passed that or not. Just shy of the Project+ TTT, I ran through the 004 materials so as to see the differences. If you want to watch my TTT series for Project,
@NATUNA's got it
linked up here.
With Project+ all done, I had just a few months left to turn my attention back to the CASP. I wanted to also take the time to evaluate the CertMaster materials. So I got evals of them all, and started in, doing CM Learn, Labs, and then Practice.
So, honestly, CertMaster lays out the foundational stuff you need to know. I think there may be a couple of concepts that I didn't see in the CM materials. But for the greatest majority of it the concepts are in there, but really at a
Blooms Taxonomy * 1/2 level. You are going to need to take things to the Application level.
@Jill West's post did a good job at summing up some of the things from the exam, but for us instructors that are using CertMaster Learn/Labs in the classroom, just studying it alone, without practical application will not get you there, unless you're super intelligent and can put the concepts together fluidly. For the 80% of us (ref: Pareto's law), CertMaster Learn/Labs will not at all replace a solid instructor. But put a solid instructor in there, who can walk through the applicative stuff, like WHY running commands and their associated switches will give you the information you're seeking, versus just knowing what commands like vmstat, for example, do. I didn't see too much more content gain using CM Learn vs. using the CompTIA book. I think, at the end of the day, it comes down to approach and gives you that 'self-guided course' feel.
(* If you don't know Blooms Taxonomy, review it right quick, so you can get the context of what I'm trying to say here)
Rest assured, fellow instructors, CertMaster is not an AI that will put you out of a job. CertMaster will, if you use it right, focus your study and orient you in the right direction. The way I see it, if you use the
Scouts BSA EDGE Method religiously in the classroom, with CM Learn/Labs along side, assuming your student is attentive and motivated, all your classes will be great.
Which brings me to CertMaster Practice - I really don't think, are generally certification grade. They are heavy Knowledge and Understanding based with a couple reaching into Application. CASP admittedly is for the candidate who has been doing security work for a few years and even soft-prereq's CySA+, Linux+, and PenTest+ before going in. So, yes, drill the questions from CM Practice to get the fundamental concepts down, but again, a candidate is really going to need to practice doing stuff. Reading code snippets, running vulnerability scans with Nessus or Greenbone, doing some pen testing, fiddling with Aircrack-ng, actually doing a key stretch - stuff like this. I would love to see more realistic PBQs and VM Sim questions in CertMaster Practice. This is where I think things like Cyber Skyline or HackTheBox are really good at augmenting knowledge - by really doing stuff.
As we know, students, and even some of us, don't go into certifications like we've been doing it for 20 years. Usually, we're stretching upward to get the bigger cert, which is why we all have to study and work at it. So the expectation here is that we want the materials that we use to provide that coverage. This is also what makes braindumps so alluring, because they just tell a candidate what's on the test, rather than actually learning and/or testing out of knowledge acquired in the field.
Well, I'm gonna wind this post up and say congrats to all of you that wound up the year finishing a cert, whether it be CASP+ or something else. Onto 2023 for me and I hope you too!
Rick
