Creo Certification Courses

[razmosis]

Has anyone taken the Creo Certification courses, and if so, was it worth it?  Do you maintain your certification once you've earned it?

I primarily work with "complete machining" extension.  I've been using Creo since 2012, currently on Creo 10.  I did a lot more modeling back when I started, but now we receive models from the engineering group and I use them to program the manufacturing.

I did go about reaching out to Sales about the associated costs.  My fear is that the courses are sort of entry level and will be a waste of my time.  It appears that it may be an opportunity to see some of the work with the High Speed Milling extensions without having to purchase those licenses.

Anyhow, I'd appreciate any input on how other's experiences have been with these certification courses.

Thank you,

Matt

[KenFarley]

I would think that your suspicions about things being entry level or at least very simple are justified. If you've been using Creo for such a long time and generating NC code you won't be needing the simplistic "how to set up a work center" instructions, etc. Some would argue that you might get some insight into other aspects of the program, but does that justify the expense of the time and the not insignificant money? My approach to such training classes has been to use them for new people, to get them started in using the program and understanding the interface, etc. Even then I see people taught methods that I consider "questionable" - seem to be biased towards placating users of other more "popular" CAD systems. Not enough "rigor" in sketch definition (i.e. leaving dimensions weak), which leads to instability when inevitable design changes are made.

Certification seems more like a thing for people who are going to be changing jobs or new to the work and want to have something they can point to to reassure potential employers. Perhaps thats my cynical view on it, but there you go. I'd much rather know someone has been using the program for a while than to see a certification, but I guess it's better than nothing.

Now, if you were going to be undertaking a new aspect of the Creo world, like stress or flow analysis, wire harnesses, electronics, etc. then I could see the benefit of maybe taking a class or two. Hopefully this would give a good starting point for dealing with entirely new requirements and program user interfaces.

[razmosis]

Ken,

Perhaps cynical, but that's probably the reality.  A few years back my employer purchased a license to the elearning library.  The modeling and the milling portions were very elementary.  So based on that experience, it was quite disappointing.  The certification courses might be a level higher than that, but its pretty hard to beat experience.

I did ask for a quote and its like $1300.  They provide virtual machines to take the courses on, so you can work with extensions that you may not already have.  (that's my understanding)  That does seem intriguing to me because we run "Complete Machining" and they've tried to sell us on the High Speed Milling extensions but don't seem to be able to come around to actually proving it could be better for us.  They have more of the Buy it and Try it theory rather than Try it and Buy it.

We are quite slow right now.  This may be a good opportunity, but it would be a hard "sell" for me to management.  I am as good as they need me to be at what I do and there is little benefit to them.  I mentioned in the initial thread that I used to do a lot more modeling.  Aside from a few tweaks here and there to make Die Engineering's models more manufacturable, I do NC programming and checking that programming with Vericut all day, every day.  Right or wrong I feel like that does put me at a disadvantage outside of here because almost nobody outside these walls (or this forum) are using Creo to program.

I will keep picking customer support's brain to see what exactly I would stand to learn in the courses.  When things pick up, I really don't have time to make use of it.

Thank you for your thoughts!

Matt