I’m just 40, disabled, and work from home part time as web developer. I love my job and been given more complex projects, which I enjoy doing. I’m also taking a continuing education course in VB.NET. My boss is enthusiastic in my decision to increase my skills. In addition, I’m doing tutorials at W3Schoos.com.
While it’s all and good for my employment, I’m wondering what the overall merit is for continuing education in the workplace? I’m just curious as to what people would think of a 40-yr. old disabled person who has recently obtained, say, a “Letter of Completion” for each course in a series of courses (VB.NET, C++, C#, PHP/MySQL, Perl, and PhotoShop – these are the ones I hope to take) and “Certifications” from W3Schools in ASP/ADO and HTML/CSS? Do these really matter much?
It seems from my employer’s view, it’s what I can DO that matters, rather than what papers I have. Is this the general consensus? If so, I’d like to know so maybe I can follow free online tutorials and get skilled and not pay a lot of money. The continuing education courses do take a bite out of my limited income. Anything to save some money yet increase my skills would be nice.
