Ugandan University student wins Cisco regional networking challenge
Mark Ojangole a Cisco student at the College of Computing and Information Sciences (CoCIS) Cisco Academy was the overall best in Sub-Saharan Africa in the recently concluded EMEA 2013 International CCNA NetRiders Skills Competition.
The NetRiders competition attracted over 130 students from all Cisco Academies in 57 countries across the globe that sat the same Cisco Theoretical and Practical examinations at the same time. “The overall standard of these examinations is higher than the international certifications and they thoroughly test the contestants’ CCNA knowledge and configurations performed in the shortest time possible (based on CCNA certification),” said Ms. Deborah Natujjuna, the acting head of CoCIS’ Center for Innovations and Professional Skills Development (CiPSD) under which the Cisco programs are offered.
An excited Mark who wins himself a one-week study trip to California – USA, the Cisco Head Quarters in January 2014 attributed his success to his instructors (Robert Tuhaise and Momanyi Wycliff) and the conducive learning environment at CoCIS.
“Participating in this competition has been an interesting and rewarding experience. I am grateful to the CoCIS Cisco Academy that provided with me excellent instructors, learning materials and equipment. They also ensured that we always had access to wireless Internet,” he said.
At the Cisco headquarters, Mark will interact with other winning students from Asia Pacific, Latin America, USA and Canada and who knows, he might be the Next Cisco Network Engineer at Cisco HQ.
“We are very proud of Mark, the proctors (Tuhaise and Wycliff) that fine-tuned him to the level of an international Cisco Associate. Mark represents Makerere University Cisco Academy, Uganda, East Africa and Africa at large,” added Ms. Natujjuna.
Every year, hundreds of thousands of Networking Academy students worldwide gain the skills needed to build, design, and maintain computer networks; improving their career prospects while filling the global demand for networking professionals. “We are proud to be an Academy delivering quality instruction to our students and the community. CoCIS Cisco Academy is now an Academy Support Center (ASC) and Instructor Training Center (ITC) for the Region. As an ASC/ITC, we play a supervisory role over other Cisco Academies, recruit new academies and carry out instructor training for all academies, technical and programs support, re-fresher training on-site support visits among others,” she added.
CoCIS Cisco Academy also offers the CCNA course to undergraduate students during their recess term for free.
