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Microsoft Virtual Academy.
Roll up your sleeves for the latest Microsoft Virtual Academy Know it. Prove it. challenge. Whether you’re a Developer, IT Pro, Data Scientist, or student, this is a great opportunity to learn valuable skills quickly through video tutorials, assessments, and more. Between November 15, 2016, and December 14, 2016, choose from Big Data, web development with the MEAN stack, or Internet of Things (IoT) challenges. We’ve streamlined the course lists, so each challenge should take less than 12 hours to complete.
Want to track your progress? After you sign up for a challenge, it’s integrated with your MVA dashboard so you can find out, at a glance, what you have already accomplished and which courses you have left. If you’ve completed a course before the challenge begins, that achievement is also reflected. Have questions or need help as you work through a challenge? The MVA community can help you find answers and can cheer you on through our social channels and forums!
To celebrate completed challenges, we’ve added digital badges—tangible ways to highlight your accomplishments and to prove that you have met the challenges. Badges are protected with metadata unique to you, and they are linked from your dashboard to evidence pages that itemize your completed courses. With badges, you can share your achievements with your business and social networks. Simply download the badge from a link in your “Congratulations” email, and then share that link via email or on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, or other social media. Save and store the badge wherever you keep your open digital badges, such as Badgr or Open Badges Backpack.
With the Big Data learning challenge, learn to make sense of ever-increasing volumes of data, and get the details on tools and platforms to share your insights. If you enjoy this challenge, be sure to take a look at the Microsoft Professional Program Data Science curriculum, which can help you prepare for a career in one of the hottest job tracks today.
Ready to dive into web development? With the Web Development learning challenge, skill up on powerful and efficient MEAN stack technologies (MongoDB, Express, Angular, and Node.js), end to end, and learn what you need to develop at scale on Azure with open source platforms. Find out what real-world developers are using to build for the cloud, as you add to your dev toolkit. If you want to learn more about why Azure is a great place for Node and our infrastructure as a service (IaaS) model and what it takes to run the MEAN stack on Azure VMs, check out this recent post on the Microsoft + Open Source blog.
How are companies using the Internet of Things (IoT) to improve efficiency? Costa Farms uses Microsoft IoT Suite to develop best practices for their new crops, increasing remote monitoring and preventive maintenance. And Tyre Express uses an IoT platform to enable fleet operators to track tire performance in real time. Take the IoT learning challenge, and explore techniques and tools used by companies today at industrial scale, both at a conceptual and practical level, to leverage the future and develop IoT apps.
We designed these Know it. Prove it. challenges to help you build and test your tech knowledge and to help you build the skills that employers are looking for. Accept the challenge, join the community, track your progress, earn badges, and share your success. Which challenge will you tackle first?
Sign up now!
