Re: Underscores the problem with vendor certifications
'..It is the same for IT Professionals. You need a degree and continuous professional development...'
Err, I was what you'd call an 'IT Professiona'l, I neither had a degree, nor engaged in any sort of CPD (and I'm assuming you're talking here about the scheiße sponsored/peddled by employers and certain professional bodies, not the get-up-off-your-fat-arse-and-learn-something-new stuff we all do ourself without looking for some sort of toady points from someone for).
I've done a number of things over the years, from microcontroller design, through component level repair of PCs, Sun workstations and the occasional old Minicomputer, design of analog/digital I/O cards for PCs and their associated device driver software, looked after large computer networks and their security, coded stuff still in daily use out there in many languages, etc. bloody etc. (And, for the record, that was just on the IT side, if you want to talk about machining/CNC and/or chemical labwork, I can go there as well..)
'..Anyone waving a vendor certification around has, by very definition, too narrow a view of the landscape to be called a professional.
One bit of paper is as worthless as another, from long and bitter experience from over two decades of IT related employment, a degree isn't a sure indicator of ability either as you seem to believe (especially if awarded by certain 'universities').
I have known people with degrees, doctorates and, dare I say it, memberships of the relevant august societies who I wouldn't trust to change the toner cartridge of a laser printer, let alone touch any software I've written or fiddle with any computer systems I've set up.
I could regale you with over two decades worth of anecdotes apropos degree laden 'ITiots' I have known and 'worked around', but I'm happily out of the game and am now employed doing something I wished I'd done at least a decade ago, so those IT days are past now, and in the past they must remain..
Judge/hire on ability, not paperwork.