Oakton Community College now offers a new course of great importance to students who are pursuing any type of business related curriculum, CAB138 (Excel Application Specialist Certification Preparation).

CAB138 will be given each Spring and Fall semester beginning with the Fall 2009 semester. CAB138 has a prerequisite of CAB135.

CAB138 is designed to prepare you to take the Microsoft Office certification exam for Excel 2007 (Also known as the MCAS Excel 2007 exam).

This exam is critically important for any student wanting to pursue a business related career. Since Microsoft Office is used universally throughout the world by over 96% of all companies, achieving expert knowledge in Excel gives you a definite advantage in the competitive job market of today. Plus, once you have started in a business related job, your expert knowledge will enable you to stand out from your coworkers as an expert in the use of Microsoft Excel. In fact, it has been documented that workers who are skilled in Microsoft Office, and especially in Word and Excel, earn an average of 12% more than their coworkers who are not as skilled in Microsoft Office.

For additional information about the advantages of being certified, click on the Microsoft link below. For additional information about the two courses specifically, contact Doris Gronseth, the CAB department chair, at 847-376-7055, or myself, Floyd Aylin, at faylin@oakton.edu, or call the Division 2 office at Oakton and leave a message for me so I can call you back.

http://www.microsoft.com/learning/en/us/certification/cert-default.aspx