Getting to Know Alibaba Cloud's Professional Certification Framework

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Lately, we've gotten some questions on the newly refreshed (well, ongoing refresh) Professional Certifications and we thought that we'd give some insights on what's changed, and what you can expect from Alibaba Cloud Academy moving forward.

What are Alibaba Cloud Professional Certifications?

Alibaba Cloud Professional Certifications are role-based certifications that assesses proficiency in performing a specific job role using Alibaba Cloud technology. The professional certification series is divided into four levels:

● Alibaba Cloud Certified Practitioner (ACF)

● Alibaba Cloud Certified Associate (ACA)

● Alibaba Cloud Certified Professional (ACP)

● Alibaba Cloud Certified Expert (ACE)

Each level demonstrates a certain degree of proficiency with Alibaba Cloud services, as well as knowledge and mastery of the technological concepts that underpin those services. By taking these certifications, learners can validate and demonstrate their technical expertise in cloud concepts and Alibaba Cloud technology, from the basics such as virtualization to provisioning, operating, and managing distributed application systems on Alibaba Cloud.

Refreshed Professional Certifications

Technology is always changing and evolving in unexpected ways, and preparing our learners to take on new challenges in cloud and generative AI technology is a job that Alibaba Cloud Academy takes very seriously. Refreshing our certification offerings gives us a chance to review, renew, and make changes to ensure that our learning resources and certifications are up-to-date with the latest technologies, and suit the career market - as many of our certification takers go on to take up roles in companies that have strong requirements in cloud computing skills.

Introducing Job Roles & Key Skills

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As the training and certification arm of Alibaba Cloud, we often get queries from our learners, customers, and partners. One common theme appears in the questions we receive - "What makes a jobRole ?", and "What skills do I need to master as a jobRole ?"

That's why the new professional certifications are designed around two key elements: job roles and key skills. These elements provide a guide for individuals and organizations to build competencies and nurture talent around cloud and AI technologies, as well as help them identify any potential competencies they may be lacking for a particular job role or position.

More General & Vendor-agnostic Content

Cloud computing and generative AI is here to stay, and that's a fact. You may have noticed that your employer or company is ditching traditional in-house and on-prem servers in favor of the cloud. To some, it's exciting; to others, maybe a little scary. We've received a lot of feedback from learners who trust us, and we're ready to act on it. A career in cloud computing or generative AI can take many forms, meaning that although you're certified with Alibaba Cloud, your employer or company may choose to use different cloud services. That's why we've decided to make our content more cloud-agnostic and vendor-agnostic.

So what does this mean for you? It means that you'll not only be exposed to Alibaba Cloud technology (or any vendor-specific technology), but we'll also be covering more general concepts and technologies behind these cloud computing services. That means by learning and getting certified with Alibaba Cloud, you'll be fine even if your company or employer chooses a different cloud service provider. As an added bonus, the addition of general-level and vendor-agnostic content means that the learning curve becomes a little smoother for those who do not have prior knowledge and experience in cloud computing. All-in-all, the new professional certification series from Alibaba Cloud is more accessible for beginners, more applicable to real-world scenarios, and gives back to our loyal learners - no matter which cloud they choose to use.

Mapping Between New and Old Certifications

The ongoing refresh of our Professional Certifications also sees some changes to the naming of our certifications. To help our learners quickly map between the new and old certifications, we've prepared the following table:

Old Certification	New Certification	Certification Codes
ACA Business User	Business User (Practitioner)	BUF-C01
ACA Generative AI Engineer	Generative AI Engineer (Associate)	GAA-C01
ACA Cloud Computing	Cloud Engineer (Associate)	CEA-C01
ACP Cloud Computing	Cloud Architect (Professional)	CAP-C01
ACE Cloud Computing	Solutions Architect (Expert)	SAE-C01
ACA System Operator	SysOps Administrator (Associate)	SOA-C01
ACA Cloud Security	Cloud Security Engineer (Associate)	CSA-C01
ACP Cloud Security	Content is being refreshed, we will keep you updated
ACA Developer
ACP DevOps
ACP Networking
ACA Big Data
ACP Big Data
ACE Big Data
ACA Cloud Native
ACP Container Service
ACA Database

Certification Code Naming Conventions

Under the new framework, professional certifications and their related courses no longer make use of the ACT8X00X convention. Instead, the new convention will adhere to the following rules:
image_1_

Where job roles are shortened to a 2-word abbreviation (e.g. Cloud Engineer = CE), certification levels are denoted by a single letter, and content version.

Certification levels:

● Practitioner: F
● Associate: A
● Professional: P
● Expert: E

What to Expect in the New Certifications (and Courses)

Learners can expect to see an improvement in quality of the training content, with more interactive and fun animations that help visualize complex cloud computing concepts into easy-to-understand graphics.

SampleACA

The refreshed courses will also feature more general-purpose content to help learners understand the ideas behind Alibaba Cloud services and what kind of challenges they solve. Furthermore, refreshed courses and certifications are getting a big upgrade in terms of scope and clarity, matching the requirements and expectations of the roles defined by their namesakes'.

More information comparing course contents and scopes will be released in the future.

In terms of certification exams, we've made a big change in terms of standardization, making them consistent across certification levels. We've also made the decision to increase the complexity and toughness of the exams to provide a better gauge on the proficiency of our learners, as well as to test on knowledge and experience that are more relevant to the responsibilities of the job role. This means that questions will be more scenario-based, and focus on how individuals in certain job roles solve day-to-day challenges in their domain. The following table provides a quick look into the upgraded format of the exams:

Certification level	Item	Old version	New version
Practitioner	Duration	90 mins	90 mins
	Passing grade	70 (out of 100 points)	70 (out of 100 points)
	Number of questions	50	50
	Multiple choice questions	✅	✅
	Multiple response questions	✅	✅
	True/false questions	❌	❌
Associate	Duration	90 mins	90 mins
	Passing grade	60/65 (out of 100 points)	70 (out of 100 points)
	Number of questions	50/60	50
	Multiple choice questions	✅	✅
	Multiple response questions	✅	✅
	True/false questions	✅	✅
Professional	Duration	90/120 mins	90 mins
	Passing grade	65 (out of 100 points)	70 (out of 100 points)
	Number of questions	60/70/80/100	50
	Multiple choice questions	✅	✅
	Multiple response questions	✅	✅
	True/false questions	✅	❌
Expert	Duration	150 mins	120 mins
	Passing grade	90 (out of 150 points)/65 (out of 100 points)	80 (out of 100 points)
	Number of questions	50/75	100
	Multiple choice questions	✅	✅
	Multiple response questions	✅	✅
	True/false questions	✅	❌

Certifications That Are Still Being Refreshed

As we've discussed in our previous blog post (Course and Certification Updates from Alibaba Cloud Academy in December 2024), virtually all old versions of the professional certifications are being retired. As the refresh aims to update content to fit with job roles and deliver more industry relevant content and certifications, it will affect individual certifications differently:

● Some retired certifications may be refreshed and have a one-to-one replacement

● Some retired certifications may be combined to better fit with job roles in today's cloud computing industry

● Some retired certifications may not have any replacements

However, if you have an existing certification, your certification will continue to be valid until the specified expiration date. Alternatively, if your goal is to gain an understanding in a certain Alibaba Cloud service, you are welcome to take our Capability and Competency Certifications.

Final Words and Future Outlook

We hope that this post answers your questions on the refreshed Alibaba Cloud Academy certifications, and we look forward to hearing your feedback.

Do remember to like, subscribe, and leave a comment below!

Community

Getting to Know Alibaba Cloud's Professional Certification Framework

What are Alibaba Cloud Professional Certifications?

Refreshed Professional Certifications

Introducing Job Roles & Key Skills

More General & Vendor-agnostic Content

Mapping Between New and Old Certifications

Certification Code Naming Conventions

What to Expect in the New Certifications (and Courses)

Certifications That Are Still Being Refreshed

Final Words and Future Outlook

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