CDI is the academic equivalent of putting lipstick on a pig. If you’re smarter than me and decided to read reviews before enrolling, let me tell you why you shouldn’t.
I enrolled in the Network Systems Administrator course in the summer of 2015 (1-year program) at the CDI South location (Midnapore). I interviewed a couple different schools. This one was the most convenient location for me. The admissions “recruiter†at the time, a guy named Floyd, was on me like a used car salesman the moment I showed them interest. He made a huge hype about how high their success rates and hire rates and certifications perks were. He literally promised the world and said that their staff was there to support and guide us - especially since it was a smaller school community and a lot of students with no post-secondary experience.
So where do I start. It’s going to have to be a bullet list so you’re not here reading all day. Brace yourself!
• The tablet that comes with the course (and is how you access your text books) took almost a month to get. I had to keep reminding them that I paid for it and desperately needed it for my studies
• That admissions “recruiter†was fired a month into my course for stealing the $100 cash deposits paid by students – mine included – and the school tried to sweep it under the rug by adding that $100 back to my bill!
• I was told there would be hands-on training with actual networking equipment, instead it was all lab simulators that I could have just done from home. I never once saw or touched a switch or router!
• Our instructor had a heavy language barrier, then he quit half way through the year only to be replaced by someone with an even heavier language barrier!
• At the start of the course there was enough workstations for all the students. By the end people were bringing their own laptops and working from the back of the class because they oversold their spaces in the class
• We were promised “vouchers†to take the certification exams of the courses we studied (Microsoft, Cisco and CompTia). When the course was finished, we were told they no longer gave vouchers for the Microsoft exams and that they stopped doing that “years agoâ€
• Getting the remaining vouchers was like pulling teeth! It took me 6 months after completing the course for someone to finally figure out how to even get the vouchers, let alone get them to me
• If I hadn’t called in a favor from a family friend, I would never have gotten into a practicum and passed, and I would have student loans demanding their money back
• The testing centre for the exams is the CDI North location and they literally stick you in a broom closet at the reception area with a broken chair and an old crappy computer. It’s noisy, filthy and incredibly hard to focus
• We were JUST informed of our grad ceremonies: this June, more than a year after completing.
• I have one exam left that I had booked for tomorrow. I’ve been preparing for it for months. I booked the time off work and made arrangements. I just got an email from Pearson Vue (the company that handles the exams for them) that they were cancelling me for tomorrow. When I called the north CDI to ask why, all the girls could say was “uuuuuh… like, I don’t know. Like I think we just found out and like, are gonna take the day off or something. Like…†I could go on with experiences but I’ll wrap it up.
Don’t waste your time or money. This was a huge investment not only for myself, but for my wife and kids as well. These experiences have caused so much stress and strife in our lives! The organization as a whole is unprofessional, cheap and only interested in getting your money! Most of the staff is not qualified to do their jobs and they will make promises they can’t keep (if they even work there long enough to have the opportunity to let you down). I’m incredibly disappointed, I communicated these levels of disappointment with them all throughout and never saw changes. Their entire focus and budget is spent on recruiting. Go to SAIT.
Shaune Matthews
Ryan Stock
One Cent
