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What Students Need to Know About New Cisco CCNA Certification Exams

Last Updated 05 April 2013

On March 26, 2013, Cisco announced the redesign of the Cisco® associate-level certification programs, including

the Cisco CCENT® and CCNA

® certifications, to align with the evolution of the job market. The certification formerly

known as CCNA has evolved to a concentration and has been renamed CCNA Routing and Switching. The new

Cisco Networking Academy® CCNA Routing and Switching curriculum currently in development will be fully aligned

to the certification changes announced, with new and updated content including:

Comprehensive troubleshooting

IPv6, IOS 15.x, HSRP, and EtherChannel.

The latest Cisco routing and switching technology and software

In addition, CCENT certification now becomes a foundational certification and replaces CCNA as the prerequisite

for associate-level advanced technology certifications, including CCNA Security, CCNA Voice, CCNA Wireless,

and CCNA SP Operations. This is exciting news and especially important for NetAcad™ students preparing to

enter the job market, as these changes provide greater flexibility and options to help integrate working and learning

experiences as you pursue your education and future careers.

End-of-Life for Current CCNA Certification Exams

Along with the new certification changes, Cisco also announced that the current CCNA exams will end-of-life on

30 September 2013. In order for the current exams to apply towards the CCNA Routing and Switching

certification, you must take and pass the current exam(s) on or before 30 September 2013, as shown in Table 1.

Table 1. Current and New CCNA Certification Exams

Current Exam Current Exam End-of-Life Date New Exam

640-822 ICND1 30-SEP-2013 100-101 ICND1

640-816 ICND2 30-SEP-2013 200-101 ICND2

640-802 CCNA 30-SEP-2013 200-120 CCNA

In the past, the Networking Academy™ program has been able to negotiate an extension of certification exams for

NetAcad students. However, to conform to American National Standards Institute (ANSI) accreditation

requirements, which provide a global benchmark for personnel certification programs, Cisco must now set the

same certification end-of-life date for everyone, including Cisco Academies. You can find additional information on

the ANSI accreditation of Cisco certifications in the news release Cisco issued.

Transitioning to the New CCNA Certification Exams

We are committed to supporting you and your instructors to help you prepare for the new certification exams by

providing appropriate guidance. As our new CCNA Routing and Switching courses become available, we plan to

provide delta information with details on the extent of changes and supplemental content recommendations to help

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you fill in the knowledge gaps between CCNA Discovery or CCNA Exploration courses and the new certification

exams.

We are targeting phased releases of our new CCNA Routing and Switching courses starting in June 2013, with all

courses to be available by December 2013. We encourage you to learn more about the new certification exams

and why being equipped with the latest relevant skills featured in these exams will help to better prepare you for

your future employment and Mind Wide Open careers.