So, I did a thing. I earned my first Microsoft certificate: Azure AI Engineer Associate! 🎉

Here is my story from training to passing the exam.

The Learning Journey

The journey began with a four-and-a-half-day company-provided AI-102 training session.

It was a mix of online classes and labs. I was actually on vacation during this period, so I only managed to focus for about three days, probably.

The labs provided during the training were very useful.

There were about 10 labs, each lab could be done up to 10 times, with each session lasting 1 to 3 hours.

So I didn’t need to pay Microsoft to get familiar with the Azure AI environment.

Roughly calculation, the training provides 100 to 200 hours of lab time available, but I only used about 20 hours before taking the exam.

After the training, I mainly sticked to Microsoft Learn: Designing and Implementing a Microsoft Azure AI Solution to fill gaps.

Trust me, that’s really helpful! The MS Learn modules helped me understand the concepts better.

Cramming and Building Knowledge

As the exam date got closer, I quickly skimmed John Savill’s Technical Training videos on YouTube for one time.

His videos helped me build a complete knowledge framework in my head. One time is enough for me.

Last but not least, please do read Areeb Pasha’s AI-102 notes on Notion!

Thanks to Areeb Pasha! It’s so useful.

These notes were like a concise version of MS Learn and made my studying very efficient.

I managed to cover all the important points quickly.

The Exam Day Experience

The exam day finally arrived: June 26, 2024!

My exam was scheduled at 8:15 AM, so I logged into OneVue 30 minutes early as advised.

It turned out to be a good idea because there were many things to do before starting the exam (in my case tho).

First, I had to tidy up my room…

Then, there was an ID check and a room scan. I had to use my webcam to show every corner of my desk, which was quite tricky.

Spoiler: all the photos were crooked.

Pro tip: No paper and pen are allowed. My proctor made me remove even the white sketch paper and pencil.

So, it was just my computer, and a bottle of water on the table.

Wait! Scheduling Challenges

Scheduling the exam was a challenge itself. Booking an in-person exam in near by exam center was nearly impossible within three weeks.

I’ve checked all exam center online, no luck!

I just checked again, you can feel it:

It has available slot until October!

So I switched to an online exam, but the earliest slots were at 5 AM, with only one slot per day.

After much searching, I found a slot 10 days later. I would be out of town for a couple of days, remember I was still on vacation?!

So the timeline is like, I joined 4 and half training, then schedule the exam, then went on vacation for several days, then spent three days of cramming after came back.

The Moment of Truth

When I started the exam, the first question was a massive use case. It was like getting hit with a wall of text.

I managed to get through it, and then there were some easy questions that helped me relax 😌.

Time management was a big issue. Because I used MS Learn too much to double check my answers and search answers…

Did I mention that you can use MS Learn during exam? Yes! But it’s not that helpful, MS Learn is not ChatGPT, you will get overwhelmed.

So it’s helpful to check facts if you know where to find the required information of the problem.

I was in a panic with 6 minutes left and 4 questions to go.

I quickly selected answers for those questinos.

With a mix of excitement and nerves, I hit that “submit” button like it was the launch of a rocket.

The Sweet Victory

Drumroll, please… 768! I passed!

It was a close call, but I did it. The journey was a mix of hard work, a lot of stress, and a bit of fun.

I’m glad I did it.

So there you have it—a glimpse into my adventure of becoming a Microsoft Certified: Azure AI Engineer Associate.

Looking back, I started my AI learning journey since last year’s hackathon event in my company. I built a RAG chatbot and integrated it into company’s product portal and garnered huge attraction from leadership team. Then I deep dived into LLM/Agent/RAG technologies and keep advancing my hackathon project! Then I worked hard for around 30 hours and passed Andrew Ng’s Supervised Machine Learning.

I am eager to apply my newly acquired skills and knowledge to further innovate and contribute to the field of AI and cloud services.

If you’re on a similar path, keep learning, stay focused, and you will be there as well.

Good luck!

#MicrosoftCertified #AzureAI #ExamJourney #TechLife #NeverStopLearning