David S. Read

During the past several months I’ve had an interesting experience working with Brainbench.  As you may know, Brainbench (a part of Previsor) offers assessment tests and certifications across a wide range of subjects.  They cover many technical and non-technical areas.  I have taken Brainbench exams myself and I have seen them used as a component within a hiring process.  However, I did not understand how these exams were created.

That mystery ended for me late last year when I received an email looking for technologists to assist in validating a new exam that Brainbench was creating to cover Spring version 2.5.  Being curious about the test creation process I applied for the advertised validator role.  I was pleasantly surprised when they contacted me with an offer for the role of test author instead.

I will not delve into Brainbench’s specific exam creation approach since I assume it is proprietary and want to be sure I respect their intellectual property.  What I found was a very well-planned and thorough process.  Having a background in education and a strong interest in teaching and mentoring, I know the challenge of creating a meaningful assessment.  In the case of their approach, they focus on an accurate and well-considered exam.

I believe that I am quite knowledgeable regarding Spring.  I have used many of its features for work and personal projects.  The philosophies supported by the product (encouraged, not prescribed) address many areas of coding that help reduce clutter, decouple implementations, and simplify testing.  As a true fan of Spring’s feature set, I found it challenging to decide which aspects were most important when assessing an individual’s knowledge of the overall framework. (more…)