certificates are meaningless..
portfolio of experience is everything.
take for instance Andreas Antonopoulos's fame. that did not rise due to certification. that rose due to a portfolio of good open dialog presentations and speaches
a few years ago when i was involved with looking for experienced people for projects, their certificated resume/CV was not what i looked for. i looked for thier portfolio of actual knowledge
anyone can pass an exam by cramming in research 48 hours before an exam and then forget that knowledge straight after the exam. but actually demonstrating
them using real retained knowledge to actually do something with it, means more
its far better to spend a couple months making youtube videos that can show off your knowledge to the world. rather then hide in a classwork/basement and hope a glossy certificate does the job