I'm an IT professional with many years of experience. There's no single certificate that is the "best". The IT field, even just systems and networking, is incredibly broad. The trends appear to be toward cloud/virtualized architectures with an emphasis on supporting rapid development and security, so I'd keep that in mind if you go ahead with this. I did the "traditional" route of starting with desktop support/desktop OS migrations, moved on to file/print servers, moved on to web/application servers, and on to architecting highly-available application hosting environments using dedicated front end load balancing and clustered databases. If I had to do it all over again today, I'd go into desktop support to pick up day gigs more quickly and get cash flow, while studying Linux admistration, and would probably get a Red Hat certification to improve chances of moving into that area. Honestly, if you know what you're doing, certs don't matter, I haven't bothered to have any certs for years, I don't need them. The best objectives for pursueing certificates are 1) learning and 2) having some cred to put on your resume in lieu of extended work experience. Number 1 is the most important, to start with, because you're useless if you don't learn first.
I think that pursuing certifications via community college courses is a viable approach. However, it is not likely to succeed much without you investing some personal time into self-study, outside of the course(s), before and after taking the course(s).
I'd also say that networking is probably more in demand than systems administration, but it's a little harder to get into as a noob. The advantage you have as a noob is that you'd be cheaper to hire, presumably.
Good luck!
EDIT: I'd recommend getting some basics first, if you can afford the certifications. A+ will teach you about basic computer hardware and operations (essential!), unless you're already confortable with the OSI network model and assembling working computers from parts. An A+ cert alone probably won't get you a job, you still need functional operational knowledge of OSes, so study Windows or Linux after an A+ cert, and study scripting (python, powershell, bash, etc.). If you discover that networking really gels for you and turns you on, go after networking (i.e. Cisco certs), if you love scripting then consider going into programming (although you'll probably still need an IT day job like desktop support to afford to study programming long enough to be hireable). In any case, having a functional understanding of computer hardware and OSes will make you better at any of the above.
EDIT2: If you're technically inclined, I strongly recommend studying Linux. Linux will outlast Windows imho. It will still help a lot to be comfortable with Windows technologies to one degree or another.