[liz]the access potential for online learning is one of the most exciting things about e-learning.people who would not normally have access to these educational and training opportunitiescan when the learning environments are online. [matt]so we try to walk the line about balancing the content between the educational worldand the corporate world since we have people in our program who are working in both environmentsand pursuing career advancements in both areas. [liz]in the academic world, that means broad access to people who are working full time, havefamilies and other responsibilities, can’t go the path of the traditional student. itcan mean geographically diverse access.
[matt]in the corporate context, it usually manifests as producing learning materials for stafftraining and internal training, and often e-learning is turned to because it's a morescalable resource and a lower-cost resource than in-person training. [liz]the first course, which is the one that i teach, it’s designing e-learning environments.so students learn how to use multi-media effectively, how to include elements that engage the learnerand keep them interested. [matt]the course that i teach, the managing and developing, is more about the practical hands-onapplication of developing that content with
authoring tools, working with subject matterexperts, managing projects and tasks, developing story boards and executing prototypes andeventually a final product, whatever that product is. [liz]and then, in the third course, it focuses on evaluation or assessment – how do youtell if your e-learning is working, what metrics do you use to evaluate your roi. and thenwe also have a very exciting practicum course, which is the last course in the series. andthat’s when students work on a project of their own choosing and leverage all that they’velearned throughout the previous three courses to create a module, or part of a larger sequence,that’s relevant to them personally.
[liz]the designing and developing e-learning certificate program is entirely online and asynchronous.students can access it anytime, anyplace. [matt]this course is great for working professionals in that most of the readings and the exercisescan be done on their own pace within, usually, a general week time frame for the assignments. we have great instructors in this program,and we have a lot of guest speakers who are part of our advisory board and they span allof the top businesses in the puget sound area, from becu to boeing to amazon to f-5 networks,and it’s really the best and the brightest talent in this industry in the region thatparticipate in this program.
[matt]some students go on to get instructional designer or training delivery roles or e-learning developerroles within big, large corporate corporations like amazon and microsoft. i've also seenstudents advance in their personal career, whether that's in an educational environmentor a university environment. [liz]i would say having a credential from a well-respected institution, like the university of washington,really increases your chances of being hired out of school. there are other programs, butvery few of them focus this intensely on what's really necessary in the field.
