I have personally witnessed an ever increasing number of customers interested in using LearnCentrix as a tool for certification.  Basically, companies are wanting to provide a certain amount of online training for their proprietary products and services.  And the key piece of the certification program is to have students pass exams of 50-100 questions.  Thus, if students can pass the test, they are certified.

That seems pretty prudent.  It also seems to be a perfect fit for online training tools like LearnCentrix.  Of course the tool can provide randomization of the questions, different subsets of questions selected for each student, tracking of how each student responded, scores, averages, etc.  But one objection has been raised lately....cheating. 

What if a student gets a colleague to go online and take the exam for him or her?  How could we ever police that in an online training system?

Some of our clients administer thousands of such tests per month in LearnCentrix.  And many times they are requiring the testing to take place online while the student is physically in a computer lab or classroom with a proctor monitoring the student progress (and preventing cheating).  That makes sense.  But is it necessary?  How much of a problem is certification fraud?

And there is another form of cheating that someone mentioned to me recently - looking up the answers while taking the test.  An open-book test is sometimes very desireable.  But certification exams are usually not a good place for it.  Implementing a time limit on the exam is useful to only allow a fixed amount of time for the average question.  That is a good mechanism for keeping the student moving as quickly as possible through the test.  Is that enough?

One way that a client of ours has addressed that specific issue is to create a special certification login account for the student.  That way, while logged into the system to take the exam, the student does not have enrollment access to the training materials.  It seems to be working for them.  The downside is the extra administration overhead.  If a company has thousands of students to certify, then they probably will either to use the time limit or invest the energy into having proctors.

I believe it is beneficial for our e-Learning practitioners to address this growing aspect of online training.  Certifications seem to be increasing and playing a larger role in the specialization of the world workforce.  Companies like Microsoft have built an entire sub-industry within their customer bases for getting people certified as experts in their products.  Smaller companies are noticing the marketing benefits of the certification programs because of the loyalty and differentiation they enable in the marketplace.

So, what do we as e-Learning practitioners think about e-Learning for certification?  Any comments and best practices that you wish to share would be greatly appreciated.

Last week, there was an article that highlighted a new certification program delivered via e-Learning.  I'll share an excerpt from the press release:

"EdCetra Training, a provider of custom training solutions and Canadian Standards Association (CSA), a developer of standards and codes, were selected by the Construction Sector Council (CSC) to design and develop a construction management and supervisory e-learning course in the area of project management. This e-learning course is part of an industry recognized certification program. The course is intended to provide learners with the necessary skills and knowledge to successfully develop a business case; develop project scope; manage project procurement; manage the construction contract process; manage risk; manage change and execute project close-out.

The CSC’s primary objective is “the development of a highly-skilled workforce and a safe workplace environment that contributes to the organizational productivity and individual prosperity of the members of the construction industry.” As part of its mandate to improve the skills and performance of the construction industry’s resources, to vouch for quality construction, to promote a safe workplace environment and to increase productivity, the CSC has turned to e-learning to deliver an important vehicle for an industry-recognized certification program.

Using subject-matter expertise from the CSA and CSC, the Project Management elearning course will target three key job functions; superintendents, estimators and project managers. The total duration of the course is expected to be around eight(8) to ten(10) hours of seat time and will be delivered in English and French. The course will showcase a multimedia approach, incorporating audio and video when appropriate. In addition, the course is expected to demonstrate advanced instructional design approaches making the learning interactive and engaging for learners.

'Our intention is to raise the expectations of learners who are traditional brick and mortar students to really find the online environment to be as effective if not more for learning,' said Nancy Safar from edCetra Training. 'The CSC has shown a true commitment to providing the highest quality learning to their members and we are proud to work in partnership with the Canadian Standards Association and the CSC on this project.'”

This shows that there is demand for online certification.  However, their website mentions nothing of the actual certification exams.  Interesting...

For more information: http://www.edcetratraining.com