The educational system has barely thought of all kinds of training programs to complement formal university or technical education. Today, we are seeing the proliferation of certificate level training courses for short term IT certificate level courses, nursing, paralegal, management, environmental, technical and vocational training, and many others. It is expected that the apprentices, after completing these courses, have learned enough useful things to look for a job, improve performance in their current job or establish some type of business of their own. Like colleges of higher education, which place great emphasis on formal academic training, these institutions also use scorecards to ensure that students get what they signed up for. The former would call their scorecards diploma scorecards, while the latter would call theirs certificate scorecards.
There are many levels of certificate level courses. There are those that are intended to provide basic knowledge and skills and there are those that are relatively advanced, such as advanced courses for lawyers or IT consultants. For people who are taking short-term certificate level courses for whatever purpose, it is best to make sure that the training center or course has some sort of government approval or accreditation. Skill centers are usually accredited by government agencies, and a certificate attesting to that accreditation can be a passport to a job or a better job offer.
When it comes to management processes, there are not many differences between the scorecards of formal schools and informal training schools that give certificates instead of diplomas. Both will have goals, objectives and plans, and execution strategies. There will be specific dashboards for HR, finance, teaching, administration, etc.
The main difference between the two will be in the curriculum. Universities and colleges will be more comprehensive, more varied to ensure that what one develops is not limited to just specific skills, like keeping accounting books or programming, but learning other things that will be useful in the general conduct of one’s life. once they are out of school. The curriculum of training centers that award certificates focuses on specific skills or basic knowledge that will be immediately useful. You won’t need psychology to program a computer, so such things are considered unnecessary.
Curriculum adequacy can be determined by conducting a training needs analysis that compares the general skills and knowledge levels of the workforce with business or industry requirements. This could be quite a complex task, but it will ensure that there will always be takers for the courses on offer. Training needs analysis is, in fact, what drives the growing number of short courses.
Next to the curriculum scorecard are the teaching and facilities scorecards. The first thing to ask yourself is whether the teaching staff have the right qualifications for the job and whether the equipment and facilities available are sufficient to promote a good learning environment. Remember that these are short courses and all possible learning aids should be on hand. It is normal for training centers to offer both theoretical and practical training. Usually, theoretical lessons come first and are then reinforced with practical lessons to complete the learning process.
Anyone wanting to take advantage of certificate-level short courses will do well to make sure of a few things: the curriculum, the qualifications of the training staff, and the approach to learning and the learning aids used, such as facilities and equipment. Training institutions have balanced each of these that make up what can be called a certificate scorecard.