[Edu-sig] Question about certifying teachers

[kirby urner]

Hi Charles (fond memories from Google App Engine days... we met at a Pycon
in Chicago years ago)...

Issuing some proof of completion, in certificate form (an actual document
with their name on it, could be PDF) helps your enrollees put something on
their resume.  The other half of that equation is not a big name school or
company, though that might help, so much as a detailed course outline
and/or the actual course content, or both -- such that those following up
on this credential get a sense of what it means.

What did these students actually work through?  Were there projects?
Quizzes.  Describing the program helps too (including with recruiting new
enrollees).

When O'Reilly School of Technology closed its doors, I was clear that the
best way to support our alumni was to preserve a record of what we offered,
so those advertising completing our courses could point to something
objective, in terms of content covered.  OST listened and our content is
still online to this day.

Example pages:

http://archive.oreilly.com/oreillyschool/courses/programs.html
http://archive.oreilly.com/oreillyschool/courses/courses.html
http://archive.oreilly.com/oreillyschool/courses/Python1/index.html

We show our quizzes, but not our projects, not sure why at this point.

Students had to finish all the projects, which were assessed by their human
instructors.  We had no robo-grading whatsoever, not even for quizzes, as
we wanted them to know they had a real human on the other end.

Of course a lot of the code camp type websites don't provide actual
instructors to sign off on work, as you know.  They may have students
aseess each other (or not), ala Coursera, which, in combination with
deadlines, means not everyone who starts, manages to finish.

Attrition stats may or may not be relevant in your case.  If they got a
credential for just showing up (attendance), that's of course not as
impressive, so you do your students a favor by advertising the rigors of
your offerings.

Kirby
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