The Student Challenge has ended.
I’d like to thank every who participated in the MOOC and Online Course Student Challenge. As of today, the student challenge has officially ended.
I appreciate all of you who participated and shared your accomplishments. Thanks to you I was able to try several new online educational platforms including Lynda.com, edX, Coursera, Udemy, CBT Nuggets, Udacity, LinkedIn Learning and many others.
Though the challenge has ended, I have decided to maintain my list of educational activities (certifications, online courses and in-person courses) that I completed prior to the challenge, during the challenge and going forward. Take a look and share your thoughts.
Note: A few activities were removed because I either did not like the course/activity or it simply did not align with my overall brand.
Going forward.
Be sure to remember that while Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) can be valuable educational tools, often packed with high-quality content, employers may not consider them to be educational tools that are greater or equal in value to other educational efforts, like traditional degrees.
It is my opinion, as of the time of this post, that employers value educational activities in the following order (listed from the most valued activity to the least valued activity):
- Degrees from accredited colleges or universities.
- Industry certifications that are well-known and widely respected.
- Technology vendor certifications that are well-known and widely respected.
- Graduate certificates from accredited colleges or universities.
- Online courses from accredited colleges or universities.
- MOOCs offered in partnership with accredited colleges or universities
- MOOCs offered in partnership with well-known and widely respected technology vendors or industry entities.
- Everything else.
Before investing your time, money and effort into any educational activity be sure that the entity offering the activity is accredited, trusted, well-known and/or widely respected. If you are not sure whether the activity meets this criterion then please to talk to your employer, mentors, and experienced professionals before enrolling.
Now, go out in the world and be successful.
Feel free to continue sharing your educational successes and new learning platforms that you encounter with me – also reach out to ask a question or to just catch up.