New business certificates fill a need
Concordia's School of Extended Learning (SEL) is offering three new business-related complementary university credit (CUC) certificates this year.
The Business Practices, Marketing Practices and Human Resources Practices certificates were inaugurated in this year’s fall session. The 30-credit programs are offered on a part-time, evening basis, and are designed to reach out to an underserved – and possibly unserved – market.
Professor Robert Soroka acted as a consultant and developer for the program, and is one of its instructors. He says there is a rather neglected target population for these programs.
“These are people who are looking for an opportunity to get higher learning, but may feel business school is unavailable to them or may be intimidated by it, or may lack the prerequisites for the John Molson School of Business,” he says. In other cases, they may not be interested in a full program, and are looking for a particular course to either complement the knowledge they already have or obtain concrete information about a particular area of business education. One example might be a film production student who is interested in marketing those skills after graduation.
These certificates are principally aimed at more mature students — with or without business experience — and who are interested in applying practical skills rather than the theoretical concepts behind them.
“They’re not looking to do an MBA or even pursue a full-time graduate degree,” says Soroka. “They have a specific skill set they want to develop and a particular focus. They want skills to make them more promotable, to enhance their capabilities within their current job or to embark on an entrepreneurial venture.”
A total of 60 SEL students registered for the internal pilot launch of the certificate programs this fall prior to public registration, which will begin in January.
Soroka says he’s “excited” by the new certificates, and that they fill a gap in terms of what’s offered elsewhere.
Like other SEL programming, these certificates are part of Concordia’s continuing effort to provide innovation and excellence in education, and to increase accessibility to university studies. The CUC program is flexible, with no obligations to the number of classes taken at any one time, nor an expectation of the time it takes to complete the program. It also offers the opportunity for a more comprehensive overview of effective practices. Students who want to complete a certificate program will spend 300 hours in the classroom versus the 80 hours of the extended learning programs currently available.
Future plans include offering daytime, compressed and online versions of the CUC courses. Soroka says SEL will also look for corporate partnerships in order to provide training to company employees, adding, “We already have the infrastructure for that.”
There will be an information session on Tuesday, November 23, at 6:30 p.m. in 207/209 of the Faubourg Tower, 1250 Guy St.
Related links:
• SEL CUC certificates
• Robert Soroka