Certifications Overview

Certifications help ensure organizations are able to meet and document various internal and external compliance standards and are a way of organizing curriculum or learning pathways for learners.

For example, a government agency may require all or certain groups of employees to document that they have taken and passed a specific course or series of courses within a valid timeframe (again, for example, let’s say that all Physicians and Nurses working at a hospital must take specific Ebola training every year). The Certification feature would enable the LMS administrators and managers to assign certification to a specific course (or group of courses) and track those users who have successfully completed those courses. It can then make this information available to managers or regulators. If desired (or required), it can even allow the users to print certifications that they can use for their own, internal organization or external organizational (e.g. Continuing education credits required by the American Medical Association - AMA) needs.

Certificates vs. Certifications

Certificates are pieces of paper in a predefined format that serves as proof that a user has completed a specific course or group of courses. If enabled, users who have completed a course with an associated certificate can physically print this certificate.

Certifications are proof that internally or externally designated training has been completed. This can be for a single course or a group of courses, for online and offline courses, and for mandatory courses, elective courses or a combination of courses. For example, OSHA may have a predefined “Bio-Hazard Aware” certification which is issued if students enroll in and successfully complete three required, specific online courses. A local hospital, on the other hand, may have an internal “Bio-Hazard Expert” certification which is based on both completing the OSHA “Bio-Hazard Aware” certification and taking and passing a hospital specific classroom-based course.

Note, the Learnsoft LMS system enables certification to be associated with multiple courses (see prior paragraph) and to allow a single course to be associated with multiple certifications (for example, a single “Ebola Training” course can be associated with “Contagious Disease Certification” for Physicians and “RN Annual certification” for Registered Nurses (and more).

The Certification Process

There are two basic steps to the Certification Creation Process:

1. Create a Certification
2. Add a Course (or group of courses) to comprise the certification.

Users / Managers also need to be trained in how to enroll in courses that are part of a certification and how to Print Certificates.

Create a Certification

Each specific Certification is created using the Advanced View > Learning Object Drop Down menu (and selecting “Certifications”). Each Certification will require a name, duration and a location in the catalog tree. Optional attributes can store descriptions, required credits to obtain certification, expiration and reminder and associated paper certificate information. Associate Learning Objects with the Certification.

Note, if desired Certifications have previously been created, this step can be skipped.

Enrolling in courses that are part of a certification

This guide will assume that users are aware of how to manually enroll in courses and managers are aware of how to assign courses. When enrolling in a certification there is unique certification object icon. Upon clicking it, the user will be given a list of all the courses associated with the certification and has the ability to enroll in any or all the courses. In order to enroll in a certification, all required courses must be selected. If required courses are not available, the enrollment button will not be operational. 

Printing Certificates

Upon completion of the certification, if a paper certificate has associated the user can use the click on the Print Certificate Icon in the Transcripts section to print their certificate associated with the particular certification earned.