Basic about Continuing
Education
Continuing education
is a great idea for people who need a degree. Continuing education
may refer to one of two types of
education.
The first is completed after
secondary
education and is not usually designed for a particular
degree or certification. Another type of continuing education is
education required in a licensed
profession
in order for the professional to maintain the license.
Continuing education
can be delivered in traditional types of classroom lectures and
laboratories. However, much continuing education makes heavy use of
distance learning, which not only includes independent study, but
which can include
videotaped/CD-ROM
material,
broadcast
programming, and online/Internet
delivery. In addition to independent study, the use of
conference-type group study, which can include study networks as
well as different types of seminars/workshops, can be used to
facilitate learning. A combination of traditional, distance, and
conference-type study, or two of these three types, may be used for
a particular continuing education course.
In the
United States,
continuing education usually involves enrollment in college
credit-granting courses, often by students enrolled part-time, and
often offered through a division or school of continuing education
of a college/university known sometimes as the university extension
or extension school. Also frequently in the US, it can mean
enrollment in non-credit-granting courses, often taken for personal,
non-vocational enrichment. Moreover, in the US, several such
non-credit courses are offered by
community
colleges.
In
1904
the
University of
Wisconsin was the first academic institution in the US to
offer what today would be considered an identifiable continuing
education program. In
1969,
Empire State
College, a unit of the
State
University of New York, was the first institution in the
US to exclusively focus on providing
higher
education to adults.
Licensing
bodies in a number of fields have begun imposing continuing
education requirements on people who hold licenses to practice a
particular profession. The requirements are intended to encourage
professionals to maintain their training and stay up-to-date on new
developments. Depending on the field, some of these courses may be
offered by regular colleges, but they are often provided by
organizations that cater to a specific profession. Conferences and
seminars may also be designed to satisfy professional continuing
education requirements.
Additional education credits are sometimes mandatory when renewing government-controlled certifications like a teaching certificate. Although some groups do not make the ongoing educational process mandatory, almost all provide an opportunity to obtain the educational credits through sponsored classes, seminars, and online "CBT" or computer based training.
Just a small investment in additional training can go a long way to keeping skills fresh and increasing the competence level of any professional. In order to stay professional and remain in good standing wit many of the recognized professional organizations ongoing continuing education is critical for a career.
Certified public accountants need to keep up with the latest laws and be up to date with many of the somewhat esoteric accounting principles. Teachers and nursing are two other fields that also require continuing education to remain active in the profession. In addition, quality engineers and managers focus on competence and techniques that allow for the lowest cost products to be developed. They also understand the trade-offs between cost and quality.
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