Dentists, nurses, doctors, lawyers and accountants are just some of the long list of professionals that need to constantly refresh their skills in order to continue practicing their profession. When awarding CEUs, you carry the responsibility of offering quality training that can comprehensively prepare other professionals in the workplace.
In order to deliver Continuing Education Units online, your course must deliver training that is both informationally accurate and effective. In most cases, an accreditation organization such as IACET, will determine whether or not your program is capable of doing so. During the process, supervising bodies will examine various requirements within your course content and elearning site.
When applying for accreditation, it is important that your website meets certain functionality requirements in addition to delivering a quality educational program. Below is a list of some must-have feature for your Continuing Education elearning site
Verified Attendance
Continuing education programs differ from other online courses in one simple way; as opposed to an optional or recreational learning experience, students are required to complete continuing education programs in order to legally practice their profession. For this reason, it is important that you verify that students are actually attending lessons and completing coursework independently.
By adding features that help mark, log and verify students’ attendance, your CE program is more likely to be accredited by supervising bodies.
Effective Evaluation Methods
Accreditation bodies look closely at how you evaluate your students when determining whether your course can be accredited for CEUs. Continuing Education programs need to accurately assess students’ knowledge, as well as their ability to perform in the workplace/profession.
When selecting an LMS to host your continuing education courses, you should look for a strong set of assessment features. Some features that will help you evaluate your students progress include quizzes, assignments, essays and interactive activities.
Being able to use a variety of quiz questions types as well as including interactive activities such as drag and drop quizzes or image hotspots will help you diversify evaluations to better assess your students’ results.
At the same time, and particularly with online teaching modalities, it is important to implement anti-cheating measures. For example, setting time limits for quiz questions reduces the chances that students will consult their notes or their peers when completing an assessment.
Completion Certificates
Students looking to earn CEUs for completing your online training need to receive valid proof of course completion. That’s where course certificates come in.
Certificates not only act as evidence. They also provide important information that will help students validate an educational milestone to obtain Continuing Education Units or Credits. For this reason, certificates must contain all of the necessary and relevant information about a course.
This data can vary depending on the profession and credit accreditation requirements. This is why working with an LMS that allows you to customize certificates is highly beneficial.
Some information typically displayed in Continuing Education Course Certificates includes:
- Course, student or certificate ID/number
- Student’s personal information
- Date of course completion
- Certificate expiry date (if any)
Record Keeping and Reports
Like any university or institution that provides legally accredited education, you should keep organized records on students and their activities. This means being able to keep track of the dates when students enroll in a course, complete lessons, submit quizzes and assignments and earn certificates. Keeping track of assignment, essay, project and quiz grades is no less important.
If live training is a part of your course, tracking attendance to webinars and events is also a priority.
Privacy and Security
Ensuring privacy and data protection for your site’s users is key. If accreditation bodies determine that your site isn’t secure or puts students’ information at risk, they’ll most likely refuse to vouch for your program.
For this reason, you should focus on building an elearning site of a high overall quality and pay attention to features beyond your LMS such as security optimization.
Bottom Line
Gaining accreditation for your CEU program will require you to meet high educational standards. For this reason, LMS requirements for continuing education extend beyond the needs of regular elearning sites. When selecting an LMS, It is important to look out for specific features that will help you deliver the most professional learning experience possible.
If you need help selecting a learning management system for your continuing education website, our LMS consultants can help! Having worked with several CEU providers, we are well equipped to help you succeed.
