LearnKey Blog

Duval County Public Schools Photoshop CS6 Training

A couple of months ago, Scott Walker and I took a trip to Florida to help high school teachers in Duval County Public Schools to become ACA certified in Photoshop CC. Last week, we found ourselves back in Duval helping a group of forty-seven middle school teachers become ACA certified in Photoshop CS6. When we arrived at the school Tuesday morning, we were also asked to introduce them to the IC3 training. By the end of the week, all but seven teachers had passed the Photoshop ACA exam, with several also receiving their IC3 certifications.

Unlike the group we worked with in October, many of the teachers in our training last week had never used Photoshop before. In fact, most of them were not even CTE teachers! It was a new experience working with people who were unfamiliar with the software, and it gave me a greater appreciation for what these teachers must go through every year when they are given a new group of students.

We spent the first day walking the teachers through the Photoshop and IC3 training on OnlineExpert and showing them the student workbooks, then we asked them to go home that night and practice using Photoshop by doing some of the projects in the workbooks.

On Wednesday, LaQuanda Paschal, one of the teachers we worked with in October, gave a presentation to demonstrate some of the techniques she uses in class to help her students pass the Photoshop certification exam. Between studying Tuesday night and LaQuanda’s presentation, about half of the teachers felt ready to test on Wednesday afternoon and most of those passed that day!

Duval County Public Schools Photoshop CS6 and IC3 GS4 training workshop

Are you excited for the end of summer? You should be!

I know what you are thinking – “Why is this guy talking about the end of summer when summer has just begun?” Well, as promised in my last blog post I want to keep you up-to-date with some of the exciting happenings at LearnKey this summer. Here is a little sneak peek of some awesome OnlineExpert features to look forward to over the next couple of months.

Learning Management System (LMS) Tour

This free instructional course teaches educators and administrators how to easily access, use, and learn the functions of OnlineExpert. The LMS tour is broken into manageable sections, which allows users to easily find and watch material that is relevant to their needs.

This is one feature you don’t have to wait for – the LMS Tour was just recently released! Since it is free, current customers can easily have our representatives add it to their course libraries.

Projects

Teachers: We have listened to your requests – “More hands-on activities!” We are excited to announce that our Office 2007/2010, Adobe ACA, and IC³ courses will feature hands-on projects created by teachers who use our courses in their curriculum. These projects will help reinforce what students are learning by providing them with hands-on experience throughout the course.

Touchscreen support

In the past, our courses have made heavy use of Flash video and players, which certain mobile devices don’t support. Since these devices are becoming more and more popular in learning environments, OnlineExpert will allow students and teachers to use mobile devices as a learning tool with new touchscreen support beginning in August.

I am excited to be able to share these upcoming releases with everyone. After all, don’t we all need a good reason to actually look forward to the end of summer? Be sure to check back often for the down low on what’s going on at LearnKey.

I love getting comments, so here’s a question for you – What are your favorite summer traditions or vacation spots?

Sweet “Temporary” Home Alabama…

I recently had the opportunity to travel to Alabama with Justin, our newest member of the sales team, to attend an education conference and meet with teachers interested in eLearning and industry certifications. Here is a brief overview of our travels:

Wednesday

Beautiful weather in Bessemer, Alabama where we stayed. We spent some time in Tuscaloosa, meeting with a teacher working with students and passing the CompTIA exams like A+ and Network+. We showed him the teaser clip to our upcoming A+ 2012 release and he’s really looking forward to it.

We also had the pleasure of visiting The University of Alabama, which has a beautiful campus. We found a great place called The Mellow Mushroom, and had some of the best pizza I have ever eaten. We had a Cesar Salad pizza…yes I know salad on top of a pizza, and yes it was amazing!

Thursday

The first day of our education conference and 2 hour workshop for teachers went really well. The conference was hosted at the Mercedes factory located in Vance, Alabama. This location is the manufacturing facility where the M-Class, the R-Class, and the GL-Class are built. Our conference was located in the training center for the employees, the landscape is so beautiful and we had a chance walk through the visitors center and gift shop where I picked up a few souvenirs.

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Dallas Trip – Big Hats and Big Hearts

Dallas is one amazing place! I have fallen in love with Texas and had the pleasure of working with amazing people again this last week.

Monday – Airport Re-Route

I had an exciting start Monday night with only 30 minutes left until our arrival in Dallas-Ft. Worth; we received an announcement from the pilot that the airport had been closed due to bad weather! WHAT? Well we quickly stopped for gas in Wichita Falls and finally arrived in Ft. Worth around 12:40 AM, only to wait in line to allow all planes to drop off passengers all at the same time. I finally deplaned around 1:40 AM and then made a mad dash to the Rental Car center…

I have a picture of LEO the Lizard on the dash of my rental car at 2:05 AM in a line of about 15 cars trying to leave the airport rental check out.

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LearnKey – You’ve got Talent

It is absolutely amazing what a great team we have at LearnKey! Over the past three weeks I have had a blast traveling throughout Utah between Salt Lake City, Cedar City and St. George getting to know each and every team member.

The talent is unbelievable. Starting with our production studios in Salt Lake City, if you want to get a taste of what they do then be sure to check out our A+ Certification 2009 course; its one of the most popular in the industry.

After they shoot the video, then its up to the brilliant group of elearning video designers and technical writers in our Cedar City office, led by Wyett, that make it all come together. After my first visit the design team put together a list of ideas in how we can deliver a better video delivery experience for our customers – is that cool or what?  Wait till they get more familiar with our newest partner LearnCast and learn about the opportunities this great mobile platform will create for everyone in the company. Really going to be exciting.

Of course when talking about talent at LearnKey, there is no way I can close this message without giving major props to our St. George headquarters, especially for a flawless roll out of our OnlineExpert v6 release. It really is a reflection of good people working together for one cause, which is to provide the best user/customer experience we possibly can.

My number one priority is to ensure our leadership team fosters a culture focused on “employee first” values around Trust, Value and Ease. John, Lori and Dave are totally on board and holding me accountable to do that everyday. Who are they? More to come so stay tuned!

OnlineExpert Helps Teachers with Increased Accountability

I am glad to be back in the office after a whirlwind travel week and on location training. Only nine airports in five days, but I did manage to sneak over to the beach for five minutes for this picture:

This was an informative trip, and it gave me insight about what teachers need for their students in the 2011-2012 school year. They expressed concerns that they are more accountable than ever this year when it comes to getting their students industry certified. It was an added bonus in the past for their students to achieve industry certifications. Now these programs are being measured, and programs could be cut if a large percentage of students don’t pass these exams.

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LearnKey Launches OnlineExpert v6

Recently we launched the new version of our leaning management system, OnlineExpert v6. This new LMS features a totally redesigned and reworked interface, making several improvements to speed up and streamline managing your users.

Visit the OnlineExpert v6 info site for an interactive feature guide and more information about the new interface. You can read the full press release below:

LearnKey Launches Redesigned Learning Management System, OnlineExpert V6

St. George, UT- August 15, 2011- LearnKey, a global provider of self-paced training, proudly announces the release of OnlineExpert V6, their recently redesigned learning management system.

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The New and Improved OnlineExpert v6

OLEv6

LearnKey is proud to unveil our newly remodeled learning platform, OnlineExpert v6. We listened to all of the great feedback you gave us and after countless hours of hard work we have finished the remodel. The process began with the idea of making a few additions to OnlineExpert and then it morphed into a full remodel. Of course we kept the strong fundamentals characteristic of OnlineExpert, but added to it to make it even better. Hopefully you join us in our excitement!

It has always been a top poriority for us to create and maintain a learning platform that serves your needs and provides you with an enriched learning experience.

To accomplish this some great new features have been added:

  • One click to training functionality designed to simplify the navigation process
  • A new, user friendly dashboard
  • Expandable training view capability
  • A redesigned GUI

To tour the new features visit onlineexpert.com/v6 – a site built to showcase the new version and explain any questions you might have. You will also find contact information for LearnKey representatives in case your question is not answered in one of our resources.

To view the press release about the launch of OnlineExpert v6, click here