King County   

Details

In this course, an experienced grant writer will show you how to research and write winning proposals that get funded. You will become proficient in the proposal format used by the vast majority of public foundations. Learn what to do and what not to do on your cover sheet, narrative, background page, and your stakeholder and third-party evaluation plan. Discover the quickest and most efficient ways to gather the information you will need to develop your proposal's attachments, including information on your organization's structure, administration, and finances. Gain a full understanding of the criteria funders use to determine whether your grant proposal gets funded or rejected.

Before this course is over, you will have discovered a number of significant finishing touches that can give your project the edge over others. You will learn about the importance of obtaining community and political support before submitting a proposal to any government agency.

Enrollment Option

-Self-Guided

Self-Guided courses are designed for completely independent learning, without instructor moderation. Students interact in the class discussion area. Students have access to the course for 3 months. After enrolling, you will receive all lessons immediately and have three months access to complete the course content. Self-Guided courses do not have extensions.

-3 Months Access

-Start within 3 business days of registration.  You will receive an email from our Educational Partner, Ed2Go with log in details.

Syllabus

Lesson 1 - Types of Proposal Formats

In this lesson, you'll learn the different types of grant proposal formats for corporations, foundations, and state and federal government agencies. This lesson is important because you'll discover who reviews your proposals at each step, what format the proposal review staff expect to receive, and how and why decisions to fund or reject grant proposals are made.

Lesson 2 - Match Funders With Projects

This lesson will teach you how to carefully research the funding agencies so you can match your grant funding needs to their interests. You'll learn how to find and use Internet research sites to identify multiple funders for grant proposal projects. You'll also learn how to spot the funder/project matches that result in a 90 percent or higher funding success rate.

Lesson 3 - Write the History and Major Accomplishments Sections

In this lesson, you'll learn how to prepare the first section of the grant proposal narrative: the research and major accomplishments section. You'll learn how to sift through organizational documents and write useful information that will answer the dozens of questions that grant reviewers ask when reading your narrative. Most importantly, you'll learn how to avoid the mistakes that can cause your grant proposal to lose points during the initial stages of the funder's review process.

Lesson 4 - Write the Current Programs and Activities Section

This lesson will teach you how to develop a current programs and activities section narrative template. You'll also learn where to find the type of information a grant reviewer needs in this section of your grant proposal. Finally, you'll learn how to confidently answer all of the questions that funders ask when they read this section of your grant proposals.

Lesson 5 - Write the Target Population Served Section

In this lesson, you will learn how to write accurate and magnetizing copy for the target population served section of your grant proposals. You'll also learn how to conduct extensive research on your target population and how to order, organize, and write the information for this critical section of your grant proposals.

Lesson 6 - Write the Partnerships Section

This lesson will teach you how to find the most current information on your organization's partners in the community, region, and nation. You'll also learn how to identify potential partners when your organization has few or no partners. Most importantly, you'll learn how to organize and present your partnership information in an appealing format for funders.

Lesson 7 - Write the Needs Statement Section

In this lesson, you'll learn how to understand the needs statement section from the funder's viewpoint. You'll also learn the type of information to collect on the target population and your organization in order to glean language for this section.

Lesson 8 - Write the Program Design Section

This is perhaps the most important of all the lessons. You are halfway through the main writing sections for your grant proposal narrative and gaining more confidence in your skills. This lesson will teach you how to show the funder that you have a well-thought-out plan for spending grant monies. You'll learn how to look at the program design section from the funder's viewpoint, how to collect the right information, and how to spot poorly written narrative in this section.

Lesson 9 - Write the Management Plan Section

In this lesson, you will learn to understand the thinking patterns of grant funders when they read the management plan section. You'll also learn how to avoid the most common types of errors made by other grant writers when writing this section, and how to cull the right information from your program staff or administrators.

Lesson 10 - Write the Evaluation Section

This lesson will teach you how to look at the evaluation plan section from the funder's perspective. You'll also learn how to steer clear of the age-old errors that other grant writers make when planning and writing this section. From learning where to find the information needed to write an award-winning evaluation plan to learning the common terms that funders look for, this lesson hits the target.

Lesson 11 - Develop the Budget Section

At this point, you're nearing the finish line for Advanced Proposal Writing. In this lesson, you will learn the standard definitions you need to know when it comes to planning your budget line items. You'll also look at examples of award-winning budget sections on the Internet. Most importantly, this lesson will teach you how to recover with the funder when you make a glaring budget error.

Lesson 12 - Apply Finishing Touches and Conduct Follow-Up Tasks

This last lesson will teach you how to view your entire proposal package from the funder's viewpoint. You'll also learn how to use words that work, some final formatting techniques, and how to prepare the supporting documentation for your grant proposal-the attachments. The lesson will also teach you the ins and outs of signatories, copies, and how to mail your grant proposal the right way. Lastly, you'll learn how to follow up on all outstanding items, such as verification of proposal delivery and checking back with funders. Finally, you'll learn the next step to take when your proposal is either funded or rejected.

Requirements

Prerequisites:

Completion of an Introductory Grant Writing course or equivalent experience.

Requirements:

Hardware Requirements:

• This course can be taken on either a PC, Mac, or Chromebook.

Software Requirements:

• PC: Windows 8 or later.
• Mac: macOS 10.6 or later.
• Browser: The latest version of Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox are preferred. Microsoft Edge and Safari are also compatible.
• Adobe Acrobat Reader.
• Software must be installed and fully operational before the course begins.

Other:

• Email capabilities and access to a personal email account.

Instructional Material Requirements:

The instructional materials required for this course are included in enrollment and will be available online.

Instructor

Dr. Beverly A. Browning

Dr. Beverly A. Browning is a grant writing consultant and visionary who uses thought leadership to work with nonprofit organizations struggling with the woes of revenue stream imbalances. She has been researching grant funding, grantmaking trends, and board-related barriers to nonprofit capacity building for over 40 years. Together she and her team have helped her clients win over $750 million in grant awards.

Dr. Browning is the founder and director of the Grant Writing Training Foundation and Bev Browning, LLC. She is the author of 44 grant writing publications, including six editions of Grant Writing for Dummies and the 6th edition of Nonprofit Kit for Dummies (to be published in 2021).

Dr. Browning holds graduate and post-graduate degrees in organizational development, public administration, and business administration. She is also a Certified Strategic Planning Facilitator (CSPF), has a McNellis Compression Planning Institute Facilitation Training distinction, and is an Approved Trainer for the Grant Professionals Association (GPA), the Certified Fund Raising Executive International (CFRE, and the Grant Professionals Certification Institute (GPCI).

Instructor Interaction: The instructor looks forward to interacting with learners in the online moderated discussion area to share their expertise and answer any questions you may have on the course content.

Details

Discover the graceful and expressive language of sign language and learn to communicate with anyone, anywhere, just by using your hands! With this American Sign Language (ASL) course, you can unlock this rewarding ability and master communicating with Deaf people.

Throughout your online sign language training course, you will learn to fingerspell the alphabet, sign colors, numbers, objects, and family members. You will acquire a wide range of useful, everyday vocabulary that will enable you to engage in meaningful conversations with members of the Deaf community. Using video demonstrations, you will understand how to form correct signs and incorporate facial expressions to communicate beautifully in sign language.

Explore the history and usage of American Sign Language (ASL) and how to navigate the culture and social customs of the Deaf community. By the end of this sign language course, you will be confident and ready to participate in a conversation using the power of sign language.

Enrollment Option

-Self-Guided

Self-Guided courses are designed for completely independent learning, without instructor moderation. Students interact in the class discussion area. Students have access to the course for 3 months. After enrolling, you will receive all lessons immediately and have three months access to complete the course content. Self-Guided courses do not have extensions.

-3 Months Access

-Start within 3 business days of registration.  You will receive an email from our Educational Partner, Ed2Go with log in details.

Syllabus

Lesson 1 - Introduction to Sign Language

What is sign language? Is it a real language? How did it develop? In this lesson, you'll discover what sign language is and who uses it. You'll also learn about the impact Deaf people have made on us as we embrace sign language. We'll discuss its use in America, and you'll begin learning this language as you learn to sign numbers 0 to 15.

Lesson 2 - Fingerspelling

Master your ABCs as you learn how to fingerspell the alphabet. You will discover how double letters are made when they're inside a word and how they're signed when they fall at the beginning and end of words. You will also learn tips on how to read fingerspelling.

Lesson 3 - Introducing Yourself

How do you do? Through this lesson, you'll take the first steps toward having a conversation as you learn how to introduce yourself. In addition to learning the basic signs for this kind of interaction, you'll also gain some more strategies for learning and understanding new signs, including the four aspects that make up each sign. While you add these skills to your signing toolbox, you'll also learn more about the Deaf community, including what Deaf people expect to learn about you when you meet for the first time, and the role facial expression plays in sign language.

Lesson 4 - Getting to Know You

Next, you'll build on the introduction you learned in the last lesson and see how to keep the conversation going. You'll explore the different customs of conversation in the Deaf community, such as how to know when one person is finished talking and how to take turns. In addition, we'll continue to navigate through your introduction by adding more information about yourself. Finally, you'll gain some additional vocabulary as you learn the signs for colors and numbers 16 to 30.

Lesson 5 - Continuing the Conversation

In this lesson, you'll learn more signs to help you continue the conversation you started in the two previous lessons. You'll learn about the cherished custom Deaf people have of giving name signs so you'll understand what to call yourself, your city, and your state. You'll also gain more vocabulary about objects in your living environment. You'll learn to sign the types of dwellings people live in and modes of transportation. In addition, you'll add to your knowledge of numbers by mastering the signs for numbers 31 to 66. We'll end with a discussion about an important issue in the Deaf community: whether deafness is considered a disability.

Lesson 6 - Talking About Family

Signing becomes a family affair as you learn signs for family members. You'll understand how sign language categorizes the signs for gender, and we'll discuss communication in families with a Deaf person. This includes lipreading and other communication strategies. We'll end by learning the signs for numbers 67 to 100.

Lesson 7 - Extended Family and Beyond

In this lesson, you'll learn signs for extended family members. You'll also learn signs to describe how you're related to them. We'll put together longer sentences to practice using your new vocabulary. You'll be introduced to number systems beginning with age and telling how old family members are. We'll discuss Black signs ―the sign language of a subculture within Deaf culture.

Lesson 8 - A Sign for the Times

What time is it? In this lesson, you'll discover how to tell time as well as sign the days of the week and other time periods such as minutes and hours. We'll discuss how spoken languages handle past, present, and future tenses, and then examine how sign language does this. Finally, we'll discover the impact the "Deaf President Now" movement had on the lives of Deaf people and our society.

Lesson 9 - More Time on Your Hands

This lesson teaches signs for additional time frames such as yesterday, today, and tomorrow. You will learn signs for indoor and outdoor activities. Then, you will learn signs for your opinion, so you can explain which activities you like and don't like. You will also learn about CODAs—a group of hearing people unique to the Deaf community.

Lesson 10 - Feelings and Traits

Now it's time to learn the signs for feelings and personality traits, and you'll combine these signs with signs learned in previous lessons. You'll see how to communicate how you're doing, how to ask how others are doing, and how to describe different personal attributes. You'll also learn more about Deaf culture—this time, about physical contact and getting the attention of a Deaf person both nearby and across the room. Finally, you'll gain tips for practicing your signs.

Lesson 11 - Clothing and Hairstyle

In the final lesson, you'll learn signs for clothing and hairstyles, such as jacket and long hair, and we'll combine these with signs from other lessons. You'll learn about classifiers and how to use them with patterns such as stripes. Then you'll learn signs for descriptions such as mustache and beard. You'll also explore the last of our issues of Deaf culture: teaching hearing babies to sign.

Lesson 12 - Food and Animals

We conclude the course with a lesson that will equip you to wish a friend happy birthday, offer a birthday treat, and talk about your favorite animal. You'll start by learning to sign the months of the year and how to say, "Happy birthday!" You'll also learn signs for food and animals. We'll finish by exploring how English is translated into sign language, and you'll get an introduction to the role of the professional sign language interpreter. You'll even get some tips on using an interpreter with a Deaf person.

Requirements

Prerequisites:

There are no prerequisites to take this course.

Requirements:

Hardware Requirements:

• This course can be taken on either a PC, Mac, or Chromebook.

Software Requirements:

• PC: Windows 10 or later.
• Mac: macOS 10.6 or later.
• Browser: The latest version of Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox are preferred. Microsoft Edge and Safari are also compatible.
• Adobe Acrobat Reader.
• Software must be installed and fully operational before the course begins.

Other:

• Email capabilities and access to a personal email account.

Instructional Material Requirements:

The instructional materials required for this course are included in enrollment and will be available online.

Instructor

Erin McHenry

Erin McHenry has been signing since 1996 and holds both a Bachelor of Science and a Master of Arts in Interpreting. She is an Associate member of the American Sign Language Teachers Association. Since 2003, Erin has been professionally interpreting across various settings including education, community, and medical. She has been both a staff interpreter and a freelance interpreter.

Instructor Interaction: The instructor looks forward to interacting with learners in the online moderated discussion area to share their expertise and answer any questions you may have on the course content.

Details

Do you have a nagging suspicion that a small improvement in your writing skills might also improve your career prospects? Don't let small gaps in your business writing skills prevent you from reaching your full potential!

It doesn't matter whether you're a clerical worker, an engineer, or an executive. If you communicate with others in writing, you need this course to help you identify and eliminate problem areas. By the end of this course, you'll know the secret to developing powerful written documents that immediately draw readers in and keep them motivated to continue until your very last, well-chosen word.

Enrollment Option

-Self-Guided

Self-Guided courses are designed for completely independent learning, without instructor moderation. Students interact in the class discussion area. Students have access to the course for 3 months. After enrolling, you will receive all lessons immediately and have three months access to complete the course content. Self-Guided courses do not have extensions.

-3 Months Access

-Start within 3 business days of registration.  You will receive an email from our Educational Partner, Ed2Go with log in details.

Syllabus

Lesson 1 - Writing as Problem Solving

In this first lesson, you'll learn a brainstorming technique that will help make writing easier and more fun for you right away. You'll learn how to disentangle the efforts of your creative and critical sides, and you'll come to understand why both sides are important components of good writing. You'll also learn why writing is one of the best problem-solving tools around.

Lesson 2 - Why Write and Who Is Your Reader?

Here's where you'll learn a helpful system for organizing your writing, whether it's an email, a formal letter, or a company-wide memo. You'll start by picking out a document that you have to write anyway so that you can put your new writing knowledge to use right away. You may as well get some work done while you're learning, right? Next, you'll nail down why you're writing this particular document and who your reader is. A second brainstorming technique will help you have fun thinking through these two questions.

Lesson 3 - Benefits You Can Offer Your Reader

In this lesson, you'll learn to make your readers do what you want. Your readers will be happy, too, since they'll get what they want in this win/win system. You'll learn the seven basic benefits you can offer your reader and how to write the crucial first sentence of your document. You'll learn one more brainstorming technique that will help you capture good ideas, words, and phrases.

Lesson 4 - Sequencing Your Ideas and How to Write Your Ending

Master seven strategies for putting your ideas in order and learn how poor sequencing can sabotage your efforts. You'll also discover the best way to end any document. It's an idea that may surprise you!

Lesson 5 - Revising, Formatting, Editing, and Proofreading

Revising, formatting, editing, and proofreading may all sound similar, but they're four distinct activities. In this lesson, you'll learn how revision is a process of exploration and discovery. You'll learn formatting strategies that will invite your reader in. You'll also learn to be a ruthless editor and professional proofreader.

Lesson 6 - What Words to Take Out

In this lesson, you'll learn how to write clearly and concisely. You'll explore three mistaken notions that lead business writers to use lots of convoluted phrasing and needlessly long words. You'll examine the pitfalls of using business clichés, jammed modifiers, trendy words, jargon, foreign words, redundancies, and hedging adjectives.

Lesson 7 - What Words to Put In

In the last lesson you learned what words to remove from your document. In this lesson, you'll learn what words you should include to make your business writing more compelling. You'll learn the four parts of the written communication process. You'll find out why the verbs and nouns you choose make a major difference. You'll also learn more ways to make the task of writing more enjoyable for you.

Lesson 8 - Strategies for Good Spelling and Punctuation

In this lesson, you'll look at strategies for good spelling and punctuation. Everyone needs this review! To keep it fun, you'll get to deal with the topics of spelling and punctuation by taking some easy quizzes. It's a chance to learn by doing. See how good your spelling and punctuation skills really are. You'll learn that punctuation is not a tyranny of rules, but an evolving protocol to help you communicate. Finally, you'll capture your weak areas on a Tips Card.

Lesson 9 - One Easy Grammar Lesson

Why do you have to bother with grammar? You'll find out why in this lesson. Take the Grammar Blitz Quiz to discover your grammar strengths and weaknesses. It will help you fill in the gaps that remain after years of boring grammar classes. You'll learn why using the active instead of the passive voice can be a demonstration of your integrity. You'll also explore the traps pronouns set for those who are sensitive to gender issues.

Lesson 10 - Getting the Tone Right

Getting the tone right in business writing can be tricky, especially in email. In this lesson, you'll get to tackle your worst moods with one more brainstorming technique. You'll learn how to defuse any negative emotions that might get in the way of your problem solving. You'll also learn how your attitude toward your reader, your topic, and your own needs determines your tone. As you go through the lesson, you'll learn two easy ways to eliminate unintentional tone mistakes.

Lesson 11 - When You Have to Say No

In this lesson, you'll learn why being able to say "no" with grace is a crucial business skill. A five-part format will give you a solid strategy for writing documents that say "no" while retaining the goodwill of your reader. You'll learn how to keep bad news letters, memos, and emails positive and helpful.

Lesson 12 - Email Etiquette

This lesson will provide an up-to-date review of all the ways that email is different from other kinds of business writing. It will teach you how to write emails that get the job done quickly and efficiently and explain their legal status in court. You'll also discover how to manage the tone of your emails so that you don't accidentally offend your reader.

Requirements

Prerequisites:

There are no prerequisites to take this course.

Requirements:

Hardware Requirements:

• This course can be taken on either a PC, Mac, or Chromebook.

Software Requirements:

• PC: Windows 8 or later.
• Mac: macOS 10.6 or later.
• Browser: The latest version of Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox are preferred. Microsoft Edge and Safari are also compatible.
• Adobe Acrobat Reader.
• Software must be installed and fully operational before the course begins.

Other:

• Email capabilities and access to a personal email account.

Instructional Material Requirements:

The instructional materials required for this course are included in enrollment and will be available online.

Instructor

Ann Linquist

Ann Linquist is a continuing education instructor on college campuses, at corporations, and with non-profit organizations. She has helped thousands of adults learn to tackle their writing tasks with enthusiasm. Having written everything from novels to newsletters, articles to ad copy, Linquist is able to address the writing needs of each individual. The breadth of her background ensures a powerful, involving learning experience that builds on the strengths of each participant.

Instructor Interaction: The instructor looks forward to interacting with learners in the online moderated discussion area to share their expertise and answer any questions you may have on the course content.

Details

Wouldn't it be great to learn how to effectively use all the advanced Excel pivot table features? In this practical and information-packed course, you will learn how to maximize this program's functions and capabilities.

Most organizations rely heavily on Microsoft Excel pivot tables to analyze and report financial information. Your company is probably no exception. By learning these advanced techniques, you can become more valuable to your organization.

This course will teach you how to utilize the numerous pivot tables to develop useful analysis models and reports within your company. Impress your coworkers by learning how to create functional and eye-catching interactive dashboards using a combination of pivot tables, Pivot Charts, and Slicers. You will discover advanced techniques for pivot tables, like creating Timelines, calculated fields, and calculated items. You will learn how to use Excel's Table function to efficiently manage changes to the pivot table's source data in order to avoid making mistakes when data is added or deleted.

Enrollment Option

-Self-Guided

Self-Guided courses are designed for completely independent learning, without instructor moderation. Students interact in the class discussion area. Students have access to the course for 3 months. After enrolling, you will receive all lessons immediately and have three months access to complete the course content. Self-Guided courses do not have extensions.

-3 Months Access

-Start within 3 business days of registration.  You will receive an email from our Educational Partner, Ed2Go with log in details.

Syllabus

Lesson 1 - Pivot Table Concepts

In your first lesson, you will develop a solid understanding of the requirements to use pivot tables. This lesson introduces the foundational elements needed to understand and get the most out of pivot tables.

Lesson 2 - Creating a Pivot Table

Not all data is created equal. In this lesson, you will learn what's required to make sure your data is organized well enough to be used in a pivot table. You will discover a very common issue that occurs when the source data changes and you how to easily eliminate that issue.

Lesson 3 - Pivot Table Analyze and Design Tabs

Working efficiently with pivot tables requires knowing where to find the proper pivot table feature without searching high and low for it. Most pivot table features reside on one of the two pivot table Ribbon tabs. This lesson introduces the different features that are grouped and what each one provides.

Lesson 4 - Pivot Table Formatting Inside and Out

Learn to group ordinary pivot table fields, which will create new fields that you can use within the pivot table or as a Slicer. In addition, you'll learn how to expand and collapse fields to help in summarizing the pivot table data. Then learn how to locate data anomalies in large data sets and the proper use of report filters which can assist in any data investigation as well as a great tool for creating multiple reports from a single pivot table report.

Lesson 5 - Pivot Table Options and Field Settings

Most users may not know that there are certain options and settings that provide little-known but extremely useful features. Most of these features are accessed through the pivot table Ribbon tabs, but some are not. In this lesson, you will learn how to use some of the more obscure settings in the Pivot Table Options and Field Settings dialog boxes.

Lesson 6 - Value Field Settings

Similar to the Field Settings, the Values section of a pivot table report has unique settings and summarization options. For most people, simply summing or counting the data within the Values section is enough. But once you learn how to use these lesser-known settings, you will go from an average pivot table user to an expert.

Lesson 7 - Grouping Pivot Table Fields

A pivot table is ideal for analyzing and summarizing data. By default, the table does an excellent job at summarizing the data within the various fields, but there is a way to summarize the data even further. This lesson will show you how to group ordinary pivot table fields, which will create new fields that you can use within the pivot table or as a Slicer. In addition, you will learn how to expand and collapse fields to help in summarizing the pivot table data.

Lesson 8 - Data-Integrity Checks and Report Filters

A pivot table is a great way to locate data anomalies in large data sets that would otherwise be hard to find scanning through the source table. In addition, the proper use of report filters can assist in any data investigation, as well as providing a great tool to create multiple reports from a single pivot table report. You will learn all about these tools in this lesson.

Lesson 9 - Cloning a Pivot Table and the Wonderful World of Slicers

Pivot tables are extremely useful and flexible for data analysis and reporting. It's easy to add, remove, or simply move fields to create different-looking reports from the same source data. This lesson focuses on creating different versions of reports and the different techniques needed to do so.

Lesson 10 - Calculated Fields and Items

Pivot tables are great for analyzing and reporting information, but they're limited in their functionality when your source data is missing needed information. Or, perhaps the information isn't needed in the source data and is only needed for analysis for a short time. This lesson will demonstrate how to use Excel's Calculated Items and Fields feature to create items that are missing from the source data.

Lesson 11 - Working With Slicers and Pivot Charts

Your pivot table isn't complete without a Slicer and pivot chart. In order to create an effective dashboard, you'll need a pivot table and a pivot chart controlled by multiple Slicers. This lesson focuses on creating and managing Slicers and Pivot Charts.

Lesson 12 - Timelines and Dashboard Development

In the final lesson, you will learn about the many interactive tools and techniques available to make pivot tables and pivot charts fun to use. Similar to a Slicer, Excel offers a tool called Timelines. Timelines are available when a field available in your pivot table or chart is a date. Within a dashboard, using the Timeline feature can be useful and eye catching to the users.

Requirements

Prerequisites:

There are no prerequisites to take this course.

Requirements:

Hardware Requirements:

• This course can be taken on either a PC or Mac.

Software Requirements:

• PC: Windows 8 or later.
• Mac: macOS 10.6 or later.
• Browser: The latest version of Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox are preferred. Microsoft Edge and Safari are also compatible.
• Microsoft Excel 2010, Microsoft Excel 2013, or Microsoft Office 2016 (not included in enrollment).
• The "Starter", "Web App", and "Office Mac Home" versions of Microsoft Excel will not work with the full version of Excel taught in this course.
• Adobe Acrobat Reader.
• Software must be installed and fully operational before the course begins.

Other:

• Email capabilities and access to a personal email account.

Instructional Material Requirements:

The instructional materials required for this course are included in enrollment and will be available online.

Instructor

Chad Wambolt

Chad Wambolt has spent his entire professional career in the finance field, working for both private and publicly-held companies with sales ranging from $500 million to $3 billion. He is a graduate of Boise State University, where he obtained his bachelor's degree in accounting. Through the course of his career, Wambolt became an expert user of Microsoft Excel. Since 1997, he has taught Excel to students of varying skill levels and helped organizations streamline internal processes.

Instructor Interaction: The instructor looks forward to interacting with learners in the online moderated discussion area to share their expertise and answer any questions you may have on the course content.

Details

Most organizations rely heavily on Microsoft Excel to consolidate, analyze, and report financial information and other important data. Your company is probably no exception. If you work with data of any kind, learning Excel's advanced functions to taking on greater responsibilities in your organization.

This course will help you master many features in Microsoft Excel 2019 that most users don't know exist. You will learn the secret to using formula-based conditional formatting as a creative solution to common issues. You will also learn how to leverage Excel's Power Query tool to import and transform data from about any data source. By the time you finish this course, you will have mastered Microsoft Excel 2019 and will be able to better serve your company's data management needs.

Enrollment Option

-Self-Guided

Self-Guided courses are designed for completely independent learning, without instructor moderation. Students interact in the class discussion area. Students have access to the course for 3 months. After enrolling, you will receive all lessons immediately and have three months access to complete the course content. Self-Guided courses do not have extensions.

-3 Months Access

-Start within 3 business days of registration.  You will receive an email from our Educational Partner, Ed2Go with log in details.

Syllabus

Lesson 1 - Customizing Excel

To kick things off, your first lesson explores different ways you can modify Excel to streamline processes and make your work easier. You will use the Excel Options dialog box to customize some of Excel's behind-the-scenes behavior and set up your Quick Access Toolbar.

Lesson 2 - Table Management

This lesson explores Excel's table management features, using data forms with Excel databases, and alternative database techniques. You'll be glad to know that formatting and working with tables has become much easier in this latest version of Excel.

Lesson 3 - Data Validation

In this lesson, you will tackle data validation techniques—your first line of defense against incorrect or missing data and the logical next step after data forms. You will practice using whole number, decimal, date, time, list, and other forms of validation.

Lesson 4 - Custom Controls

This lesson will introduce you to custom controls—graphical objects that help facilitate data input and are sure to impress users. You will learn how to create standard and drop-down list boxes, check boxes, option buttons, and group boxes.

Lesson 5 - Conditional Formatting

This lesson will teach you how to use conditional formatting. You will learn how to use conditional formatting to hide errors, to highlight records based on multiple criteria, to track and alert you about due dates, to find the differences between two lists, to shade every other row, and more.

Lesson 6 - Consolidating and Outlining

In this lesson, you will learn how to use Excel's consolidation function to efficiently summarize data from multiple sources. Many Excel users do this the hard way, but with Excel's automatic consolidation feature, you will no longer need to develop a web of formula links to multiple sources.

Lesson 7 - Excel Functions and Nesting

Excel's functions are too numerous to cover in just one lesson, so this lesson focuses on a few important ones spanning four categories: Logical, Database, Math & Trig, and Lookup & Reference.

Lesson 8 - Import External Data

This lesson focuses on importing external data. You will learn how to use the built-in Query Editor using Excel's powerful Power Query tool and import external database that combines two database tables into a single import.

Lesson 9 - Data Tables

Data tables are very powerful what-if analysis tools that are great for analyzing potential outcomes of personal or business financial decisions. In this lesson, you will learn how to use two different types of data tables.

Lesson 10 - What-If Analysis Tools

This lesson explores three more of Excel's what-if analysis tools: Goal Seek, Scenario Manager, and Solver.

Lesson 11 - Advanced PivotTables

In this lesson, you will discover how to use PivotTables, which are excellent for summarizing massive amounts of data and viewing different cuts of the information quickly. There are two methods for creating PivotTables, and you will practice using both.

Lesson 12 - Analysis ToolPak, Advanced Filter, Array Formulas, and More!

Your final lesson with a look at the functions available in the Analysis ToolPak, including Moving Average and Sampling tools. You will learn how to use the View Side by Side tool and how to use the Watch Window to keep tabs on your data when you're updating a workbook.

Requirements

Prerequisites:

A basic understanding of Microsoft Excel's uses and functions or completion of Introduction to Microsoft Excel & Intermediate Microsoft Excel.

Requirements:

Hardware Requirements:

• This course must be taken on a PC. It is not suitable for Macs or Chromebooks.

Software Requirements:

• PC: Windows 10 or later.
• Browser: The latest version of Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox are preferred. Microsoft Edge is also compatible.
• Microsoft Excel 2019 (desktop version), available to download with the desktop version of Microsoft 365, or Microsoft Office Home and Student 2019 (not included in enrollment)
• Note: The "Starter Version" and "Web App" versions of Microsoft will not work with the full version taught in this course.
• Adobe Acrobat Reader.
• Software must be installed and fully operational before the course begins.

Other:

• Email capabilities and access to a personal email account.

Instructional Material Requirements:

The instructional materials required for this course are included in enrollment and will be available online.

Instructor

Chad Wambolt

Chad Wambolt has spent his entire professional career in the finance field, working for both private and publicly-held companies with sales ranging from $500 million to $3 billion. He is a graduate of Boise State University, where he obtained his bachelor's degree in accounting. Through the course of his career, Wambolt became an expert user of Microsoft Excel. Since 1997, he has taught Excel to students of varying skill levels and helped organizations streamline internal processes.

Instructor Interaction: The instructor looks forward to interacting with learners in the online moderated discussion area to share their expertise and answer any questions you may have on the course content.

Details

If you create business documents like letters, brochures, or newsletters, you know that their quality is representative of your organization. To create professional-quality documents efficiently and effectively, you have to use advanced word processing functions. This online course will teach you how to use Microsoft Word 2019, the newest version of Microsoft's widely-used word processing software.

Through hands-on lessons and modules, you will learn how to use a number of shortcuts and time-saving techniques to create complex documents. By the end of the course, you will know how to create and organize tables, manipulate graphics, and merge spreadsheets, amongst other functions, to turn Word into a simple desktop publishing tool.

Enrollment Option

-Self-Guided

Self-Guided courses are designed for completely independent learning, without instructor moderation. Students interact in the class discussion area. Students have access to the course for 3 months. After enrolling, you will receive all lessons immediately and have three months access to complete the course content. Self-Guided courses do not have extensions.

-3 Months Access

-Start within 3 business days of registration.  You will receive an email from our Educational Partner, Ed2Go with log in details.

Syllabus

Lesson 1 - Timesavers in Word 2019

Things have come a long way since the days of the typewriter. What used to take hours can now be done in seconds with Microsoft Word 2019. And the less time you spend typing, the more time you can spend being creative and having fun. In this lesson, you'll learn shortcuts in Word that can help you create documents faster and more accurately than ever before. Not only will these shortcuts save you time, but they'll help you create letters and reports more easily than you might have thought possible.

Lesson 2 - Methods to Streamline Text Formatting

What you write is half of communication. The other half is getting people to read what you write. One way to make your writing more appealing is to make it look presentable with formatting. Of course, formatting text is easy, but applying different types of formatting over and over again can get tedious. In this lesson, you'll learn a fast and easy way to format chunks of text quickly and consistently using something called styles. You'll find out what a style is, how to apply it, and—more important—how to create and save your own styles to use in any document. By the end of this lesson, you'll be able to make any document look presentable with just the click of your mouse.

Lesson 3 - Working with Templates

A template stores the formatting of a document so that you can apply it to another document. Templates let you format entire documents as easily as formatting a single word. Word offers lots of convenient templates stored right on your computer or available over the Internet. In this lesson, you'll learn about how to search and use Word templates, and you'll also discover how you can create your own.

Lesson 4 - Adding Graphics to Your Word Documents

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, so what better way to spice up your documents than by adding pictures? In this lesson, you'll learn how to add your own digital photographs to a document so that you can show everyone your vacation pictures, family holidays, or just interesting sights you've captured with your own camera. In addition to adding your own photos, you can also add clip art from Word's massive library of free graphics. And you'll find out how to resize, rotate, and style your pictures, as well as wrap your document text around them. By the end of this lesson, you'll see why Word documents are about much more than words!

Lesson 5 - Creating Text-Based Graphics in Word

Digital photographs and clip art are just the beginning of what you can do with graphics in Word. In this lesson, you'll discover how to add a variety of informational graphics, including charts, graphs, and WordArt, which allows you to display text as a graphic image. Not only will you learn how to add these graphics, but you'll also find out how to edit them when your data changes. You'll finish off the lesson by seeing how Word allows you to format documents with multiple columns—a handy skill for creating newsletters and publications!

Lesson 6 - Organizing Your Text with Columns and Sections

Do you often create long documents? If so, you'll appreciate this lesson, which shows you how to divide a large document into parts called sections. Sections allow you to format part of a document a certain way without that formatting affecting the rest of your text. For example, you may want headers and footers to appear on some pages but not others. Sections make this easy! You'll also spend some time inserting footnotes and end-notes in a document. If you need to write research papers or other academic content, Word makes it a snap to add and format these previously pesky notes!

Lesson 7 - Creating Tables in Word

If you've ever seen a spreadsheet, you know how rows and columns let you organize numbers and text on the screen. Well, tables do the same thing in Word. In this lesson, you'll see how to create tables of all different sizes right in a Word document! You'll cover how to modify tables, too. And don't think Excel users get to have all the fun—you can even enter formulas to perform calculations in your tables, sort them, and style them for a customized look. Your data has never looked so appealing!

Lesson 8 - Creating Stationary in Word

You probably print most of your documents on standard letter-size paper. While this is great for ordinary letters or business reports, sometimes you may want to get creative with your paper sizes. But then there's the trouble of printing. In this lesson, you'll see how you can define the dimensions of the paper you're using, so Word will print everything correctly. You'll also learn how to print names and addresses directly on envelopes of any size. After this lesson, you won't feel confined to boring 8 1/2 x 11-inch paper anymore!

Lesson 9 - Creating Business Stationary in Word

As you've probably already figured out, Word can do more than write letters. It can also function as a simple desktop publishing program for creating greeting cards, calendars, or newsletters. In this lesson, you'll find out how text boxes are the key to simple desktop publishing, and you'll see how other elements come into play in customized documents. Along the way, you'll look at business cards and greeting cards to get a feel for how desktop publishing works. If you've always wanted to create a document that combines text and graphics in an artistic or visually appealing way, you'll find out how to do that and much more.

Lesson 10 - Desktop Publishing

With the basics down, it's time to take your desktop publishing skills to the next level. In this lesson, you'll discover the magic of linked text boxes that give you the power to move your text anywhere you want on the page and keep it flowing. You'll see how to create, position, resize, and group text boxes so that you have total control over your text.

Lesson 11 - Merging Data with Documents

Have you ever received one of those "personalized" letters from a company in the mail? You can be sure that nobody typed the entire sales letter from scratch. Instead, the company used a form letter and something called mail merging. In this lesson, you'll learn how to store long lists of names and addresses that you can reuse in a form letter. Just create a document once, leave blanks for inserting information such as names and addresses, and let Word personalize each letter for you. Now, you too can create personalized letters for business or personal use, such as sending out holiday greetings to family members and friends.

Lesson 12 - Creating Summative Lists of What's in Your Document

Look in most books, and you'll find a table of contents at the beginning and an index in the back. Often, these are the last components added to a document, since they need to have accurate titles and page numbers. Thankfully, Word takes a lot of the tedious work out of creating these components. In this final lesson, you'll see how you can use Styles to make creating a table of contents a snap, and you'll explore how to tag index terms so that Word knows what page they're on, even if they move later. Word can also help you keep track of any figures, such as charts, illustrations, or graphs, in your document. By letting Word worry about the details, you can create an accurate table of contents, index, or list of figures with very little extra effort on your part. These finishing touches will make your most important documents shine!

Requirements

Prerequisites:

Completion of Introduction to Microsoft Word 2019 or basic familiarity with Microsoft Word's word processing and editing.

Requirements:

Hardware Requirements:

• This course must be taken on a PC. Macs and Chromebooks are not compatible.

Software Requirements:

• PC: Windows 10 or later.
• Browser: The latest version of Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox is preferred. Microsoft Edge is also compatible.
• Microsoft Word 2019 (desktop version) available to download with the desktop version of Microsoft 365, or Microsoft Office Home and Student 2019 (not included in enrollment)
• Note: The "Starter Version" and "Web App" versions of Microsoft will not work with the full version taught in this course.
• Adobe Acrobat Reader.
• Software must be installed and fully operational before the course begins.

Other:

• Email capabilities and access to a personal email account.

Instructional Material Requirements:

The instructional materials required for this course are included in enrollment and will be available online.

Instructor

Wallace Wang

Wallace Wang is the author of over 40 computer books including "Microsoft Office 2019 For Dummies." In addition to writing computer books, he has also co-authored "Breaking Into Acting for Dummies" and ghost written several books about investing in real estate, day trading stocks, and becoming an entrepreneur. Some of his past jobs have included teaching computer science courses at the University of Zimbabwe, performing stand-up comedy, and appearing on a weekly radio show.

Instructor Interaction: The instructor looks forward to interacting with learners in the online moderated discussion area to share their expertise and answer any questions you may have on the course content.

Details

Across all industries, the ability to create documents in a word processor is essential in day-to-day functions. From writing reports to Knowing how to use Microsoft Word, the most widely-used word processing program, adds an important skill set to your professional profile.

This course will introduce you to the 2019 version of Microsoft Word. You will learn the basics of Word 2019 needed to write and edit text and to create, format, and organize documents. By the time you're done with these hands-on activities, you will be able to use Word confidently at home or on the job.

Enrollment Option

-Self-Guided

Self-Guided courses are designed for completely independent learning, without instructor moderation. Students interact in the class discussion area. Students have access to the course for 3 months. After enrolling, you will receive all lessons immediately and have three months access to complete the course content. Self-Guided courses do not have extensions.

-3 Months Access

-Start within 3 business days of registration.  You will receive an email from our Educational Partner, Ed2Go with log in details.

Syllabus

Lesson 1 - Getting Started

In this introductory lesson, you'll learn how to use the different parts of Word 2019's user interface, how to look at your document in different types of views, how to zoom in and out to magnify or shrink your text, and how to change the margins of individual paragraphs.

Lesson 2 - Typing and Navigation

The whole purpose of Word is to let you create and edit text, so in this lesson, you'll go over the basics of moving the Insertion Pointer, or Cursor, and deleting text. Pressing the BACKSPACE and DELETE keys can delete text one character at a time. The keyboard lets you move the cursor one character, one word, or one line at a time. The mouse lets you quickly move the cursor and scroll through large documents far faster than the keyboard. By knowing the pros and cons of navigating through a document with the keyboard and mouse, you can use both to help you work faster in Word.

Lesson 3 - File Management

In this lesson, you're going to learn how to save the documents you create in Word. You'll learn how to save documents with unique names, as well as in other formats so that you can share your documents with people using different word processors or even different computers. Finally, you'll learn how to rename, copy, and even delete any files you've created so that you'll always be in complete control of all the files you create.

Lesson 4 - Editing Text

After you've typed some text in a Word document, you may need to edit that text. The easiest way to edit is to delete individual characters using the BACKSPACE or DELETE keys. Another option is using Word's Overtype mode by typing over text you no longer need. If you ever delete anything by mistake, don't panic! Word's handy Undo and Redo commands retrieve unintentionally deleted text. You may also want to delete large chunks of text. Use your keyboard or mouse in tandem with the BACKSPACE or DELETE keys to efficiently remove entire sections of text. By learning how to delete text and undo mistakes, you can edit your documents quickly using Word.

Lesson 5 - Working With Multiple Documents

Most people use Word to view and edit a single document at a time, but Word actually lets you open and view two or more documents at the same time. This can be handy for copying text from one document to another, comparing two different drafts of the same document, or simply using one document as a reference while writing in the second one. By learning how to open, switch between, and view multiple documents, you can increase your productivity with Word.

Lesson 6 - Text Formatting and Alignment

Once you know how to add, delete, copy, and move text, the next step to modifying your document is to change the physical appearance of your text. You can make text appear in different colors or background highlighting, change the actual size of text, alter the alignment of text, and even choose different fonts to modify the way individual letters look. As you can see, Word provides plenty of ways to help you both edit text and change it so it looks visually appealing.

Lesson 7 - Printing

Most people use Word to print letters and reports. But Word also helps you get creative by letting you choose different paper sizes and orientations. For example, you can print a letter in portrait orientation or print a sign in landscape orientation. Just think of turning a page up so its height is taller than its width (portrait orientation) or turning the page on its side so its width is wider than its height (landscape orientation). Word also lets you choose to print on different paper sizes, such as envelopes, just as long as you can run those odd-shaped paper sheets in your printer. With Word's ability to print on different types of paper sizes and orientation, you can create more than just typical documents using Word.

Lesson 8 - Margins, Tabs, and Page Numbering

Most of the time when you create a document, you can use the default page settings. But sometimes you may want to modify those settings to change margins around a page to give you more (or less) space on the top, bottom, left, or right sides of a page. By knowing how to set and use margins, you can modify an entire document or just a single page. By using tabs, you can modify how individual paragraphs look on a page. Finally, you'll also learn how to add page numbers to the top or bottom of a page to keep track of the right page order when you print out your document.

Lesson 9 - Paragraph Formatting

Word can be handy for typing and formatting text, but once you've written several paragraphs worth of text, you may need to format individual paragraphs separately from the rest of your document. Word provides ways to change the appearance of a paragraph's first line, line spacing within a paragraph, and line spacing between paragraphs. In addition, Word lets you create bullet and numbered lists, so you can display short bits of information in a visual manner. With Word's various paragraph-formatting options, you can customize the appearance of all your paragraphs.

Lesson 10 - Language Tools

It's not enough just to write and format your text. After you're done writing, you may need to check your spelling, change your words, and even hyphenate your text to make your entire document look the best it can. For important documents, you may even need to collaborate with others. To keep track of all the changes multiple authors may make to a single document, Word offers a Track Changes feature, so you can see exactly what and who changed the document. With so many ways to polish your document, there's no reason not to write exactly what you want to say with Word.

Lesson 11 - Customizing Word

Word can easily handle any characters you type with a keyboard, but sometimes you may need to type an occasional foreign language character, a mathematical symbol, or another unusual character that doesn't appear on your keyboard. With Word, you can press different types of keystrokes or search and click the symbol you want to use. This lets you add practically any type of unusual character to your documents, even smiley faces. You probably won't need to type all of these characters regularly, so just find the ones you'll likely need and remember how to use them. Word lets you type practically anything you want, regardless of the limitation of the keys on your keyboard.

Lesson 12 - Making a Word Document Pretty and Organized

Writing involves more than just typing and editing text. With Word's advanced features, you can insert page breaks and cover pages to adjust how your text appears when you print it out. To make text on each page look its best, you can use drop caps and styles. Finally, you can use outlines to organize your text and quickly move chunks of text within a document just by rearranging an outline heading. By learning these advanced features of Word, you can make each document display text in the most appealing way possible.

Requirements

Prerequisites:

There are no prerequisites to take this course.

Requirements:

Hardware Requirements:

• This course must be taken on a PC. Macs and Chromebooks are not compatible.

Software Requirements:

• PC: Windows 10 or later.
• Browser: The latest version of Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox is preferred. Microsoft Edge is also compatible.
• Microsoft Word 2019 (desktop version) available with the desktop version of Microsoft 365, or Microsoft Office Home and Student 2019 (not included in enrollment)
• Adobe Acrobat Reader.
• Software must be installed and fully operational before the course begins.

Other:

• Email capabilities and access to a personal email account.

Instructional Material Requirements:

The instructional materials required for this course are included in enrollment and will be available online.

Instructor

Wallace Wang

Wallace Wang is the author of over 40 computer books including "Microsoft Office 2019 For Dummies." In addition to writing computer books, he has also co-authored "Breaking Into Acting for Dummies" and ghost written several books about investing in real estate, day trading stocks, and becoming an entrepreneur. Some of his past jobs have included teaching computer science courses at the University of Zimbabwe, performing stand-up comedy, and appearing on a weekly radio show.

Instructor Interaction: The instructor looks forward to interacting with learners in the online moderated discussion area to share their expertise and answer any questions you may have on the course content.

Details

Organizations initiate projects to create new computer applications, erect bridges and buildings, improve processes, develop new products, and reorganize company operations. Unfortunately, most organizations do not manage projects well, creating an unprecedented demand for project management practitioners.

If you're organized, perceptive, detail-oriented, and an excellent communicator, you just might have what it takes to succeed in the fast-growing field of project management.

In this course, an experienced Project Management Professional will help you master the essentials of project management. You will become an indispensable member of your project team by discovering and mastering the critical concepts you need to plan, implement, control and close any type of project.

You will learn about project politics and ethics, project measurements, and project closure. You will be able to develop all sections of a project plan, you will become comfortable with the project management body of knowledge, and you will develop a variety of powerful techniques to generate project ideas.

If you're new to project management, this course will provide you with the essential information you will need to prepare for and complete your first project. If you're an experienced project manager, this course will make you more valuable to your employer by increasing your skills and competencies.

This course and its follow-up (Project Management Applications) also include essential information that will help you prepare for the Project Management Professional (PMP)® and the Certified Associate in Project Management (CAPM®) exams offered by the Project Management Institute (PMI)®. Certification Magazine recently identified PMP certification as "the highest-paying certification" of the year.

PMP, Project Management Professional, Project Management Professional (PMP), PMBOK, PgMP, PMI-RMP, CAPM, PMI-SP, PMI Scheduling Professional (PMI-SP) and the PMI REP Logo are registered marks of the Project Management Institute.

Enrollment Option

-Self-Guided

Self-Guided courses are designed for completely independent learning, without instructor moderation. Students interact in the class discussion area. Students have access to the course for 3 months. After enrolling, you will receive all lessons immediately and have three months access to complete the course content. Self-Guided courses do not have extensions.

-3 Months Access

-Start within 3 business days of registration.  You will receive an email from our Educational Partner, Ed2Go with log in details.

Syllabus

Lesson 1 - Project Management Overview

In our first lesson, you'll learn why project management is necessary and find out how to differentiate projects from programs and tasks. When you finish with this lesson, you'll understand the temporary and unique nature of projects and discover why scoping a project is a critical activity. This lesson will also provide pathways for a career in project management using guidelines from the Project Management Institute (PMI).

Lesson 2 - The Power of Planning

In this lesson, you will learn how planning represents a key factor in helping you develop your project plan. We'll start off the lesson by discussing the nature of planning and discovering the benefits of planning. Next, we will move on to examine the various planning elements and identify the planning process. Then, we'll explore two planning constraints: the triple constraint and the limiting factor. We'll finish Lesson 2 by discussing how contingency planning can be beneficial, recognizing the power of the plan-do-check-act (PDCA) concept, and seeing how estimating is such an essential component of planning.

Lesson 3 - The Power of Control

We'll start off this lesson with an overview of the control process, and we'll review the reactions that many people have to it. You'll discover the characteristics and goals of effective control systems and be able to identify the benefits of control. You'll learn the prerequisites to use control, find out how to use steps of the control process, and identify problems with using control. You'll also discover the various types of control techniques.

Lesson 4 - The Project Manager and the Project Team

This lesson may be the most important one in the course: A highly functional project team and an excellent project manager are critical success factors for any project. In this lesson, you'll learn about a project manager's roles and responsibilities, and also required skills and competencies. To support your project manager, you'll discover the characteristics of a team, see how a team comes together, and find out how to use effective team building activities. Finally, we'll discuss a few project challenges that teams may face.

Lesson 5 - Stakeholder Interactions and Expectations

In this lesson, we'll discuss two different sides (deliverables and stakeholders) of the same coin. You'll learn about the concept of deliverables, identify how deliverables are prone to change, and examine the deliverables chain. You'll see how Quality Function Deployment (QFD) is a wonderful tool to identify and satisfy stakeholders. Also, you'll learn how important it is to recognize and meet stakeholder requirements and how to minimize stakeholder conflict. You'll spend time learning the ins and outs of communication and change management. Lastly, you'll discover how you can use brainstorming and brainwriting, and describe the nominal group technique and affinity diagrams to help you create innovative project management ideas.

Lesson 6 - Project Management Soft Skills

This lesson focuses on the "soft skills" (activities related to interpersonal engagement) that you will certainly be able to apply in your future projects. You will get an overview of decision making, the behavioral aspects, and barriers that exist that influence decisions. A logical extension of decision-making is problem solving. You'll learn about root cause analysis, a problem-solving model, cost benefit analysis, and decision trees. You'll also get an introduction about organizational politics and examine the various political tactics. Then, you'll finish the lesson by exploring conflict management and how to improve your negotiation skills.

Lesson 7 - Project Cost Management

This lesson focuses on the various elements of project cost management. You'll start off by learning about several classification of costs. Then you'll discover the elements of project budgeting including bottom-up and top-down budgeting, the S-curve, and an assumption log. Next, you'll see how change requests and a change control board (CCB) assist with project cost control. You'll move on to explore activity-based costing (ABC) and learn how a focus on cost drivers is superior to traditional approaches. Finally, you'll examine variance analysis and earned value performance management (EVPM) as ways to help keep your project costs at or below budget.

Lesson 8 - The Project Plan (Part 1)

In this lesson, you'll learn how to develop the first part of your project plan. You'll start off by learning about the influence of external and internal environmental factors. Then you'll discover the importance of a project's strategic fit, structures used for project organization, and examine project selection criteria and models. Next, you'll learn about the project planning hierarchy and see how effective development of a project's statement of work (SOW), the project charter, the work breakdown structure (WBS), and the project schedule significantly increase the probability of having a successful project.

Lesson 9 - The Project Plan (Part 2)

This lesson is all about supporting plans for your project. You'll start off by reading about the role of human resource, supply management, interface, and configuration management plans. Then, we'll devote some time to discuss quality and how to implement a project quality plan. Next, we'll explore cost management, risk management, and reporting plans. Finally, you'll discover the ins and outs of project management software and determine the requirements for successful implementation.

Lesson 10 - Project Implementation

In this lesson, we'll expand upon the fundamental elements so you can successfully implement your project plan. We'll start off by describing the elements of a successful project. This will help you determine if your project is headed in the right direction. Next, you'll discover why it's beneficial to implement a pilot before launching your project. Then, you'll see why it's important to review work packages and establish project accounts. We'll move on to examine what takes place with a project kick-off meeting. Finally, you'll finish the lesson by exploring the interpersonal aspects of a project and discover how to keep your project moving in the right direction.

Lesson 11 - Project Control

Project control is the most important activity for your project. Regardless of how much time and effort you invest into your project plan, it's likely that your actual results will differ from what you expect. If you don't effectively control your project, the chances of meeting your project objectives are very slim. In this lesson, we'll expand on what we discussed earlier in the course. We'll start off by describing the principles of project control. Next, you'll discover the nature of project performance measurements and move on to discuss project reporting and the frequency and responsibility for project control. Then, you'll see what is involved with project progress monitoring before moving on to examine earned value performance management (EVPM) and identify its benefits. Finally, you'll finish the lesson by exploring the nature of a project audit.

Lesson 12 - Project Closure

In our final lesson, we will talk about what happens at the end of a project. We'll start off by describing the importance and value of project closure. Next, we'll identify the reasons why project closure is skipped, and discuss a process plan for project closure. Then, we will move on to discuss runaway projects and the reasons why project fail. Finally, you'll finish the lesson by discussing how to deal with premature project termination.

Requirements

Prerequisites:

There are no prerequisites to take this course.

Requirements:

Hardware Requirements:

• This course can be taken on either a PC, Mac, or Chromebook.

Software Requirements:

• PC: Windows 8 or later.
• Mac: macOS 10.6 or later.
• Browser: The latest version of Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox are preferred. Microsoft Edge and Safari are also compatible.
• Adobe Acrobat Reader.
• Applications must be installed and fully operational before the course begins.

Other:

• Email capabilities and access to a personal email account.

Instructional Material Requirements:

The instructional materials required for this course are included in enrollment and will be available online.

Instructor

Tony Swaim

Tony Swaim has helped many clients, colleagues, and students reach their professional and personal goals. He has been an online instructor since 1998 and has taught at colleges and universities across the United States since 1981. His focus areas are project management, Six Sigma, and supply chain management. Tony manages a successful consulting firm, and his industry experience includes 20 years of supply chain management. He earned a Doctorate in Business Administration from Kennesaw State University and holds professional certifications in six disciplines, including the Project Management Professional (PMP)® certification from the Project Management Institute (PMI)® and Certified Six Sigma Black Belt (CSSBB)® from the American Society for Quality (ASQ)®.

Instructor Interaction: The instructor looks forward to interacting with learners in the online moderated discussion area to share their expertise and answer any questions you may have on the course content.

Details

Are you a part-time or accidental project manager? Part-time project managers have projects assigned to them in addition to their daily responsibilities. Accidental project managers find themselves leading projects without formal training in the discipline. Some people choose project management as a career, and many others find project management just another part of your area of responsibilities. For you, project management is a skill set, not a career.

If you have been assigned projects and need a quick jump start to get going, then this is the course for you. You will learn the 10 essential skills you need to survive and thrive. Topics include understanding the business need and the related project outcomes, setting project boundaries so you know what's included and what's not, getting to know your project stakeholders and their needs so you can set and meet their expectations, and how to plan projects and create a schedule.

It's not enough to just manage a project, you also have to control it, so things don't get out of hand. Eventually, the project will come to an end, so you will need to know what project closing looks like. You will want to turn the project over to your customer, so you can close down the project and move on to your next big adventure.

Throughout the course, you will find examples of real projects and how each of these essential skills applies in the real world. Project management skills are essential life skills with many practical applications and all industries. Project management and leadership are consistently the top two skill sets current and future employers look for, so this is also essential for your professional development.

Enrollment Option

-Self-Guided

Self-Guided courses are designed for completely independent learning, without instructor moderation. Students interact in the class discussion area. Students have access to the course for 3 months. After enrolling, you will receive all lessons immediately and have three months access to complete the course content. Self-Guided courses do not have extensions.

-3 Months Access

-Start within 3 business days of registration.  You will receive an email from our Educational Partner, Ed2Go with log in details.

Syllabus

Lesson 1 - Introduction to Project Management

When people talk about project management, what exactly do they mean? Project management is a proven framework to plan and manage new initiatives that are called projects. Projects are handled differently than other work because they create something new that hasn't been done exactly like this before. There are many project management tools, methods, skills, and techniques that anyone who finds themself leading a project can use. In this lesson, you'll learn the basic concepts and terminology of project management and see how project management skills can help you in your job no matter what your official title is.

Lesson 2 - Challenges of Part-Time Project Managers

Not all who are put in charge of projects are project managers. Projects are everywhere, and you may be chosen to lead the next project. For you, this is only one of several hats you wear, and that can be challenging. How can you balance it all and be successful? In this lesson, you'll take a closer look at the challenges of being a project manager and then learn some strategies you can use to ensure your success.

Lesson 3 - Define Your Project

The most critical step in every project is understanding why the project was initiated in the first place. Do you understand the problem you're supposed to fix? Do you have a clear understanding of the project boundaries? Answering these questions will form the basis of project scope definition. Without good definition, your project has little chance of success. In this lesson, you'll learn how to define the three essential components of a project's scope: boundaries, requirements, and deliverables.

Lesson 4 - Plan Your Project

After you've defined your project's scope, it's time to start planning. Your project plan states how you intend to complete the project. You'll need to identify all the project tasks and sequence them so that you and your team can complete the work within a set time frame. You'll need to know the project priorities according to your stakeholders, and you'll develop a detailed schedule based on those priorities. This lesson will give you some strategies and tools for identifying your key stakeholders, documenting your project's activities, and putting together a schedule to complete those activities.

Lesson 5 - Anticipate Problems

Every project creates something new, and that means there's an unknown element that could result in problems. It's the project manager's responsibility to anticipate what could go wrong and develop appropriate plans to handle situations that come up. This lesson will walk you through the risk identification process and introduce techniques for listing and documenting project risks in a risk registry.

Lesson 6 - Communicate With Stakeholders

Good communications are the glue that binds all the project work and stakeholders together. People need information, and it's your responsibility to make sure the right people get the right message at the right time. That kind of goal requires a good communication strategy and plan. In this lesson, you'll learn how to create a communication plan by figuring out the who, what, and how of your project communications.

Lesson 7 - Manage Your Time

It seems like there's always more work to do than hours in the day. Time management and organizational skills improve your ability to tackle your "to-do" list in the most efficient way possible. After all, if you can't manage your own work, you'll definitely struggle managing the work of others in your projects. In this lesson, you'll learn how setting goals and prioritizing help you maximize your effectiveness.

Lesson 8 - Manage the Work

After you've planned your project, it's time to actually do the work. Your responsibilities during project execution are to make sure tasks are completed according to the schedule, update the project plan as needed, handle any issues that come up, and communicate project status to your stakeholders. While doing these things, you'll work to establish yourself as an effective team leader. In this lesson, you'll learn how to manage the work of the project from the kick-off meeting all the way through to completion.

Lesson 9 - Control the Work

Every project starts with a plan, but as you know, plans don't always work out. How can you evaluate what's actually happening during project execution compared to the plan? That's where controls come in. In this lesson, you'll learn about common project controls and how to use them to identify variances between your project plan and current project performance.

Lesson 10 - Know When You're Done

It may sound like a strange question, but how do you know when the work of the project is really done? The answer often depends on who you ask. As long as there are multiple understandings of this concept, you are at risk. This lesson introduces how to quantify project completeness and the practical aspects of closing a project.

Lesson 11 - Transition the Project

Once the project deliverables are done, it's time to transition them to their final owner. The final owner may be an external customer or an internal department, such as Operations or IT. Your goal is to facilitate a seamless transition from the temporary nature of the project to the team or department who will be responsible for it in the long term. In this lesson, you'll find out how to create a transition plan and ensure that your project deliverables can be used or implemented by their final owner with minimal disruption.

Lesson 12 - Documenting Lessons Learned

Projects are initiated to create something new: a product, a service, or a new capability that didn't exist before. But the project's deliverable is not the only thing that's new: You're also creating new knowledge and gaining new experiences that may be positive or negative. In this lesson, you will learn how to identify important learning experiences from your project so that they can benefit you, your team, and your company.

Requirements

Prerequisites:

Project Management Fundamentals (or equivalent)

Requirements:

Hardware Requirements:

• This course can be taken on either a PC, Mac, or Chromebook.

Software Requirements:

• PC: Windows 8 or later.
• Mac: macOS 10.6 or later.
• Browser: The latest version of Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox are preferred. Microsoft Edge and Safari are also compatible.
• Adobe Acrobat Reader.
• Software must be installed and fully operational before the course begins.

Other:

• Email capabilities and access to a personal email account.

Instructional Material Requirements:

The instructional materials required for this course are included in enrollment and will be available online.

Instructor

Nikki Choyce

Nikki Choyce, PMP, has been involved in the project management field for more than 20 years and has worked as a project management consultant and instructor for much of that time. She has worked in a variety of industries, including Information Technology, Insurance, Manufacturing, Marketing, Aerospace, Construction, Telecommunications, and Healthcare. She has worked with Microsoft Project for over 15 years.

Instructor Interaction: The instructor looks forward to interacting with learners in the online moderated discussion area to share their expertise and answer any questions you may have on the course content.

Details

In this online Spanish course, you will learn to converse in Spanish using common words and phrases and demonstrate the proper forms of common Spanish nouns and verbs. You will also have the opportunity to discuss Spanish culture and differences in Spanish-speaking countries while learning how to use numbers in Spanish to discuss dates, times, and money. By completing this course, you will gain confidence in your ability to converse with others in Spanish, be prepared to travel to a Spanish-speaking country and communicate effectively, and build in-demand skills that can increase your career opportunities.

Enrollment Option

-Self-Guided

Self-Guided courses are designed for completely independent learning, without instructor moderation. Students interact in the class discussion area. Students have access to the course for 3 months. After enrolling, you will receive all lessons immediately and have three months access to complete the course content. Self-Guided courses do not have extensions.

-3 Months Access

-Start within 3 business days of registration.  You will receive an email from our Educational Partner, Ed2Go with log in details.

Syllabus

Lesson 1 - ¡Bienvenido! Getting Started with Spanish

Just like other languages, Spanish sentences are made up of different parts! In this lesson, you'll learn how to combine those different parts together to create conversations. We'll start this lesson with some tips on how to use the resources in the course to help build fluency. Next, we'll cover some basic rules of pronunciation for Spanish. Then we'll introduce some nouns and verbs you can use to immediately begin building Spanish sentences. You'll be surprised how many sentences you can create after this lesson!

Lesson 2 - Around the House

In this lesson, you'll build your Spanish conversational skills with some house-related vocabulary and fun phrases. We'll continue to learn more handy sentence starters and verbs and a new method of building sentences using the word for there is or there are. Imagine how many sentences you can create using these words!

Lesson 3 - Around the Community

You may already know some numbers in Spanish, but can you count to 15? In this lesson you'll learn to do just that. You'll need to know these numbers to be able to talk about time, dates, and money. We'll cover another handy topic in this lesson – the days of the week, and you'll learn some new vocabulary related to your town or community. And you'll have plenty of opportunity to practice your sentence-building and conversational skills.

Lesson 4 - Connections: Family and Food

In this lesson, we'll cover two important topics – family and food. You'll learn the Spanish words for family members and some restaurant-related words and phrases. You'll also learn how to say where is in Spanish, so you can add important questions to your conversations.

Lesson 5 - Let's Describe Things!

So far, you haven't learned how to describe anything in Spanish. In this lesson, you'll learn several adjectives and how to use them. We'll also continue our counting with the numbers from 16-100. And put on your running shoes, because it's time for a few speed drill activities to teach you to respond quickly with your newly learned Spanish!

Lesson 6 - The Four Seasons

Since it's a great start to any conversation, this lesson will teach you how to discuss the weather in Spanish. You'll also learn about the seasons and the months of the year. We'll look at a few more fun phrases and practice with more speed drills.

Lesson 7 - On the Move: Travel Tales

Are you ready to take a trip? In this lesson we'll travel to a Spanish-speaking country. You'll need to learn some travel-related vocabulary and fun phrases for our journey, so we'll cover those and more in this lesson.

Lesson 8 - Emotions and Experiences

Are you hungry or thirsty? Are you cold? In this lesson, you'll learn how to express these experiences and more, in Spanish. You'll also learn to ask questions using question words like who, what, when, where, and why. You'll be surprised how your conversational skills improve with this lesson.

Lesson 9 - To Your Health!

Is there a doctor in the house? This lesson will teach you how to discuss physical and mental health issues in Spanish. You'll also learn how to identify different types of clothing. You'll learn plenty of new words and phrases you can add to your conversations.

Lesson 10 - Expressing Desires

In this lesson you'll learn how to share wants and needs in everyday Spanish-speaking situations and We'll also introduce some handy phrases and several more verbs. You'll get plenty of practice so you can continue to improve your conversational skills.

Lesson 11 - What Do You Do?

Now it's time to talk about work, but don't worry it will be fun! You'll learn some occupation-related vocabulary and practice asking and answering questions about jobs and work. You'll also learn to share your likes and dislikes.

Lesson 12 - Surprise!

In this final lesson, we'll attend a beach birthday celebration! You'll learn some new beach-related vocabulary and some phrases you can use when talking on the phone. We'll also learn how to convert a sentence to negative, so that you can express yourself fully.

Requirements

Prerequisites:

There are no prerequisites to take this course.

Requirements:

Hardware Requirements:

• This course can be taken on either a PC or Mac. Chromebooks are not compatible.
• Working headphones or speakers are required for listening to audio content.

Software Requirements:

• PC: Windows 10 or later.
• Mac: macOS 10.6 or later.
• Browser: The latest version of Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox are preferred. Microsoft Edge and Safari are also compatible.
• Microsoft Word Online
• Adobe Acrobat Reader.
• Software must be installed and fully operational before the course begins.

Other:

• Email capabilities and access to a personal email account.

Instructional Material Requirements:

The instructional materials required for this course are included in enrollment and will be available online.

Instructor

Dan Mikels

Dan Mikels is a college instructor who has been teaching Spanish for more than 20 years. He holds a master's degree and has authored and coauthored more than 20 educational products, including Speed Spanish, Fast French, and a variety of reading programs.

Instructor Interaction: The instructor looks forward to interacting with learners in the online moderated discussion area to share their expertise and answer any questions you may have on the course content.

Details

Preparing successful grant proposals to receive funding from corporations or foundations requires careful research, meticulous preparation, and graceful writing. Grant administrators will often say that many grant requesters have a limited understanding of the proposal writing process, and as a result their worthy causes lose out.

If you learn how to avoid the errors that lead to the rejection of your proposal, you will be better prepared to help the causes you most admire. This course will walk you through all of the essential steps, including an important discussion of what you must do when the grant arrives.

In this course, you will learn how to become fully familiar with the institution or project for which you are requesting support. You will get valuable guidance in preparing a background statement and a brief financial statement to support your request. You will also research some charitable foundation and corporate giving sources.

Then, you will learn how to put everything together, so you can assemble, write, and submit complete grant proposals to foundations, corporations, and wealthy individuals for any number of your pet projects.

Enrollment Option

-Self-Guided

Self-Guided courses are designed for completely independent learning, without instructor moderation. Students interact in the class discussion area. Students have access to the course for 3 months. After enrolling, you will receive all lessons immediately and have three months access to complete the course content. Self-Guided courses do not have extensions.

-3 Months Access

-Start within 3 business days of registration.  You will receive an email from our Educational Partner, Ed2Go with log in details.

Syllabus

Lesson 1 - The Writing Style You Will Need for Your Grant Proposal

There's nothing magical about preparing a grant request, but in this lesson, you will learn some easy and fun tricks of trade that will help you with all sorts of writing projects, even those beyond grant proposals. Additionally, you will learn some special ways to practice these tricks.

Lesson 2 - Thinking About Your Institution the Way Grantors Do

People who work for causes that they believe in will often care about those causes in a very special and personal way. But grantors, who deal with literally thousands of institutions and causes, have a rather different way of thinking about them. In this lesson, you will put yourself in their shoes and learn how to effectively describe your own cause to anyone.

Lesson 3 - Information You Will Need for Your Grant Proposal

Now that you have tried on your grantor's shoes, it's time to talk about why those grantors look for certain kinds of information and documents. You will learn what these documents are, so you can dig them out and be ready to supply them when you prepare a grant request.

Lesson 4 - Special Characteristics of Non-Profit Organizations

There are lots of interesting things to know about each individual nonprofit organization, but all nonprofits share one thing: They're not in it to for the money. Generally, you can measure a good business by its bottom line—whether it makes money or not. But how do you measure the effectiveness of a nonprofit that needs money? In this lesson, you will start to look into it.

Lesson 5 - Finding Funding Sources—Foundations

The hunt for funding sources is the eternal game of hide and seek that grant writers have to consider. How do you find sources that might be appropriate for you? This lesson will point you toward the most effective research tools available.

Lesson 6 - Finding Out About Your Foundation Prospects

Once you find some foundations that you think might be a good fit for your cause, how do you choose among a field that might include hundreds? In this lesson, you will learn different ways to sift through these foundations, and in the course of this process, you may unearth sources you haven't even considered.

Lesson 7 - Finding Out About Your Corporate Prospects

You have looked at all the possible charitable foundations that fit your cause, but don't stop there. What about the corporate world? Corporations have foundations, but they also have other ways of giving. This lesson focuses on packaging your projects for corporations.

Lesson 8 - Doing the Numbers

Even if you're a word person, you'll need to learn another way to tell your story—by letting the numbers do the talking. The people who review your proposals will attach great importance to numbers, so you can't get away with only describing a project with words. In this lesson, you will learn about preparing numbers effectively. It's not hard to do, but it's essential to the success of your proposal.

Lesson 9 - Assembling Your Proposal

By the time you reach this lesson, you will have all the pieces you need for your proposal. Now it's time to put them all together and add the finishing touches so you can finally put a complete proposal in the mail.

Lesson 10 - So You Don't Get a Gift—What Now?

In the grant writing industry, you won't win them all. But when you do get a turndown, there are positive alternatives to doom and gloom. The suggestions in this lesson will help you deal with those inevitable turndowns.

Lesson 11 - So You Get a Gift—What Now?

Okay, just as you hoped—you did get a gift. There's an old saying in this business: Every gift paves the way to the next. This lesson will ensure you know just how to pave that road.

Lesson 12 - Some Thoughts About Writing Grant Proposals to Individuals

Now that you have all the elements you need for your proposal; can you also send it to an individual? Partially, yes. But you need to think about what would interest an individual and how you can best present your proposal to them; that's what this final lesson covers.

Requirements

Prerequisites:

There are no prerequisites to take this course.

Requirements:

Hardware Requirements:

• This course can be taken on either a PC, Mac, or Chromebook.

Software Requirements:

• PC: Windows 8 or later.
• Mac: macOS 10.6 or later.
• Browser: The latest version of Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox are preferred. Microsoft Edge and Safari are also compatible.
• Adobe Acrobat Reader.
• Software must be installed and fully operational before the course begins.

Other:

• Email capabilities and access to a personal email account.

Instructional Material Requirements:

The instructional materials required for this course are included in enrollment and will be available online.

Instructor

Dr. Beverly A. Browning

Dr. Beverly A. Browning is a grant writing consultant and visionary who uses thought leadership to work with nonprofit organizations struggling with the woes of revenue stream imbalances. She has been researching grant funding, grantmaking trends, and board-related barriers to nonprofit capacity building for over 40 years. Together she and her team have helped her clients win over $750 million in grant awards.

Dr. Browning is the founder and director of the Grant Writing Training Foundation and Bev Browning, LLC. She is the author of 44 grant writing publications, including six editions of Grant Writing for Dummies and the 6th edition of Nonprofit Kit for Dummies (to be published in 2021).

Dr. Browning holds graduate and post-graduate degrees in organizational development, public administration, and business administration. She is also a Certified Strategic Planning Facilitator (CSPF), has a McNellis Compression Planning Institute Facilitation Training distinction, and is an Approved Trainer for the Grant Professionals Association (GPA), the Certified Fund Raising Executive International (CFRE, and the Grant Professionals Certification Institute (GPCI).

Instructor Interaction: The instructor looks forward to interacting with learners in the online moderated discussion area to share their expertise and answer any questions you may have on the course content.