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Professional Development Studies
Welcome to Professional Development Studies (PDS) at the School of Communication and Information (SC&I). Whether you are a young professional, new manager, or experienced executive you will find a wide array of continuing education programs that will help you enhance your skills and succeed in your career.
PDS offers three non-credit professional online certificate programs:
- Business and Managerial Communication
- Public Relations
- Digital Asset Management (DAM)
- And PDS is currently developing a certificate in Health Communication and Information
To earn your certificate, you must complete six courses. You can start our programs with any course in any month. The course schedule loops so that you can complete the program in six months no matter which month you start in. You are also welcome to take stand-alone courses that meet your career development needs.
PDS certificates and courses are:
- 100% online
- Four weeks long
- Instructor-led and self-paced
- Immediately applicable to your career
PDS Current Classes
The ability to communicate in a clear, concrete, and concise manner is crucial to your success. Every time you participate in a meeting, give a project status update, lead a conference call, or engage in conversation with an organizational leader in the hallway - these are all opportunities to showcase your communication skills and positively impact how you are viewed in your organization. This course will increase your confidence, and verbal and non-verbal communication skills in situations ranging from giving an update at a team meeting to a large group presentation. The presentation techniques covered in this class will help professionals overcome barriers and communicate in a way that engages audiences and gets results.
This course offers participants with an interest in public relations or organizational communications an opportunity to gain insight into the practice of strategic public relations and build the framework to implement an actionable, effective strategic PR plan. The lessons in this course are designed to help participants learn to see the PR process more strategically, including understanding research and planning, knowing how to make strategic choices, selecting from a multitude of tactical options, and evaluating program effectiveness. By focusing on outcomes rather than outputs, the result will be positive recognition for you and your organization.
Digital assets are the essential building blocks of today’s digital world. Digital assetsareimages, videos, graphics, or any other digital file and the metadata that describes these assets.Digital Asset Management (DAM) is the blend of software and business practices to manage these many digital assets. This course provides the foundational understanding of the concepts, components, and organizational values expected of a DAM system. The basics of DAM--acquire, describe, manage, transform, use, preserve, and archive--will be covered, as will the ten core characteristics of any DAM system. This course is designed for those who are new to working in DAM, considering DAM as a career, supporting DAM technically in your organization, or just interested in this growing field.
