What are Certifications?
Certifications enable you to attach credits, normally kept as hours, to courses in the VISION Developer module and then keep track of the accumulated credit hours in VISION Learning Station. Every time a student completes course that has credits associated with it, VISION Learning Station calculates the credits that should be applied for the student, making it easy to track and report student progress. Credits are only applied when the student obtains a passing score or higher.
With the VISION Certification module, you can do the following:
•Create different categories of certification credits.
•Assign certification credits to lessons.
•Track the credits that students earn when they complete a lesson.
•Create reports detailing each student’s completion of each certification.
Overview of Steps
In order to use certifications in VISION, you must first create all of the required cross-reference tables in VISION Developer. After that, you can apply certification credits to courses, create certifications in the VISION Learning Station, and create certification records for learners. This is an overview of the process of setting up certifications in VISION so that you will know what to expect when you begin.
Set Up Certifications in VISION Developer
1.Create cross reference table(s) for certifications in VISION Developer.
2.Create cross reference items for certification requirements and link them to the certification table(s) in VISION Developer.
3.Link certification credits (requirement table items) to applicable course lessons in VISION Developer.
Administer Certifications in VISION Learning Station
4.Create certifications in the VISION Learning Station.
5.Link the VISION Learning Station certification to a VISION Developer certification cross reference table.
6.Add rules to requirements to specify how and when credits are applied to learner course completions.
7.Create certification records for learners in the VISION Learning Station.
Procedures to complete these steps are available in the VISION Learning Station help under Certifications.
Create Cross Reference Tables for Certification
Here, you will create the cross-reference tables that serve as the basis for your certifications. You will end up creating several cross-reference tables and linking them together, so follow the procedure carefully.
The process for creating cross-reference tables for certifications in the VISION Developer module is a multiple-part operation.
•First, you must create the "Certification" cross-reference table. You will make several tables, but you only need to make the “Certification" cross-reference table once.
•Next, you will create cross-reference table items that represent the certification's “requirements”.
•Then, you will create cross-reference tables for each "Requirement". You will make one for each requirement that you made an item for in the previous step.
•Finally, you will enter items in the requirement tables that show how many “credits” each requirement is worth.
Create the "Certification" cross-reference Table
1.Click cross-reference on the Main Menu and select Open.
2.The cross-reference window appears. Click the New… button on the bottom of the window.
3.Enter a title for the table and then enter “CERTIFICATION” for the User-Defined ID.
a.Note that VISION will know that this is the certification table because of “CERTIFICATION” in the user-defined ID. Do not enter anything else in your certification table’s user-defined ID.
4.In the Select a Project box, choose to share the table among all projects since only shared certification tables will appear in the Learning Station. Click OK.
Create Requirement Items within the Table
1.Open the certification table you just created by highlighting the table’s name in the cross-reference Tables window, and click the Open button.
2.Click the New Item button on the menu bar (
) or click New Item in the cross-reference menu on the Main Menu.
3.Enter a descriptive name in the Item text box and a User-Defined ID in the field of the same name. You will use this same User-Defined ID in the following steps.
4.Click OK to close the cross-reference item that you just created. Close the CERTIFICATION table and return to the list of cross-reference tables.
Create a cross-reference Table for Requirements
1.Create a requirement cross-reference table by clicking the New… button on the bottom of the cross-reference window. Give it the same name and user-defined ID that you gave the requirement item above.
2.When you are finished, click OK to close the table.
Create Credit Value Items within the Requirement Table
1.With the requirement cross-reference table highlighted, create a new item () and, in the text field, enter the number of credits that a lesson linked to this requirement is worth. You do not need to enter anything into the User-Defined ID field.
2.Repeat this procedure from for all the requirement cross-reference tables you need to create.
Link Certification Credits to Training Units
Certification programs for different jobs can be given different types of credits. One or more type of credit can be assigned to a lesson. Learners may also earn different kinds of credits depending on what they need to remain qualified for.
An important concept to remember when using the VISION Certification module is to make sure the course to lesson ratio is 1:1.
Follow these instructions to link certification credits to an existing training unit in the VISION Developer module:
1.In the Program hierarchy of the VISION Developer module, select a training unit within a “Course” organizer. Each training unit must have its own course organizer.
2. The training unit, or lesson, must be one of the following types: "Instruction and Associated Exam", "Instruction Only", or "Cognitive Exam Only".
3. If you have a SOCCED ILA number to use for reporting purposes, add it to the User-Defined ID field of the training unit (on the General tab).
4.Double-click the training unit to open the Properties window and click the cross-reference tab.
5.Use the Link button to add credit value items (numbers) from one or more requirement cross-reference tables.
6.When you are finished, click OK to save.
Continue setting up Certification in the VISION Learning Station and Certifications Web modules. See job aids in the VLS Help under Certifications.
