TAKE CONTROL OF
ENHANCING YOUR
CAREER, TEACHING,
AND STUDENT
LEARNING
Cynthia Korpan, PhD
Director
ITeach: Certification in Higher Ed Inc
ITeach: Certification in Higher Ed Inc. provides certificates to career academics (sessionals, adjuncts, graduate students, and teaching- and research-stream faculty), or anyone teaching adults, whether in higher education, the workplace, or other courses or programs, either in person or online.
In this era of upskilling and micro-credentials, you want to make sure you have what you need to be successful. ITeach: certification will benefit you in several ways, it will:
- Expand your knowledge about learning and teaching.
- Build your leadership skills.
- Accelerate your career advancement.
- Potentially increase your compensation and stabilize job security.
- Promote respect and recognition from peers and colleagues.
- Create a greater network and peer-to-peer interactions.
- Show your commitment to developing your knowledge and skills.
- Validate your abilities to employers.
- Make yourself more desirable on the academic job market.
Certificates (registration available soon):
Teaching in Higher Ed (THE)
- Do you sometimes face challenges when teaching?
- Do you want to provide the best learning experience for your students?
- Are you looking for research-based strategies to help you design courses?
- Upon completion of this certificate, you will have a completely designed learning-centered course.
Being an Educational Developer (BED)
- Are you curious what an educational developer career would be like? (in some countries this role is termed an academic or faculty developer)
- Would you like to attain a certificate that gives you the knowledge and skills for this role?
- Upon completion of this certificate, you will have an educational developer’s dossier/portfolio, ready to submit for job applications or promotions.
Career Advancement Through Teaching Documentation (CATD)
- Are you coming up for tenure and promotion?
- Or are you a graduate student preparing applications for an academic position?
- Or maybe you are looking for teaching positions and realize you need a teaching philosophy, dossier/portfolio for applications?
- Upon completion of this certificate, you will have a complete evidence-based dossier/portfolio, ready to submit for job applications and promotions, and provide you with the foundation to build on throughout your career.
Peer Review and Observation of Teaching (PROT)
- Would you like to observe peers’ teaching and provide feedback?
- Would you like to have peers observe your teaching and have fruitful conversations about teaching?
- Upon completion of this certificate, you will have a concrete plan on how to conduct peer reviews and observation of teaching that you can implement immediately.
Effective Online Teaching (EOT)
- Are you curious about the different modes of teaching online, such as asynchronous, synchronous, hybrid, blended, and hyflex delivery?
- Would you like to design a course for online learning?
- Upon completion of this certificate, you will have a completely designed online course.
ITeach: certificates are:
- Offered online through asynchronous delivery.
- Delivered in the English language.
- Composed of a series of modules with authentic up-to-date curricula and competencies relevant to potential employers.
- Designed with a mastery approach; therefore, each module’s learning outcomes must be achieved before moving onto the next module. When complete, you will receive your certificate and a descriptive letter indicating the outcomes and competencies you achieved.
- Designed to be completed in no more than 30 hours, but you will be able to proceed through the certificate at the rate comfortable for you.
- To be completed within six months.
- Practical. At the end of each certificate, you will have outputs that you can use immediately in your teaching. The work you do in each certificate is for your purposes.
- Suitable if you have prior experience in higher education or teaching adults. Therefore, you:
- have an undergraduate or college degree,
- have or are currently enrolled in a Masters or Doctorate program,
- hold an instructor position in post-secondary,
- have years of teaching experience, or
- are teaching adults in person or through online courses.
- Cost effective and highly valuable micro-credentials. Each module is valued at $247.00 USD. If you do not complete the course within six months, you may retake the certificate at the advertised cost.
Testimonials:
The courses I have taken from Cynthia have provided me with a theoretical foundation that I use to better understand how to design classroom environments that promote learning. That foundation gives me an improved capacity to articulate pedagogical concepts so that I can perform effective literature searches to continuously improve my own teaching methods. Being able to engage literature effectively then gives me more confidence to take risks and evolve my courses at a faster rate.
Former faculty member student
Dr. Korpan is very skilled in online teaching and learning, using many effective options for learning in that environment and was able to give fulsome and helpful feedback to all students. Cynthia’s knowledge of learning and teaching in university settings is extensive. Her skills as an educator ensures that her courses and classes are organized, interesting, interactive, and engaging.
Peer colleague
Cynthia is a great instructor. Very knowledgeable about the subject matter. Good choices for assessment. Highly student–centered (i.e., not lecture–based) course activities. One of the best courses that I have taken or observed. Overall, she is a fantastic instructor and role model for teaching.
Former graduate student
Dr. Korpan is a delight to work with and is genuinely sincere, open, and considerate. She brings extensive research experience to her work and simultaneously helps others thrive in their own teaching and scholarship of teaching. Above all else, she understands educational excellence from a variety of perspectives: her extensive understanding of the research in the field; her own research studies and editing experiences; her program-building capabilities; and her hard work and innovation.
Peer colleague
Why is seeking certification important?
Increasingly throughout the world, institutions in higher education, governments, or governing bodies are requiring those who teach in post-secondary to hold a credential indicating that they are qualified to teach. In tandem, there is an increase in online and blended courses, initiatives to increase the quality of teaching, and in contingent faculty positions. For example, in the United States, two-thirds of faculty members in 2021 held adjunct status (Conway & Tobin, 2023). Further, as futurist Alvin Toffler predicted, people now need to learn, unlearn, and relearn continuously through their career.
What all have in common is that academics and those teaching adults are all content experts but not necessarily experts in learning theories and how to teach. Due to the increase in the requirement for teaching recognition globally, whether someone is teaching online or in person, within post-secondary institutions, for the government, in business, organizations, or to bring their knowledge base to clients around the world, it is necessary to provide this important certification. ITeach: fills this important gap. The target audience for certification includes graduate students, faculty, trainers, entrepreneurs, or anyone who teaches adults, anywhere in the world, whether online or in person.
Many institutions across the world offer certificate programs for graduate students and faculty from that institution but there is a vast range of commitment associated with certificates, ranging from completing a few workshops to recognized accredited programs (Palmer, 2011; von Hoene, 2011). Some countries throughout the world require teaching certificates in tertiary education but the opportunity to attain a certificate that qualifies someone to teach in higher education is not always easily accessible. There are many individuals who did not have the opportunity to attain a teaching certificate while a graduate student. The same is true for faculty. Time is limited and there are many demands. Further, increasingly, hiring committees for academic positions require evidence of teaching proficiency.
Faculty currently holding a position at an institution may want to attain a teaching certificate to enhance their skills, for tenure and promotion, required by the institution, or if looking for another position by enhancing their possibility to be competitive. A significant proportion of new faculty hires each year come from practice (up to 50% at some institutions), such as engineering, law, nursing, and medicine and lack knowledge and experience teaching, with some even lacking experience as a teaching assistant.
For business trainers, entrepreneurs, or anyone teaching a course about any topic, they will gain valuable skills that will make their courses, lessons, and teaching more impactful.
No matter what or who individuals are teaching, it is imperative and an ethical responsibility, that those who teach have training in the theory and practice of teaching and how people learn before they teach.
In short, certification:
- demonstrates professionalism (differentiates those who have sought certification and those who have not) (Gilley & Galbraith, 1986; Harland, 2020);
- enhances self-esteem and builds confidence (Johnson, Yukselturk, & Top, 2014; Korpan, Gounko, & Jarisz, 2024; Ryan & Deci, 2000);
- increases financial rewards (Damitio & Schmidgall, 2001); and
- connects individuals to ongoing sources of relevant information (Fertig, Zeitz, & Blau, 2009).
Cynthia Korpan, PhD
Director
ITeach: Certification in Higher Ed Inc
About me
I have over 18 years experience in Educational Development in Higher Education and over 35 years related to workplace learning. As the former Director of Teaching Excellence at the University of Victoria, I garnered significant experience in developing programs and courses, teaching undergraduates, graduate students, and professors, and mentoring many about learning and teaching in higher education. In 2017, I was honoured with the Educational Developers Caucus Leadership Award for my national work related to educational development. My research focuses on early career academics’ first teaching in the academic workplace. This work and my expertise has been and continues to be shared with institutions around the world, such as Canada, the United States, China, Uganda, Pakistan, and Ghana.
Gain an Advantage and Secure Your Dream Academic Position
Get this comprehensive guide to help you excel in crafting a compelling teaching dossier/portfolio.