FAQs

Internal Microcredential: A microcredential or badge at UNMC that meets the following criteria

• The target audience is internal users (i.e. those who can log in to the UNMC Canvas Instance) such as UNMC students, staff, and/or faculty.
• An approved issuer sponsors the microcredential/badge.*
• It fulfills an internal educational and/or professional development purpose
• It must not be tied to participation in a specific credit-bearing course
• The issuer has articulated defined standards for earning the microcredential/badge.
• An approved, branded badge is offered to represent achievement.
• The UNMC Canvas instance platform is used for issuing the microcredential/badge.

The topic depends solely on the need your course is addressing. The key thing is to keep noncredit courses focused to just once topic that is broken up into small chunks. Popular noncredit courses generally focus on topics that enhance professional knowledge or skills, enhance personal life skills, or improve hobbies or leisure activities.

To be considered for approval, your course must address a specific need to strengthen professional development and positively impact today's workforce. View current course topics on NU Advance to make sure a similar course doesn't already exist.

Credit courses are normally very extensive and focus on all areas of a topic. They tend to include multiple learning objectives and assessment models.

Noncredit courses tend to involve one small aspect of learning with only a few learning objectives. That's because the audience for noncredit and credit courses are vastly different. Busy professionals may not have time for theory, history or excessive background information. Instead, they prefer focused and relevant information they can learn in a short amount of time and immediately apply.

Like credit courses, noncredit and microcredential courses need to be designed to accommodate students with disabilities. View five tips for ADA-compliant inclusive design.

Learners earn a badge that can be displayed on LinkedIn, a digital portfolio, or a digital resume. Badges are a visual representation of the skill they’ve learned. The digital badge is specific to the course, though not all courses will include digital badges.