Continue Your Education at CampusMBA

Your Computer, Your University... Continuing education for professionals renewing licenses is a continuing challenge. How to do it as quickly, cheaply and painlessly as possible? ... I knew that the Mortgage Bankers Association of America (MBA) had developed a serious online education program. So it was fun to surf around their CampusMBA web site with Dan Thoms, Senior Director, Education Products & Services. Wow, this is quite a comprehensive education site.

While you'll see links to print-based, classroom-based and video-based courses, I was most interested in web-based courses (naturally). At any given time Thoms says that there are 10-12,000 people taking courses, which average 15 hours in length, typically require six months to complete and cost about $125. Each online course includes its curriculum content, as well as threaded discussions and testing. Six states recognize these courses for state certification for the lending industry, and more are expected in the future.

After the tour I was more convinced than ever that there is a role for online training and certification. It will NOT replace the personal interaction with a real instructor like friends Mike Lipsey at the Lipsey Company or Tom Gille at REAL Systems, who provide excellent training. But in the future, companies will leverage personal training with web-based training to spread the word quickly and cost effectively. ... If you'd like to share your experience with online training, I'd love to hear your comments. Send me e-mail. Thanks!

--Peter Pike