Create virtual training and blended learning experiences through self-paced online courses. Our e-learning structure allows you to create courses from scratch or using existing content. Easily embed media, connect with community members in learning checkpoints and monetize courses with our built-in e-commerce functionality. Each course is accompanied with a peer-reviewed micro-credential saved to a community member’s profile and easily shared via a micro-credential link. Read more about micro-credentials.
Educational institutions use virtual courses to design learning pathways that build upon in-person courses, museum events or staff professional development trainings.
Unlike boring discussion forums, we’ve designed our discussion threads to be collaborative and easily embedded into learning experiences within your community. Starting a discussion thread takes seconds and can be tied to institutional projects, online training courses, topics of interest or simply getting to know one another in the community. Embed media, tag users and subscribe to discussions for email updates so that you never miss a beat. Take a look at a discussion thread here to see what's possible.
Spend time getting to know community members through formative and summative feedback structures. Our communities use a peer-reviewed micro-credential structure to reward achievements made and learning competencies achieved. Universities, museums and school districts use peer mentorship to ensure learning products tie back to course competencies and to engage members within the community. Learn more about this process here.
As your organization grows, create groups, or cohorts, to target communications based on specific interests, projects, levels of ambassadors and more. Groups can be used for tailored announcements and private discussions within your community.
Long gone are the tedious days of creating segmented email lists. Send announcements to your institution’s community, semester cohorts or various groups of users within your community on topics relevant to them. Announcements appear on the community home feed and automatically send emails to community members.
Have a quick question? Directly message members of your community or engage with other education institution leaders on the Participate platform. Our direct messaging feature allows you to search and connect with users in effective, real-time communication.
Organize your education institution’s resources in online resource collections. Similar to any online cloud folder, resource collections house all of the links and descriptions you need in one, privacy-safe space. Our resources tab also offers the opportunity to create customized webpages within your community. Collections can be hidden, public or private so that only members of the community or users of your choice can access them.
When the New York Hall of Science (NYSCI) developed a new student computational thinking game, The Pack, they were looking for a learning platform and partner with a strong background in education to support a robust teacher development program. An online Community of Practice with Participate continues to provide NYSCI educators with asynchronous professional learning experiences, a space to collaborate with other educators and product feedback structures for NYSCI to learn how educators use The Pack in their classrooms and beyond.
Elon University, a small private university based in Elon, N.C., uses a series of CoPs to train pre-service teachers, grant gifted education licensures and provide clinical teacher learning and support. Graduate students attend in-person classes and further learning and connection within the online community. Community members are awarded state-recognized micro-credentials for specific competencies they acquire.
A recent shortage in bilingual teachers has led districts to hire teachers needing an additional level of training that districts may not be prepared to provide. To address this situation, Wabash Valley Education Service Center (ESC) built a CoP focused on supporting educators and providing quality professional learning resources for all ELL teachers in Wabash Valley. In this community, teachers across more than 90 districts curate shared collections of teaching resources, share classroom best practices through collaborative discussions and take certified courses with competency-based micro-credentials.
Explore how education institutions like yours can build community and strengthen their impact.
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Download here →How an education service center uses a community to support ELL educators
Read about #ICANHELP’s community efforts to expand their message of positive social media use in teens
Read the blog →[Case study] How a science museum is shaping the future of game-based learning
Explore how NYSCI built a blended learning model to support their computational thinking game, The Pack.
Learn more →Education institutions rely on Participate because of our expertise in adult education and professional development. As former educators, instructional designers and education researchers, our team designed our social learning platform to meet the needs of growing organizations and their constituents. We focus on mission-alignment and intentionally partner with institutions looking to better support their adult learners by working together for the greater good, being kind, creating meaningful solutions and growing from successes and failures.
If your education institution has existing courses, events or training you’d like to move online, our instructional design team is here to help you transform those into vibrant learning experiences. We’ll take you through a guided process of online learning experience design and draft courses alongside you. Most education institutions come to us with some existing online courses, but if you’re just getting started that’s fine too! We can help you develop content and elearning experiences based on your institution’s unique needs and goals.
Most traditional learning management systems will focus solely on e-courses or forums to guide e-learning opportunities. Within a single learning experience in a Participate community, members have the opportunity to pick a personalized pathway of growth and engage with multiple users through courses, discussions, resource collections, direct messaging and more. Our tool was built for adult learning and collaboration, whereas Learning Management System competitors were often built student-facing first then adapted for adults.
Participate communities are similar to a social network combining its power with a Learning Management System. If your education institution only needs electronic courses or forums, then a Learning Management System may suffice. If you need a genuine community to facilitate connection and collaboration, then a community will be a better fit.
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