Learning Partner Archives

Program Overview

This program will teach you core cybersecurity competencies including information security, network security and penetration testing. This exposure will allow the student to better understand the different opportunities available for employment in the cybersecurity sector. Demand for cybersecurity is exploding in both the United States and worldwide. The courses will utilize both python scripting and tool usage to give the students hands-on experience penetrating and defending systems. In addition to the applied cybersecurity labs, students will also gain an understanding of the complexity in defending business systems both today and in the future. Students looking for careers in information technology, risk management, cyber defense, cyber threats, cybercrime, digital forensics, incident response, IT Security, computer networking, cybersecurity risks, information assurance, intrusion detection, risk assessment, security analysis, and vulnerability management can all benefit from the material in the courses.

What you will learn

Apply a security mindset while remaining ethical.
Implement security design principles.
Explain the core concepts of access control.
Implement reference monitors.
Apply security policies that are commonly used in modern operating systems.
Analyze the security of a basic secure system.
Explain virtualization and the impact on security and efficiency.
8. Think and work like an ethical penetration tester, implementing a repeatable and mature methodology that is tailored for each assessment.
With a given target, successfully identify vulnerabilities, score their risk, and explain mitigations.
Responsibly disclose findings in a professional report that can be used to recreate the exploit, explain the impact to the target, and prioritize each finding.
Enumerate target hosts, domains, exposures, and attack surface.
Identify flaws and vulnerabilities in applications, websites, networks, systems, protocols, and configurations using both manual techniques and assistive tools.
Reverse engineer compiled applications to discover exploitable weaknesses.
Write new exploits to test various types of vulnerabilities on clients, against servers, and to escalate privileges.
Demonstrate the fundamentals of secure network design.
Understand the issues involved with providing secure networks.
Analyze underlying cryptography required for secure communications, authorization and authorization.
Enumerate the issues involved with providing secure networks.

Courses List

Learn the fundamentals of information security, including Security Design Principles, Threat Modeling and Security Policy.

Learn more fundamentals of information security, including Introduction to Cryptography, Authentication, Access Control and Containerization.

Learn more fundamentals of information security, including Injection Attacks and Defenses, Privacy and Anonymity Software Validity and Rights, Cryptocurrency.

Learn more fundamentals of network security, including cryptographic algorithms used in networking protocols, TLS/SSL, IPSec Layer 2 Security and Wireless Security.

Learn advanced topics in network security, including Security Monitoring, Perimeter Security, IPv6 and IPv6 Security.

Learn fundamentals of penetration testing, including an Introduction to Penetration Testing Methodologies, Recognisance and Enumeration for Penetration Testers, Scanning and Vulnerability Enumeration.

Learn exploitation phase of penetration testing, including the foundations of explorations, application debugging, reverse engineering, exploitation development and web application exploitation.

Learn post-exploitation phases of penetration testing, including Owning, Pivoting, Privilege Escalation and other advanced penetration testing topics.

Learn fundamentals of network security, including a deep dive into how networks are attacked by malicious users.

Meet your instructors

Justin Cappos

Associate Professor at New York University Justin Cappos is a professor in the Computer Science and Engineering department at New York University. Justin's research philosophy focuses on improving real world systems, often by addressing issues that arise in practical deployments.

Aspen Olmsted

Adjunct Professor at New York University Tandon School of Engineering Aspen Olmsted is an adjunct faculty member in the New York University Tandon School of Engineering in the Computer Science and Engineering department. Aspen's fulltime job is as an assistant professor and Graduate program director at the College of Charleston. He obtained a Ph.D. in Computer Science and Engineering from The University of South Carolina. Before his academic career, he was CEO of Alliance Software Corporation. Alliance Software developed N-Tier enterprise applications for the performing arts and humanities market. Dr Olmsted’s research focus is on the development of algorithms and architectures for distributed enterprise solutions that can guarantee security and correctness while maintaining high-availability. In his Secure Data Engineering Lab, Aspen mentors over a dozen graduate and undergraduate students each year

Program Overview

This program will teach you core computer science competencies in programming and data structures. Understanding how programming works is essential in many technical disciplines such Information Technology, Software Engineering, Cybersecurity, and Computer Science. The courses utilize the C++ programming languages to establish a solid foundation in programming and data structures for the students. Students gain valuable hands-on experience programming solutions to problems in the labs. I the labs, students will practice their core programming skills and will also develop many advanced data structures including, hashtables, sorting and search algorithms, binary trees, AVL trees, graph algorithms and many more advanced computing topics. In addition to the applied programming labs, students will also gain an understanding of computational complexity through the analysis of the data structures and programs that are developed.

What you will learn

Identify and explain a programming development lifecycle, including planning, analysis, design, development, and maintenance.
Demonstrate a basic understanding of object-oriented programming by using structures and classes in software projects.
Use object-oriented programming techniques to develop executable programs that include elements such as inheritance and polymorphism.
Document and format code in a consistent manner.
Apply basic searching and sorting algorithms in software design.
Apply single-and multi-dimensional arrays in software.
Use a symbolic debugger to find and fix runtime and logical errors in software.
Demonstrate a basic understanding of programming methodologies, including object oriented, structured, and procedural programming.
Describe the phases of program translation from source code to executable code.
Design and develop programs that utilize linked lists to store data internally.
Design and develop programs that utilize stacks and queues to manage collections of data.
Design and develop programs that recursion to solve problems that can be expressed with recurrence.
Utilize binary search trees and balanced trees to implement fast retrieval of data from a collection of data stored in memory.

Course List

Learn the fundamentals of programming in the C++ programming language, including iteration, decision branching, data types and expression.

Learn the advanced programming topics in the C++ programming language, including functions, computation complexity, arrays and strings.

Learn the advanced programming topics in the C++ programming language, including pointers, dynamic storage, recursion, searching, and sorting.

Learn the advanced programming topics in the C++ programming language, including file processing, linked lists, stacks, queues, trees, binary search trees and tree balancing algorithms.

Meet Your Instructors

Aspen Olmsted

Adjunct Professor at New York University Tandon School of Engineering Aspen Olmsted is an adjunct faculty member in the New York University Tandon School of Engineering in the Computer Science and Engineering department. Aspen's fulltime job is as an assistant professor and Graduate program director at the College of Charleston. He obtained a Ph.D. in Computer Science and Engineering from The University of South Carolina. Before his academic career, he was CEO of Alliance Software Corporation. Alliance Software developed N-Tier enterprise applications for the performing arts and humanities market. Dr Olmsted’s research focus is on the development of algorithms and architectures for distributed enterprise solutions that can guarantee security and correctness while maintaining high-availability. In his Secure Data Engineering Lab, Aspen mentors over a dozen graduate and undergraduate students each year

Itay Tal

Industry Assistant Professor at New York University Tandon School of Engineering Tel-Aviv University 2005 M.Sc., Computer Science Tel-Aviv University 1998 B.Sc., Computer Science and Mathematics

Program overview

The power sector is at a critical juncture. We urgently need to reduce the fossil fuel intensity of our power generation mix and, in many countries, power sector reform can bring other benefits, such as improvements in health and economic growth. In this program, leading academics from Imperial College London, alongside NREL and experts from industry, will explain why and how to clean up the power sector in your country, illustrated with current, real-life case studies and practical advice. Key global figures from the public and private sector add their own personal and professional perspectives to this course.

The Clean Power Program includes best-practice power sector reform policies from the perspectives of legislators, policymakers, the energy sector, investors and civil society. The first course will explain the way that clean power fits into a wider set of political priorities, such as health, technology, energy security, economic growth and the environment, in any country or region. In the second course, the policy landscape for the power sector is described in detail, demonstrating how policies can help stimulate the growth of clean power. The third course outlines the challenges and solutions to integrating different types of power sources into one stable, reliable system.

This program will equip you with the knowledge and tools to create a pro-renewables and investor-ready policy environment in your own region. In a world committed to meeting the climate change goals in the Paris Agreement, you will be well-informed to apply solutions in your own context.Established ten years ago as an Institute of Imperial College London, the Grantham Institute is a world-leading authority on climate change and environmental issues. The Grantham Institute will bring industry and public sector experts from around the world to share their practical and recent experience.

What you will learn

How to balance different political priorities to deliver clean power policies
What benefits clean power implementation can bring to different countries around the world and, specifically, what they bring in your context
What makes a successful, renewables-friendly policy environment
How to attract finance for your clean power projects
How to deliver secure and affordable clean power
How to integrate a high volume of variable renewables into a grid successfully

Program Class List

Meet Your Instructors

Jo Haigh

Professor at Imperial College London

Professor Joanna Haigh has been Co-Director of the Grantham Institute at Imperial College since 2014. For the previous five years she was Head of the Department of Physics. Jo's scientific interests include radiative transfer in the atmosphere, climate modelling, radiative forcing of climate change and the influence of solar irradiance variability on climate. She has published widely on these topics in the scientific literature and contributed to numerous items to the written and broadcast popular media. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society and of the Institute of Physics and an Honorary Fellow of Somerville College Oxford. She has been President of the Royal Meteorological Society, Editor of Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society and of the Journal of Atmospheric Sciences, a Lead Author on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and acted on many UK and international panels.

Kris Murray

Dr at Imperial College London

Kris is an ecologist with interests in global change, conservation and health, working on problems where these key themes are interconnected, including: human health - climate, environmental and social change impacts on infectious disease burdens and distributions, disease emergence, zoonoses, biosecurity risks, health economics; and climate change - influence on ecosystems, biodiversity and health risks In particular, Kris focuses on problems that characterise the impacts of global change, that could also be leveraged for mitigating human impacts and promoting better stewardship of the natural world.

Shane Tomlinson

Mr at Imperial College London

Shane Tomlinson, a Director of E3G, leads work on political economy mapping and overseeing the UK programme. He previously served as the Director of Development at E3G working across the organisation on strategy development, fundraising and the creation of systems for change. Prior to joining E3G Shane was a Senior Research Fellow at Chatham House where he published research on the future of the EU Energy Union, Brexit, stranded assets and the future of the international climate regime. He has also worked as a Policy Adviser in the Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit working on energy policy, sustainable consumption and production issues and the design and launch of the Extractives Industry Transparency Initiative (EITI) at the World Summit on Sustainable Development. Shane holds an MPA from the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton University, an MSc in Economic History from the London School of Economics and a BSc in Economics and Economic History from the University of Bristol.

Richard Green

Professor at Imperial College London

Richard Green has been studying the economics and regulation of the electricity industry for nearly 30 years. The main focus of his recent work has been on the impact of low-carbon generation (nuclear and renewables) and energy storage on the electricity market, and the business and policy implications of this. He has written extensively on market power in wholesale electricity markets and has also worked on transmission pricing. He has been a professor at Imperial College Business School since 2011. He was previously Professor of Energy Economics and Director of the Institute for Energy Research and Policy at the University of Birmingham, and Professor of Economics at the University of Hull. He started his career at the Department of Applied Economics and Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge. He has spent time on secondment to the Office of Electricity Regulation and has held visiting appointments at the World Bank, the University of California Energy Institute and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Clementine Chambon

Dr at Imperial College London

Clementine Chambon is a researcher in renewable energy technologies for rural electrification. Her interests lie in optimising design and delivery models for decentralised energy systems to reach the most energy-deprived communities in the world. Her current project examines biomass gasification and its application for rural electrification in LED countries. This spans topics such as electricity demand estimation, technological performance of biogasifiers, integration with other generation technologies as part of a hybrid system, and analysing their impact in terms of cost and CO2 mitigation potential. The research findings are directly commercialised through Oorja Development Solutions, a mission-driven company active in deploying solar mini-grids and community solar irrigation systems to provide clean energy access to off- and weak-grid communities in rural India.

Jeff Hardy

Dr at Imperial College London

Dr Jeffrey Hardy is a Senior Research Fellow at the Grantham Institute - Climate Change and the Environment at Imperial College London, where he researches energy market transformation, innovative business models. He is also a Non-Executive Director of Public Power Solutions, a wholly-owned company of Swindon Borough Council specialising in renewable power and waste solutions. Previously he was Head of Sustainable Energy Futures at the GB energy regulator, Ofgem and Head of Science for Work Group III of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. He’s also worked at the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the UK Energy Research Centre, the Royal Society of Chemistry, the Green Chemistry Group at the University of York and at Sellafield as research chemist in a nuclear laboratory.

Ajay Gambhir

Dr at Imperial College London

Ajay Gambhir is a Senior Research Fellow at the Imperial College London Grantham Institute for Climate Change and the Environment. His research addresses how society can transition to a low-carbon economy, considering the technologies and measures required to do so. He uses energy systems models at sub-national, national, regional and global scales to map out potential low-carbon transition pathways, with a particular focus on the processes that drive down low-carbon technology costs, thereby making their deployment more cost-effective. Ajay has been at Imperial College since 2010, during which time he has been the scientific lead on a number of low-carbon pathways studies for the UK government as part of its AVOIDing dangerous climate change programme. He has also led and participated in ESRC and EPSRC studies on manufacturing innovation for the production of low-cost solar PV modules, energy storage innovation, and rural electrification using solar PV and batteries. Currently he is focusing on the political economy of low-carbon pathways and how to design policies to support an equitable transition. Before joining Imperial College, Ajay was the Team Leader for EU and International Climate Change Economics at the UK Government’s Department of Energy and Climate Change. He has also worked in the UK’s Office for Climate Change, as part of the civil service team that prepared the initial draft of the Climate Change Act 2008, the world’s first climate legislation. He has also worked in the UK Committee on Climate Change, which he helped design and set up as part of his work on the Climate Change Act.

Program overview

The Columbia University Center for Veteran Transition and Integration (CVTI) supports excellence and innovation in transition programming for current and former members of the armed forces.

As a service member in transition, you may face barriers reaching your potential in accessing higher education and beginning meaningful careers, despite the many effective programs offered to this population by the Department of Labor, Department of Defense’s Transition Assistance Program, and other programs offered by the Army, Air Force, Navy, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard. With this in mind, the CVTI is dedicated to creating free courses that will help to break down those barriers to your successful transition. Currently we are offering three courses to meet these demands, with more courses on the way. While these courses are created for veterans and active duty service members, they are free and available for all.

Attaining Higher Education is a course designed to facilitate the successful transition of active duty service members and veterans to postsecondary education, whether at a two- or four-year college for an associate’s or bachelor’s degree, or even graduate school.

University Studies for Student Veterans helps orient veterans to the norms and expectations of the college classroom, along with offering strategies to ease the transition, to help achieve academic goals, and to allow students to optimize their college education.

Find Your Calling: Transition Principles for Returning Veterans will focus on the development of interpersonal, intrapersonal, and intellectual character strengths as they relate to making a successful career transition from military service to the civilian workforce. The course content is meant to provide you with a framework for an iterative process of self-reflection and the development of practical skills that enables you to make career choices that better align with your values, ambitions, and continued service. Ultimately, this course helps you answer the question: What should I do next?

What will you learn

General and detailed information about colleges and universities.
Foundational academic and study skills for achieving academic success in college.
Strategies for more effective reading, writing, test preparation, and time management.
Practical tips and strategies for making a successful military-to-civilian career transition.
A framework for how to begin thinking about and exploring new career opportunities.

Program Class List

Prepare to transition to college using intentional decision-making. Aimed at active duty service members and veterans, with this course you will learn about the college admission process, including financial aid, to help you choose a right-fit college.

This course helps veterans transition smoothly from military service to college, and helps them maximize their success once they arrive.

This course provides military veterans with a useful roadmap to transition more smoothly from military service to a new and meaningful civilian career.

Meet Your Instructors

Beth E. Morgan

Director of Higher Education Transition and Partnerships at Columbia University Born in Quantico, Virginia, Beth grew up in a Marine Corps family and was raised around the world, living for periods of time in Hawaii, Germany, and Korea. Professionally, Beth has worked for the Central Intelligence Agency, for several non-profits, as a consultant, and on staff at major universities throughout the United States, including Colgate University, Princeton University, and the University of Southern California. Prior to joining the Center for Veteran Transition and Integration at Columbia University, Beth worked most recently with the non-profit Service to School as Executive Director and previously directed the Marine Corps Leadership Scholar Program (LSP), both of which assisted transitioning service members and veterans with admission to undergraduate and graduate programs. Beth has a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Virginia and a Master of Arts degree from Stanford University.

R.J. Jenkins

Curriculum Designer at Columbia University Before joining the Columbia University Center for Veteran Transition and Integration as a Curriculum Designer in 2016, R.J. served as an Associate Dean of Students at Columbia University’s School of General Studies where he directed the Academic Resource Center and served as the lead instructor for University Studies, a transition course for first-year, non-traditional students. An award-winning teacher, R.J. has advised college students at Columbia, Cambridge, and Harvard Universities, and has taught courses in English and American literature, literary history, close reading, academic skill-building, and English for Speakers of Other Languages. R.J. holds a Bachelor of Arts in English and anthropology from Columbia University (2003), a Master of Letters in English literature from the University of Cambridge (2005), and is currently pursuing doctoral work in English literature.

Skip Bailey

Senior Advisor to the Director of Educational Financing at Columbia University William ”Skip” Bailey has been a financial aid administrator for more than 34 years. He has been managing financial aid for non-traditional students at the School of General Studies (GS) for over 20 years. Previously he administered financial aid at multiple colleges including the University of San Diego and the University of Michigan. A degree in education from Michigan State University and lots of experience has provided Skip with the tools he uses every day to assist students at GS with the myriad issues involved with college financial aid.

Tanya Ang

Vice President of Veterans Education Success at Columbia University Tanya is the Vice President of Veterans Education Success and has more than 17 years of experience in higher education. She has worked at the American Association of State Colleges and Universities and also served as the Director of Veterans Programs at the American Council on Education. Prior to joining ACE, Tanya worked at two universities including working as an Administrative Analyst for the Vice President of Student Affairs Office at California State University - Fullerton and as Associate Registrar at Vanguard University where most her work focused on the non-traditional student including military and student veterans. She was the certifying official at her institution for student veteran GI Bill benefits and worked hand-in-hand with the various offices on-campus to ensure students received the benefits and the support they needed to successfully navigate their academic career. In her current role, she works to ensure military-connected students have access to high-quality education to achieve their long term career goals. Tanya is the first in her family to graduate from college, and earned her BA in Communications at Biola University and an MA in Organizational Leadership at Vanguard University.

Sara Remedios

Associate Dean of Students at Columbia University Sara is Associate Dean of Students at Columbia University’s School of General Studies where she directs the Academic Resource Center and oversees all academic and learning initiatives. Before coming to Columbia, she worked to restructure the CUNY Pipeline Honors Program, a program dedicated to assisting exceptional undergraduate students from underrepresented backgrounds in gaining admission to doctoral programs. She is also an accomplished teacher. Dean Remedios holds a B.A. in English and political science from Washington University in St. Louis (2009), an M.Phil. in English literature from the City University of New York (2014), and a Ph.D. in English literature from the City University of New York (2016).

Josh Edwin

Senior Assistant Dean of Students at Columbia University Josh is Senior Assistant Dean of Students at Columbia University’s School of General Studies. His teaching experience at Columbia includes University Studies, academic writing classes, one-on-one writing support, and creative writing workshops for veterans. He has also taught at a public high school in Atlanta and an English language school in Seoul, South Korea. In addition to teaching, he has published widely as a poet, translator, and reviewer. He holds a B.A. in English and creative writing from Emory University and an M.F.A. in poetry and literary translation from Columbia University’s School of the Arts.

Michael Abrams

Executive Director - Center for Veteran Transition and Integration, Marine Corps Veteran at Columbia University Michael Abrams joined the Marine Corps shortly following the September 11, 2001 attacks and served on active duty for eight years, which included a deployment to Afghanistan with an infantry company as the artillery forward observer. After leaving active duty, Michael attended New York University’s Stern School of Business graduating with an M.B.A. in Finance and Entrepreneurship & Innovation. While attending business school, he founded FourBlock to help bridge the gap between returning service members and the business community. The program is a university accredited, semester-long course that educates and prepares transitioning veterans for meaningful careers in corporate America. FourBlock is in nearly twenty cities across the country, educating and serving hundreds of transitioning veterans each semester. Michael is now serving as the executive director of the Columbia University Center for Veteran Transition and Integration. The newly established center of excellence is dedicated to creating and supporting evidence-based programming that enables returning service members with reaching their academic and career potential.

William Deresiewicz

Best-Selling Author, Award-Winning Essayist at Columbia University William Deresiewicz is an award-winning essayist and critic, a frequent speaker at colleges and other venues, and the best-selling author of Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite and the Way to a Meaningful Life. He taught English at Yale and Columbia before becoming a full-time writer in 2008. Bill has published over 250 essays and reviews. His work has appeared in The New York Times, The Atlantic, Harper's, The Nation, The New Republic, The American Scholar, and many other publications. He has won the Hiett Prize in the Humanities, the Balakian Citation for Excellence in Reviewing, and a Sydney Award; he is also a three-time National Magazine Award nominee. His work has been translated into 17 languages and anthologized in more than 30 college readers. He has spoken at over 80 colleges, high schools, and educational groups and has held visiting positions at Bard, Scripps, and Claremont McKenna Colleges. Bill’s previous book is A Jane Austen Education. He is working on a book about how artists are making a living in the new economy.

Sheena Iyengar

World-Renowned Expert on Choice, S. T. Lee Professor of Business at Columbia University Professor Iyengar has taught courses in leadership and entrepreneurial creativity. Her research addresses the implications of offering people, whether they be employees or consumers, choices. She has examined choice in a multitude of contexts ranging from employee motivation and performance in a global organization, Citigroup, to chocolate displays at Godiva, to the magazine aisles of supermarkets, and to mutual fund options in retirement benefit plans. Professor Iyengar received the Presidential Early Career Award for her ongoing work in examining cultural, individual, and situational factors that influence people's choice-making preferences and behaviors.

Sebastian Junger

NYT Best-Selling Author, Documentary Filmmaker at Columbia University Sebastian Junger is the #1 New York Times Bestselling author of THE PERFECT STORM, FIRE, A DEATH IN BELMONT, WAR and TRIBE. As an award-winning journalist, a contributing editor to Vanity Fair and a special correspondent at ABC News, he has covered major international news stories around the world, and has received both a National Magazine Award and a Peabody Award. Junger is also a documentary filmmaker whose debut film "Restrepo", a feature-length documentary (co-directed with Tim Hetherington), was nominated for an Academy Award and won the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance.

Program Overview

The exciting field of Cloud Computing has experienced explosive growth. This transformative technology has not only altered the way business operate, but it has also shaken up the traditional structure of the IT department and placed new demands on staff members who are faced with reinventing their own careers. With organizations rapidly moving their infrastructures and services to the cloud, jobs are growing at a breakneck pace, with many positions are left unfilled.

Gain an understanding of cloud technologies such as AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, OpenStack, and vSphere and how to leverage them to increase business productivity and effectiveness. In this Cloud Computing MicroMasters program, you will learn about Infrastructure As A Service (IaaS), Platform As A Service (PaaS), Software As A Service (SaaS), and other “X as a service” platforms. You will receive key foundational knowledge about legal and compliance issues, security and risk mitigation and how to follow industry standards and best practices. You will also gain hands-on experience in implementing, configuring and managing cloud technologies.

This applied, graduate-level program is designed for learners who want to enter or advance their careers in this exciting and well-paying field. IT professionals not already working with cloud technologies will gain a solid foundation while those with some cloud experience will gain a more in-depth understanding of other cloud technologies and other knowledge such as security, policy, and legal and compliance issues.

What you will learn

Cloud computing foundations and models
Types of cloud computing technologies (ie: AWS, Azure, IBM)
Methods for managing a cloud computing adoption/migration project
How to design a cloud computing infrastructure or service
Deployment and configuration of cloud computing systems
Insuring cloud security and mitigating risk
SaaS, PaaS and IaaS and other service platforms

Courses in this program

Understand cloud computing technologies and how they can increase business productivity and effectiveness.

Learn how to design, configure, and manage a cloud computing infrastructure.

Learn methods for managing cloud computing projects and build an understanding of the various risks and compliance issues involved.

Learn how to identify security issues in the cloud and industry-standard techniques and procedures to prevent and mitigate risks.

Meet your instructors

Charif El MaMouni

Charif El MaMouni is a Cloud Computing professional with more than fifteen years experience in the Telecommunications and Finance industries with solid technical background in SDLC applied to DevOps, Automation and CICD, coupled with in-depth knowledge of public and private Cloud Infrastructure Architectures and Implementations. He holds a Master of Science in Computer Engineering from the University of Central Florida in addition to AWS Certified Solution Architect, DevOps Architect and PMP.

Jarrod Jordan

Mr. Jarrod Jordan is an Adjunct Faculty at University of Maryland Global Campus and Webster University and currently serves as a Cybersecurity Manager for the United States Army Cyber Protection Brigade (USACPB). His career spans over 18 years working in the Information Technology, Cybersecurity, and Intelligence industries. Mr. Jordan’s experiences as a practitioner extends throughout the Department of Defense (DoD) and Intelligence Community to include the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and the National Security Agency (NSA).

Patrick Appiah-Kubi

Patrick is the Program Director of Cloud Computing and Networking at University of Maryland Global Campus. He has over 13 years on industry and teaching experience in networks and cloud computing.

Jeff Tjiputra

Dr. Tjiputra is the Chair of the Cloud Computing Architecture program at University of Maryland Global Campus. He has over fifteen years experience teaching computer and information technology courses including computer networking, cybersecurity, and cloud computing.

Program endorsements

The pace of today’s digital transformation requires us all to make a concerted effort to keep our technical expertise current. Programs like UMGC’s MicroMasters program in Cloud Computing are excellent opportunities for people seeking to stay ahead of the curve, learning about cutting-edge cloud and modular technology solutions that are required to excel in a modern, 24/7 environment.

Greg Wenzel , Executive Vice President for Booz Allen’s Digital Solutions group

For the second year in a row, cloud and distributed computing led LinkedIn’s annual list of the skills employers need most in candidates, outpacing statistical analysis and data mining. When I published the world’s 1st Doctoral Dissertation on Cloud Computing in 2011, I envisioned cloud computing revolutionizing the enterprise. The Cloud Computing MicroMasters is an efficient and targeted way for those interested in this career path to obtain the foundational knowledge and skills in the growing cloud computing field.

Jeff Daniels , Senior Manager, Lockheed Martin Corporation

The pace of today’s digital transformation requires us all to make a concerted effort to keep our technical expertise current. Programs like UMGC’s MicroMasters program in Cloud Computing are excellent opportunities for people seeking to stay ahead of the curve, learning about cutting-edge cloud and modular technology solutions that are required to excel in a modern, 24/7 environment.

Greg Wenzel , Executive Vice President for Booz Allen’s Digital Solutions group

For the second year in a row, cloud and distributed computing led LinkedIn’s annual list of the skills employers need most in candidates, outpacing statistical analysis and data mining. When I published the world’s 1st Doctoral Dissertation on Cloud Computing in 2011, I envisioned cloud computing revolutionizing the enterprise. The Cloud Computing MicroMasters is an efficient and targeted way for those interested in this career path to obtain the foundational knowledge and skills in the growing cloud computing field.

Jeff Daniels , Senior Manager, Lockheed Martin Corporation

FAQs

Is there any way to reduce the time needed to take and pass the four online courses?
No. To earn the MicroMasters program certificate you need to successfully earn a verified certificate in all four Cloud Computing MicroMasters program courses when they are scheduled and then, pass the final, comprehensive proctored exam. The courses are on an instructor-paced schedule rather than self-paced, so there is no way to reduce the time to complete them.

Who can take this course?
Unfortunately, learners from Iran and Cuba will not be able to register for this course. While edX has received a licenses from the U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) to offer courses to learners from these countries, our licenses do not cover this course. EdX truly regrets that US sanctions prevent us from offering all of our courses to everyone, no matter where they live.

How many credits will I be eligible for after completing the MicroMasters program certificate?
Learners who successfully earn the MicroMasters program certificate and are admitted into UMGC’s graduate school are eligible to earn up to 12 credits toward the Master’s degree (36 credits are required for graduation with the MS in Cloud Computing Architecture degree).

Who is the MicroMasters program intended for?
The Cloud Computing MicroMasters program is designed for individuals who want to develop theoretical and technical competencies required to design and manage cloud computing environment.

What is considered a passing grade in the MicroMasters program courses?
Students must achieve a grade of 80% or higher for a passing grade in each of the courses in the MicroMasters program.

May I take one of the courses even though I have not taken its prerequisite?
No. The program content and course projects are sequential allowing the learner to build on subsequent work. Completing the listed prerequisite courses is essential in order to be successful in the course work.

Will I earn a separate certificate for each course or just one for the entire MicroMasters program?
You will receive an individual verified certificate for each Cloud Computing MicroMasters program course that you pass as a verified student. Students passing the final capstone project review and all four Cloud Computing MicroMasters program courses on a verified track will receive a MicroMasters program certificate.

Along with the four Cloud Computing MicroMasters program courses and the final, comprehensive exam, are there any other requirements in order to be eligible for the UMGC Master’s Degree?
Yes. You need to be admitted to the Master’s program. The MicroMasters program certificate does not guarantee admission. The Learner will need to complete the application process to UMGC and meet all entrance requirements for The Graduate School. For more information visit: https://www.umgc.edu/admissions/admission-requirements/graduate-admissions.cfm

Do I need to be a verified student to earn the Cloud Computing MicroMasters program certificate?
Yes. If you are interested in the Cloud Computing MicroMasters program certificate, you must successfully pass and receive a verified certificate in each of the four Cloud Computing Program courses (CC605x, CC607x, CC615x, CC617x) as well as successfully pass the final, comprehensive proctored exam .

How long does a student have to apply to and complete the full UMGC degree?
To ensure that your program remains relevant and up-to-date, UMGC sets time limits for completing a program. Students have five (5) consecutive years from the start of the graduate degree to complete their degree. For students who start with a MicroMasters, their “time clock” begins on the date that they complete their last course in the MicroMasters program and receive their Verified Certificate. This means that students should apply to UMGC promptly to begin the degree and have as much time as possible to complete it.

Program Overview

Gain an advantage by learning the key business essentials through this comprehensive online MicroMasters program, covering all core management disciplines.

Understanding the managerial context of decision making is critical to being a successful manager. The MicroMasters program in management from the Indian Institute of Management Bangalore, aims to provide the learner with the perfect learning pathway to develop core competencies across six management disciplines:

Accounting
Finance
Operations Management
People Management
Marketing
Business Strategy

Take advantage of the MicroMasters program certificate to rejuvenate your career or enhance your knowledge and program certificates by stepping into the campus at IIMB to complete an Advanced Management Programme on IIMBx.

What you will learn

An overview of business organizations and the role accounting plays in managing them.
Understand the role of operations management in a firm and develop the ability to structure and solve operations related problems.
Acquire a deeper understanding of the different aspects of people management.
An introduction to the systematic framework of marketing management and different approaches for marketing goods and services.
Master concepts and tools that are useful to managers for making financial decisions.
Understand the analytical approaches underlying strategy and competitive advantage.

Courses in this program

Understand key aspects of business operations and lean management including capacity, productivity, quality, and supply chain.

Learn to be a better manager by developing leadership and communication skills designed to turn first time managers into great team leaders.

Learn the ideas, concepts and tools managers use to make the right financial decisions.

Learn how a manager or CEO develops a business strategy, including analyzing the market and creating competitive advantage.

Learn how to read and interpret financial statements and manage costs to take informed business decisions.

Learn how to effectively apply marketing management theories and practices, including the marketing mix, through real-world business scenarios.

Meet your instructors

Ashok Thampy

Ashok Thampy is Professor of Finance at the Indian Institute of Management Bangalore. He received his Ph.D. from Krannert Graduate School of Management, Purdue University. Prior to joining IIMB, he was at the Department of Finance, Bilkent University, Turkey. He has also held visiting positions at the Department of Economics at Santa Clara University, USA, and the School of Business, Economics and Law, at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden. His research interests lie in the areas of Corporate Finance and Banking.

Ashis Mishra

Dr. Ashis Mishra is a faculty member in the Marketing Area at the Indian Institute of Management Bangalore (IIMB). Dr. Mishra teaches marketing management and retail management. His area of research involves Retail Productivity Analysis, Retail Atmospherics and Retail Consumer Behaviour. He has successfully developed and applied many quantitative models and business model frameworks in solving marketing/retailing-related problems. He has published over 10 papers in various national and international journals of repute. His current projects include ‘A Dynamic Model for Forecasting in Indian Retail Sector’, ‘Store Atmospherics as a Tool for Retail Productivity’ and ‘Technographic Segmentation of Indian Retail Consumers.’

Sai Yayavaram

Sai Yayavaram is an Associate Professor at the Indian Institute of Management Bangalore, where he teaches Competition & Strategy and Strategy Content. He also conducts executive education programmes on strategic management and management of innovation for senior managers. He is a Ph.D. in Strategic Management from McCombs School of Business, The University of Texas at Austin and holds a Post Graduate Diploma in Management from the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. His research focuses on technology management, complexity and strategic rents and has been published in Administrative Science Quarterly, Strategic Management Journal, and Organization Science.

P D Jose

P D Jose is an professor at the Indian Institute of Management Bangalore, where he teaches core courses on Business and Corporate Strategy and several electives on sustainability. He is a Fellow of the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad. He also has a Post Graduate Diploma in Forestry Management from the Indian Institute of Forest Management, Bhopal and Bachelors in Physics from the Institute of Science, Bombay. He has taught classes on strategy and/or sustainability at a number of schools including Cardiff University Business School (UK); the School of Economics and Business at the University of Goteborg, Sweden; Indian Institute of Management at Kozhikode and Ahmedabad. He has also consulted with several government agencies, non-governmental, private sector and international organizations.

Vasanthi Srinivasan

Vasanthi Srinivasan is a Professor in the Organizational Behaviour and Human Resource Management Area. Her research interests are in the field of HRM. She has been extensively involved in designing and delivering Leadership Development Programs for Indian and international companies. Her prior experience in offering the MOOC course - Introduction to People Management motivates her to effectively harness technology for learning impact.

MS Narasimhan

Professor MS Narasimhan teaches courses on Management Accounting, Financial Accounting, Corporate Finance and Investments. His areas of interest include Management Accounting, Corporate Finance and Capital Markets. He is a member of the Institute of Cost and Works Accountants of India. He has also completed a study on Corporate Disclosure Practices in India, sponsored under the FIRE project. He has published several articles and research studies in national and international journals and financial newspapers.

B. Mahadevan

B. Mahadevan is a Professor of Operations Management at the Indian Institute of Management Bangalore, where he has been teaching since 1992. He received his Ph.D. from IIT Madras. He was a visiting scholar at the Amos Tuck School of Business Administration, Dartmouth College, New Hampshire, in 1999–2000 and a retainer consultant to Deloitte Consulting LLP, USA, in 2001–2002. Prof. Mahadevan was one among the 40 nominated globally for the Economic Intelligence Unit’s (EIU) Business Professor of the Year Award, 2012. He is a member of the editorial board of the Production and Operations Management Journal _and the International Journal of Business Excellence. He has published several of his research findings in _California Management Review, European Journal of Operational Research, Interfaces, Production and Operations Management Journal and International Journal of Production Research.

Rejie George Pallathita

Rejie is an Associate Professor in the Corporate Strategy and Policy area at IIM Bangalore. He is a Ph.D. from Tilburg University in The Netherlands. Professor Pallathitta’s interests are in the areas of Corporate Governance, Strategic Management and International Business. He has published papers in the Strategic Management Journal and the Journal of Business Research and has presented his research work at several international conferences.

What you will learn

To design VR applications with Unity 3D
How OpenGL works and is used to create realistic looking applications
To transform coordinate systems for 3D interactions
Hardware components for VR and how they work
What makes a VR application successful
How to create your own VR app
How to use this VR program to develop augmented reality (AR) applications

Program Overview

Virtual reality (VR) is one of the hottest emerging technologies in the entertainment industry today. Millions of VR devices have been sold in the US alone, but most software developers have no formal training on the technology. This Professional Certificate program will teach you what VR devices exist, how VR technology works, and how to write software, often called VR experiences, for it.

You will learn effective 3D interaction techniques to use VR applications, how to write VR applications in WebVR and Unity 3D, and what features make a VR application successful. You will also learn the required mathematics for successful VR applications and how computer graphics are rendered onto a screen.

The final course in this program will allow you to apply the material learned in the previous courses to create your own VR app.

This program will provide you with a strong foundation to develop VR apps in all areas VR is used, including entertainment and gaming. This VR program also provides a solid foundation for people who want to develop augmented reality (AR) applications.

Courses in this program

Learn to create images of 3D scenes in both real-time and with realistic ray tracing in this introductory computer graphics course.

Learn how virtual reality technology works by writing simple VR programs with WebVR.

Learn the tools and techniques to develop your own professional VR app in Unity 3D.

Meet your instructors

Jurgen P. Schulze

Research Scientist and Adjunct Professor of Computer Science at UC San Diego Jurgen teaches computer graphics and virtual reality at UC San Diego. His research interests include applications for virtual and augmented reality systems, 3D human-computer interaction, and medical data visualization. He holds an M.S. degree from the University of Massachusetts and a Ph.D. from the University of Stuttgart, Germany. He spent two years as a post-doctoral researcher in the Computer Science Department at Brown University.

Ravi Ramamoorthi

Ravi Ramamoorthi is a Professor at the University of California, San Diego. He has taught computer graphics more than 10 times at Stanford, Columbia and UC Berkeley, and has been honored with a number of awards for his research, including the ACM SIGGRAPH Significant New Researcher Award and by the White House with the PECASE (Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers). He was a finalist for the inaugural edX Prize for Exceptional Contributions in Online Teaching and Learning.

Program Endorsements

At Qualcomm we are working on the next generation of mobile computing devices. Virtual and augmented reality are an important part of it. We value software developers with a strong foundation in 3D computer graphics programming and an understanding of virtual and augmented reality technology. It is my belief that candidates who successfully completed the edX Professional Certificate for Virtual Reality Application Development will be at an advantage when applying to Qualcomm’s computer graphics groups.

Ning Bi , Senior Director of Technology Computer Vision Systems, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc.

At Sixense Entertainment Inc. we need software developers with strong knowledge in the areas of computer graphics and virtual reality. Applicants who successfully completed the edX Professional Certificate for Virtual Reality Application Development will have a significant advantage.

Amir Rubin , CEO, Sixense Entertainment Inc.

At Qualcomm we are working on the next generation of mobile computing devices. Virtual and augmented reality are an important part of it. We value software developers with a strong foundation in 3D computer graphics programming and an understanding of virtual and augmented reality technology. It is my belief that candidates who successfully completed the edX Professional Certificate for Virtual Reality Application Development will be at an advantage when applying to Qualcomm’s computer graphics groups.

Ning Bi , Senior Director of Technology Computer Vision Systems, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc.

At Sixense Entertainment Inc. we need software developers with strong knowledge in the areas of computer graphics and virtual reality. Applicants who successfully completed the edX Professional Certificate for Virtual Reality Application Development will have a significant advantage.

Amir Rubin , CEO, Sixense Entertainment Inc.

What you will learn

Map significant milestones in the emergence of social media
Identify how different users are impacted by digital in/accessibility
Extrapolate current social trends online and map possible directions in social media
Understand how people interpret robots and bots as communicating, social, even emotional, others

Program Overview

Online communication and digital technologies dominate our everyday lives, extend our abilities, and change the way we communicate with each other. This series brings together three Internet Studies MOOCS:

NET1x will increase learners’ understandings of social media by looking at the ways networked connectivity let users become ‘social’
NET2x further explores the way digital technologies and social media channels impact our daily routines and transform how we live, using people with disability as a case study. Learners will be introduced to the social model of disability and the ways negative attitudes affect digital accessibility and representation.
Continuing the theme of human reliance on technologies, NET3x explores how people communicate with robots and bots in everyday life, both now and into the future.

Courses in this program

Discover where social media came from, how it became integral to our everyday lives, and how that has changed the way we communicate.

In Disability and Digital Media: Accessibility, Representation and Inclusion , we will explore the relationship between digital technologies and disability in the Internet age.

Robots and bots are being developed to populate our homes, workplaces and social spaces, as well as the online spaces we frequent. How do people communicate with robots and bots? What does the future hold for human-robot communication and collaboration

Meet your instructors

Gwyneth Peaty

Gwyneth is a sessional academic in Internet Studies at Curtin University. She completed a PhD exploring the grotesque in popular culture, and her wider research interests include monstrosity, post-humanism, horror and the Gothic.

Eleanor Sandry

Eleanor is a Senior Lecturer in Internet Studies at Curtin University. Her first degree was in Natural Sciences from Cambridge University. More recently, she completed a Masters in Communication Studies followed by a PhD in Communication and Cultural Studies at the University of Western Australia. Her research uses a range of communication theories and philosophies of technology to drive analyses of human-technology interactions and relations. She is particularly interested in the ways human-robot communication, where robots need not be humanlike in form, behaviour or intelligence, can support collaboration between humans and robots to complete joint tasks in the home, at work or in social spaces.

Tama Leaver

Tama Leaver is an Associate Professor of Internet Studies at Curtin University in Perth, Western Australia and a frequent expert media commentator. His research interests include online identity, social media, digital death, infancy online, mobile gaming and the changing landscape of media distribution. He has published in a number of journals including Popular Communication, Media International Australia, First Monday, Comparative Literature Studies, Social Media and Society, Communication Research and Practice and the Fibreculture journal. He is also the author of 'Artificial Culture: Identity, Technology and Bodies' (Routledge, 2012); co-editor of 'An Education in Facebook? Higher Education and the World’s Largest Social Network' (Routledge, 2014) with Mike Kent; and 'Social, Casual and Mobile Games: The Changing Gaming Landscape' (Bloomsbury Academic, 2016) with Michele Willson. Tama has received teaching awards from the University of Western Australia, Curtin University, and in 2012 received a national Australian Award for Teaching Excellence in the Humanities and the Arts.

Katie Ellis

Mike Kent

What you will learn

Understand that food security depends on food availability, food access, food utilization and stability
How we can produce enough food for everyone
How sustainable different food production systems are
How to assure access to sufficient, nutritious and safe food for everyone
About actors and activities to achieve food security at international, national, local, household, and individual level

Program Overview

Get involved: let’s find a way to feed 9 billion people in 2050

What are the biggest environmental issues we face? Pollution? Climate change? True. But among these environmental topics, feeding the growing population, 9 billion in 2050, is one of the most pressing issues we have to find a solution for.

To solve this problem, we need people to gain knowledge, do research, and explore the options. You can be a piece of the puzzle, help find a solution, and start now by gaining knowledge about food production systems, food security, sustainable development in agriculture and livestock, and systems thinking.

XSeries sustainable food security

How is it possible that the world currently produces enough food for everyone, but still people suffer from hunger and nutrient deficiencies? How can we produce sufficient food in an environmentally sustainable way to feed the increased world population in the future?

This Environmental Studies XSeries, developed by Wageningen University, consists of 3 courses:

The value of systems thinking

Learn about systems thinking and its application to improve the environmental sustainability of food production systems. The main topics are:

Complexity and diversity of food production systems
Principles of system analysis
Evaluation methods for the environmental impact of food production systems
Strong and weak points of different food production systems

Crop production

Learn the basics of crop production to feed the world and preserve our planet’s resources. The main topics are:

Basic concept of plant production
Issues related to global food production and consumption
Influences of water (scarcity and availability) and other measures on crop production
Processes that cause major problems for the environment
Measures to solve and prevent those problems

Food Access

Learn about the basics of food access decision-making from a multilevel perspective. The main topics are:

The basic principles of food access
Choices influencing food access
Dilemmas at household, local, national and international levels

About Wageningen University & Research

At Wageningen University and Research, we are dedicated to exploring the potential of nature to improve the quality of life. Studies and courses train (future) professionals from all over the world in sustainable food systems and help consumers make informed choices about what they eat, how it is produced and the impact of their decisions on the environment and society.

Course structures and certificates

The duration of each course (or MOOC: Massive Open Online Course) is flexible: study any time and place you want. You decide how to spend your time during a course. Gain the knowledge offered in each course free of charge through dynamic modules filled with video, syllabus, and assignments for practice and grading. Obtain your verified certificate for $ 49,- each. After successful completion of all 3 courses, you can obtain an overall certificate.

About course dates

EdX keeps courses available, even if the recent course date has expired. Enroll nonetheless, and allow yourself to explore content and continue learning. However, not all features and materials may be available. Check back often to see when new start dates are announced.

Scroll down to find more information about each separate course and join the Wageningen University XSeries about sustainable food security.

Courses in this program

Learn the basics of crop production and find out how to feed the future world population without depleting our planet’s resources!

Learn how to solve the 'Rubik's cube' of systems thinking and how it's applied to improve the environmental sustainability of food production systems!

Learn the basics of food access decision-making. In other words, who decides what ends up on your plate. Spoiler alert: it’s not just you!

Meet your instructors

Eddie Bokkers

Eddie Bokkers holds a PhD in Animal Sciences from Wageningen University. He is an associate professor at the Animal Production Systems group of Professor Imke de Boer. Eddie Bokkers teaches both undergraduate and postgraduate students including the course ‘Systems Approach in Animal Sciences’. That is why we could not find a more suitable person for explaining the systems approach in this MOOC. Eddie Bokkers manages several research projects contributing to our knowledge of sustainable development of animal production systems. He is especially interested in trade-offs and synergies between animal welfare, environmental impact and economics.

Martin van Ittersum

Martin van Ittersum holds a PhD in Agricultural and Environmental Science from Wageningen University. He is a professor at the Plant Production Systems group of the same university. His research and teaching focus on research concepts and methods for the analysis, design and integrated assessment of agricultural systems from field to farm, at regional and global levels. He applies these concepts to investigate opportunities for sustainable intensification of local and global food production. He (co-)developed and applied several of the concepts taught in this MOOC. He is currently co-leading the Global Yield Gap Atlas project that aims to map where and how much food production can be increased on existing agricultural land. He is also involved in research on resource use efficiency and environmental effects of different agricultural systems.

Ken Giller

Prof. Dr. Ken Giller is an outstanding expert in the field of Plant Production Systems. He leads a group of scientists with profound experience in farming systems analysis to explore future scenarios for land use with a focus on food production at Wageningen University. Ken’s research has focused on smallholder farming systems in tropical regions with special attention for sub-Saharan Africa. In particular problems of soil fertility, the role of nitrogen fixation in tropical legumes, and the temporal and spatial dynamics of resources use within crop/livestock farming systems have this interest. He leads a number of large initiatives such as N2Africa (Putting Nitrogen Fixation to Work for Smallholder Farmers in Africa), NUANCES(Nutrient Use in Animal and Cropping Systems: Efficiencies and Scales) and Competing Claims on Natural Resources.

Harrie Lovenstein

Harrie Lovenstein holds an MSc in tropical agronomy. He has specialized in arid land agriculture and gained hands on experience in o.a. runoff farming, agroforestry systems, and tree propagation techniques. All with common goal: "more crop per drop." He is presently affiliated to the Centre for Sustainable Development and Food Security at WageningenUR and involved in distance learning projects.

Gerrie van de Ven

Gerrie van de Ven holds a PhD in Agricultural Science from Wageningen University. She is employed at the Plant Production Systems Group. Gerrie van de Ven combines teaching and research with a focus on farming systems analysis and optimisation of land use systems. Nutrient cycling, environmental impacts and the interaction between crops and livestock, both in the western world and in Africa, have her special attention. Her scientific work has built on systems analysis and modelling approaches, mainly at the farm and regional level, as taught in this MOOC. She teaches both undergraduate and postgraduate students on these subjects.

Marrit van den Berg

Marrit van den Berg is associate professor at the Development Economics group, Wageningen University, the Netherlands. She studied tropical land use and development economics and obtained her PhD from Wageningen University in 2001.Her research concentrates on the livelihood of rural households in developing countries with special attention for food and nutrition security, (off-farm) diversification, technology adoption, and microfinance. She is involved in several projects assessing the impact of development interventions as project leader and senior researcher. Her teaching concentrates on methods, techniques and data analysis for field research. Her own toolbox includes mainly quantitative methods, such as econometric analysis of large scale surveys, behavioural experiments, and randomized controlled trials . She predominantly works with primary data and has research experience in Latin America, Asia, and Africa.

Hilde Bras

Hilde Bras (1968) is full professor and chair of the Sociology of Consumption and Households Group (SCH) at Wageningen University, the Netherlands. She holds a PhD in Sociology from Utrecht University/ICS. She has published extensively on demographic and life course outcomes, including marriage, fertility, migration and status attainment, on social changes in families and households, and on sibling differences and effects. She received prestigious grants for her work on siblings (VENI, Medium Investment) and for her research on family influences on fertility (VIDI, ASPASIA). She is co-editor-in-chief of The History of the Family: An International Quarterly. Her current research focuses on inequalities in food and nutrition security within and across households, and particularly on the causes and effects of inadequate food access in the life courses of women, children and adolescents.

Jeroen Candel

Jeroen Candel finished a bachelor in Public Administration and Organisational Science and a master in Public Governance (cum laude) at Utrecht University before completing his PhD research entitled 'Putting food on the table: the European Union governance of the wicked problem of food security' at the Public Administration and Policy Group (PAP), Wageningen University, the Netherlands, in April 2016. He currently works as assistant professor at the PAP group. He is interested in emerging forms of food policy and governance and studies these by applying public policy and governance theories. By doing so, he both contributes to theoretical debates and provides concrete suggestions for policymakers and stakeholders. Beside his research, Jeroen coordinates and teaches introductory courses on Public Policy and Governance and European Union politics.

Jessica Duncan

Jessica Duncan is an Assistant Professor in the Rural Sociology Group, Wageningen University. She holds a PhD in Food Policy from City University London and is the author of the book Global Food Security Governance: Civil society engagement in the reformed Committee on World Food Security (Routledge, 2015). She is an Associate Editor of the journal Food Security and the co-chair of the ECPR Food Policy and Governance Research Network. Her research focuses on the social-political dynamics of global norm setting for food security and the ways in which non-state actors participate in policy making processes. She is motivated by transformative governance mechanisms that support pathways to just and sustainable food systems.

Ewout Frankema

Ewout Frankema is professor and chair of Rural and Environmental History at Wageningen University and elected member of the Young Academy of the Royal Dutch Academy of Arts and Sciences. His research focuses on a deeper understanding of the long-term economic history of developing regions (Africa, Latin America, Asia). His work is based on a holistic conception of historical evolutionary processes in which he aims to link the distinctive fields of economic and social history, colonial history, rural history, neo-institutional economics, political economy and environmental history. Frankema is a board member of the N.W. Posthumus Institute, the African Economic History Network (AEHN) and the Center for Global Economic History (CGEH), research fellow of the Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR) and editorial board member of the Economic History of Developing Regions (EHDR).

Peter Oosterveer

Peter Oosterveer received his PhD in 2005 at Wageningen University in the Netherlands. His research and teaching is in the field of globalization and sustainability of food production and consumption. His interests are in particular on global public and private governance of food towards sustainability, including labeling and certification of food. Increasing globalisation of food raises difficult challenges in promoting sustainability as distances between producers and consumers are increasing and supply chains are becoming more complex. Conventional national government-based regulation is no longer sufficient and therefore the roles of private and civil society based actors are becoming more important. His research is focusing on these shifts and their consequences for the organisation of the supply chain and the roles of different social actors therein.

Maja Slingerland

Maja Slingerland holds a PhD degree in farming systems (2000), at Wageningen University. She worked for 10 years in research and development in west Africa. She initiated and coordinated large interdisciplinary research programmes: micronutrients (China, Benin, Burkina Faso); competing claims on natural resources (southern Africa, Brazil) and sustainable oil palm (Indonesia, Thailand). She is member of the steering committee of WU strategic funded interdisciplinary programmes "Scaling and Governance" and "Smart and Sustainable Food production" and of two interdisciplinary research programmes on conflict and climate change of the Dutch Science Foundation. She supervises PhD and Master studies, participates in public debates and published over 100 articles and book chapters in scientific and popular journals. She teaches a global food security course.

Sietze Vellema

Sietze Vellema is associate professor at the Knowledge, Technology and Innovation group, Wageningen University, and senior researcher at the Partnerships Resource Centre, Rotterdam School of Management, the Netherlands. Sietze’s interest is to understand why and how different actors collaborate in solving organisational, managerial, and technical problems related to inclusive development and sustainable food provision. He studies partnerships, certification, and institutional arrangements in agri-food chains and supervises PhD candidates in different fields: collective action in oil palm, shea, and sesame in West Africa; trading practices in East and West Africa; food safety and consumer practices in Southeast Asia; labels, governance and service delivery in global commodity trade; coordination and diversity in banana production in Asia. He leads action research focusing on value chains, partnerships, poverty, and food security in Africa.

I.J.M. de Boer

Professor Imke de Boer holds a PhD in Animal Sciences from Wageningen University. Since 2011, she leads the Animal Production Systems (APS) group at Wageningen University. This chair group uses system analysis to scientifically underpin sustainable development of animal production systems. They focus on exploring the multi-dimensional, and sometimes conflicting, consequences of innovations in livestock systems across the world, with special focus on their impact on the environment, animal welfare and livelihood of people. Imke de Boer teaches both undergraduate and postgraduate students, and supervises many PhD students in this knowledge domain.

Carolien Kroeze

Professor Carolien Kroeze is personal professor in the Environmental Systems Analysis Group at Wageningen University, specialized in pollution management. She has also been professor at the Open University of the Netherlands. Her research includes scenario analyses and evaluation of environmental policies aiming at reducing multiple environmental problems simultaneously. Carolien Kroeze co-developed environmental models studying environmental problems caused by food production, and options to reduce these problems. These models typically integrated information from the natural and social sciences.

About this course

This course explores how anyone can be a successful startup entrepreneur or corporate innovator by thoughtfully examining themselves and the business opportunity. By harnessing these insights and cultivating an entrepreneurial spirit, you can create and transform an entrepreneurial idea into a new startup company or corporate venture.

Over 800,000 people have used The Opportunity Analysis Canvas that is the basis of this course. Designed by Dr. James V. Green, the lead faculty for this course, this unique model equips you to identify and analyze a new business opportunity that aligns with your startup entrepreneurship or corporate innovation interests.

The Opportunity Analysis Canvas distills vast amounts of research in psychology, sociology, and business into a practical how-to guide for aspiring and active entrepreneurs and innovators. The course presents a whole new understanding of entrepreneurial mindset and action. The course is structured as a nine-step experience segmented into thinking entrepreneurially, seeing entrepreneurially, and acting entrepreneurially.

What you’ll learn

Develop the skills for identifying and analyzing entrepreneurial ideas;
Foster thinking entrepreneurially with an awareness of entrepreneurial mindset, entrepreneurial motivation, and entrepreneurial behavior;
Cultivate seeing entrepreneurially with attention to industry conditions, industry status, macroeconomic change, and competition; and
Champion acting entrepreneurially with an understanding of value innovation and opportunity identification.

Courses in this program

Learn today’s newest skills and tools for identifying and acting on entrepreneurial opportunities for startup companies and corporate innovations

Build your capabilities to create a value proposition, team strategy, market strategy, and financial strategy to transform your ideas into a startup company or innovative corporate venture

Learn essential marketing concepts and practical commercialization strategies to bring your new venture to market

Demystify key financial concepts for creating a financial plan for your new venture to raise the right funding from the right partners at the right time

Meet your instructors

Michael Pratt

Michael Pratt teaches and mentors students in the University of Maryland's Master’s in Technology Entrepreneurship and undergraduate programs. His career spans over 35 years in management and finance, in both domestic and international organizations. In two decades with startups and venture capital, he’s raised over $100 million for eleven different startup. Michael is the co-founder and Managing Partner in Select Venture Partners LLC, an early stage, post-seed/pre-Series A investment management firm. Prior to co-founding Select, he was co-founder and CEO of SpydrSafe Mobile Security, Inc., a mobile application security management platform that safeguarded enterprise data by controlling apps on smartphones and tablets (iOS and Android). SpydrSafe was acquired in February 2014. Prior to SpydrSafe, he was COO of CardStar, Inc., a mobile loyalty company sold to Constant Contact (NASDAQ: CTCT). From 2006 to 2010, Michael was the CFO/COO of Trust Digital, Inc., a venture-backed Mobile Device Management company sold to McAfee (NYSE: MFE). Prior to Trust, he was CFO of Galt Associates, Inc., a venture-backed software company sold to Cerner Corporation (NASDAQ: CERN) in July 2006. His earlier professional experience includes CEO of CrossMedia Networks Corp.; CEO of Point of Care Technologies (sold to Siemens Healthcare in 1999); various senior finance and operating roles with Mobil Corporation, including President and General Manager of three Mobil subsidiaries. Michael began his professional career with Arthur Andersen & Co. Michael holds a BS in Finance from East Carolina University, an MBA from Massey University in New Zealand, and an MS in Marketing from Johns Hopkins University.

Lola Koiki

Lola Koiki is a senior product manager at Capital One with responsibility for leading the development, launch, and commercialization of Emerging Payments, which encompasses U.S. Real-Time Payments, Payment Infrastructure Modernization, and Payments Innovation. She is currently leading Capital One’s effort to join the first new payments clearing system in the United States in over 40 years, while developing an enterprise-wide consistent strategy for faster payment capabilities across the company. In addition to her work at Capital One, she is a partner at PoyntFour, a Product Management and Delivery Consultancy based in the DC area, with a focus on pre-seed to series startups and mid-size government agencies looking to build high efficiency teams. She is also a Lecturer with the University of Maryland’s Maryland Technology Enterprise Institute. In her time at University of Maryland, she has taught over 500 undergraduate students, many of which have gone on to launch new ventures or work in start-ups. She is a graduate of Carnegie Mellon University, with a Masters in Information Systems Management. She holds a BS in Marketing and Supply Chain Management from the University of Maryland. She currently lives in Washington DC and volunteers with organizations in the area, such as The Neighborhood Well, a non-profit focused on helping the unstably housed in the DC Area, and Acts1038, a non-profit focused on education and career development for immigrants to the United States.

James Green

Dr. James V. Green leads the education activities of the Maryland Technology Enterprise Institute as the Director of Entrepreneurship Education. He is responsible for designing and teaching undergraduate and graduate courses in entrepreneurship and technology commercialization, leading seed funding programs, and managing residential entrepreneurship programs for students. He directs the Master of Professional Studies in Technology Entrepreneurship, an innovative online degree program enrolling students worldwide. In 2011, he earned first prize in the 3E Learning Innovative Entrepreneurship Education Competition presented at the United States Association for Small Business and Entrepreneurship (USASBE) annual conference to recognize college educators who have created new and challenging learning activities that actively involve students in the entrepreneurial experience. Dr. Green's research interests include entrepreneurship education and the psychology of entrepreneurship. He is a national presenter on entrepreneurship education with refereed papers and presentations at conferences for the Academy of Management (AOM), the United States Association for Small Business and Entrepreneurship (USASBE), the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE), and the National Collegiate Inventors and Innovators Alliance (NCIIA). Dr. Green serves as the Editor for the ASEE Entrepreneurship Division and as an evaluator for annual conference submissions. Prior to the University of Maryland, Dr. Green held founder, executive, and operational roles with multiple startups to include WaveCrest Laboratories (an innovator in next-generation electric and hybrid-electric propulsion and drive systems), Cyveillance (a software startup and world leader in cyber intelligence and intelligence-led security), and NetMentors.Org (the first national online career development eMentoring community). Dr. Green earned a Doctor of Management and an MS in Technology Management from the University of Maryland University College, an MBA from the University of Michigan, and a BS in Industrial Engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology. Connect with Dr. Green on LinkedIn.

Program Overview

What you will learn

Courses List

1Information Security - Introduction to Information Security

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2Information Security - Authentication and Access Control

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3Information Security - Advanced topics

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4Network Security - Protocols

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5Network Security - Advanced Topics

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6Penetration Testing - Discovering Vulnerabilities

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7Penetration Testing - Exploitation

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8Penetration Testing - Post Exploitation

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9Network Security - Introduction to Network Security

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Meet your instructors

Justin Cappos

Aspen Olmsted

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1Introduction to Programming in C++

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2Advanced Programming in C++

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3Introduction to Data Structures

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4Advanced Data Structures

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Meet Your Instructors

Aspen Olmsted

Itay Tal

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What you will learn

Program Class List

Meet Your Instructors

Jo Haigh

Kris Murray

Shane Tomlinson

Richard Green

Clementine Chambon

Jeff Hardy

Ajay Gambhir

Program overview

What will you learn

Program Class List

1Attaining Higher Education

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1
Information Security - Introduction to Information Security

2
Information Security - Authentication and Access Control

3
Information Security - Advanced topics

4
Network Security - Protocols

5
Network Security - Advanced Topics

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Penetration Testing - Discovering Vulnerabilities

7
Penetration Testing - Exploitation

8
Penetration Testing - Post Exploitation

9
Network Security - Introduction to Network Security

1
Introduction to Programming in C++

2
Advanced Programming in C++

3
Introduction to Data Structures

4
Advanced Data Structures

1
Attaining Higher Education

2
University Studies for Student Veterans

3
Find Your Calling: Career Transition Principles for Returning Veterans

1
Cloud Computing for Enterprises

2
Cloud Computing Infrastructure

3
Cloud Computing Engineering and Management

4
Cloud Computing Security

1
Operations Management

2
People Management

3
Corporate Finance

4
Strategic Management

5
Accounting for Decision-Making

6
Marketing Management