Spring Quarter Introduction to WordPress College Course Begins April 10

It’s hard to believe that the first ever full college course on WordPress is coming to an end, with a new one beginning April 10, 2012, but here we are, and time is running out to get your seat in this Introduction to WordPress course.

If you live in the Portland, Oregon, or Southwest Washington State area, or consider it worth the visit, the deadline is now to register for the Spring Quarter “Introduction to WordPress,” a four credit class at Clark College in Vancouver, Washington, just across the Columbia River from Portland, Oregon. Clark College has an amazingly low credit hour fee with discounts for Vets and refugees. The 10-week, 40 hour course is just over USD $400 for residents. Beginning April 10 through June 18, the class is Tuesdays and Thursdays from 6-8PM.

The demand for this type of college course has been incredibly high, with coverage in local newspapers and international websites and blogs. I’ve had requests from around the world to teach or help other schools bring such a course to their curriculum. It’s amazing!

The number of seats is limited to 20. We’ve only a few seats left and I wanted to open this up to non-students, to any business professional, small business owner, web designer, web publisher, or anyone who needs to get WordPress on their resume or learn how to create their own website or blog, so hurry. We might not be offering this course during the summer, so the next chance will be Fall Quarter.

Registration is through Clark College. Contact the Clark College Computer Technology Office (CTEC), Reesa McAllister at 360-992-2106 for details. You will need the following when you call: Item Number 6573 and Course ID CTEC 280.

What Will You Learn?

If there is a single testimony to be had from the first full credit college course on WordPress it came from student Leiulf Clausen of About Sound and Vision. He declared the best testimonial for the class was the fact that the same butts were in chairs at the end of the quarter as at the beginning. For most college classes, this is unheard of as the attrition rate is often high. I’m proud (and stunned) to say that we haven’t lost a single student during the entire course. They wanted this that much and were determined to see it through in spite of personal and family crisis, weather, hard work, and competing classes. I’m so proud of them all.

I listed all the details on what you will learn in my first announcement about the Clark College Introduction to WordPress class, and I want to expand upon that by showing off a little of what the students have done.

The students were required to get a blog on WordPress.com for the duration of the class. If they wished to continue it afterwards, it was up to them. While their sites exist, you can find the list at Clark College Student Sites on Learning from Lorelle. They were encouraged to find a WordPress Theme and customize it, and use all of the WordPress Plugins and features that come with WordPress.com.

The following are screen captures of the student sites to give you an example of the amazing creativity and diversity in the class. It’s also a great testimony to what is possible with WordPress.com.

A distinctive customization of the WordPress 2011 Theme.

As an introduction to WordPress, I taught the basics of how to set up a WordPress.com and WordPress site, how to blog with WordPress, editing and content management, analytics, basic SEO, managing multiple contributors, site customization, and an introduction to WordPress Themes and Plugins. This class will be a prerequisite for future WordPress-specific college courses dealing with Themes, Plugins, and site management. All the class homework and many of the notes and related information are found in my teaching blog, Learning from Lorelle (Lorelle Teaches).

This is an ideal class for those wishing to learn or expand their core WordPress skills, add them to their skill set, or earn ongoing education credit for work. With so many employers looking for WordPress expertise from their advertising, marketing, social media, web, and IT departments, this is an ideal program.

It is also a flexible program based upon student abilities. The students arrive with a huge gulf between expertise levels, extreme beginners with little or no familiarity with WordPress and others with WordPress and web design experience eager to get WordPress on their college transcripts and resumes. By the third week, most of the students are at the same core level and by the fifth week, the interests of the majority of students help direct which way the class goes, expanding more upon web publishing, multimedia content, Themes and Child Themes, and troubleshooting WordPress code, Themes, and Plugins, with something for everyone.

Clark College has one of the most amazing web design, digital graphics, computer science and technology, and computer and web programming programs around. I urge you to take advance of their low tuition and add some related courses such as HTML Fundamentals and Introduction to PHP to complement the WordPress class. Check their Course Catalog for more information.

This has truly been a dream come true experience. The first steps in bringing a full WordPress course into the curriculum is underway and I’ll more news on that soon, along with lessons learned, amazing revelations, and great tips for teaching WordPress. The popularity and enthusiastic support for the program from students, faculty and the business community is incredible. It’s exciting to see WordPress embraced as the key choice in web publishing today.

I hope to see you in class! Register now to get your butt in one of the precious 20 seats in the class. And thanks for helping to spread the word.

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Copyright Lorelle VanFossen.