From the Director’s Desk “Summer” Certified, and “Summer” Certifiable By Matt Murphy The summer is still a busy time for content development. I had most of my team in Scottsdale, Arizona for the Revit Technology Conference (RTC – NA). Also, I just got back from the Certified Conference in Orlando, Florida. Wouldn’t it be better to have conferences in desert and tropical climates in the winter instead of the summer? (Maybe that’s just my New England roots yearning for travel when we have 3-4 feet of snow on the ground.) As design and engineering professionals, we certainly think of certification as a way to validate knowledge and skills on software products that we use daily. For most of us Autodesk users, this means seeking the available professional certifications for AutoCAD, Revit, Inventor, Max, Maya and Civil 3D. There will also soon be professional certifications on many of the Autodesk 360 products. These certifications are the foundations for professionals in the Autodesk world. But the Certified Conference is really about how product certifications help prepare today’s K-12 students, readying them for industry-proven job skills or for college. However, certifications don’t stand on their own. They are only a single piece for vocational and college preparedness. As educators, we need to engage, motivate, inspire and recognize the achievements of students in the engineering space. Isn’t that the goal of our educational system in the first place? So with these things in mind, I’d like to share some of the challenges and successes I learned from attending the Certified Conference. www.cadlearning.com