In a new initiative, Google is introducing three courses to help individuals get professional training in high-paying popular job fields without attending university. Known as the Google Career Certificates, these courses might lead to disruption of the traditional form of higher education.
The job fields in which these courses will be offered include Project Manager, Data Analyst and UX Designer. While a regular degree can take around four years, these certificates will take not more than six months, only a fraction of usual college education and yet impart the same skills.
As announced by the tech giant, these certification programmes will be hosted on Coursera that charges a monthly fee of $49. Nonetheless, Google will also provide 1,00,000 need-based scholarships to cover the fees and will be awarding grants worth $10 million to various nonprofits that work with workforce development to veterans, underrepresented Americans and women.
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Google's SVP of Global Affairs Kent Walker said that the certificates will be equivalent to a four-year degree in a similar field and that no college degree will be required if someone has a Google career certificate.
A Google career certificate is a concise course on specific skills, aiming to help students find employment. As quoted by Google, the median salary for Project Manager, Data Analyst and UX Designer after completion of the certificate programmes are $93,000, $66,000 and $75,000 respectively.
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Walker also mentioned that these programmes will help people get into IT support careers without college degrees. Google also promises to assist students in job search after completion of the course.
As of yet, no date for availability of the courses has been announced.
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