Google announced threeonline certificate programs in data analytics, project management and user experience design and 100 thousand scholarships for the same online programs.
Google LLC is an United States of America based multinational company that specializes in Internet-related services and products, which include online advertising technologies, a search engine, cloud computing, software, and hardware. It is the most used search engine in the world. The CEO of Google SundarPichai recently announced his investment of 10 billion dollar for the Google for India Digitisation Fund and now Google is looking to provide scholarships for over 100,000 individuals who are keen on learning and improving their tech knowledge.
Google which has been working towards supporting students recently announced 3 new online certificate programs. The certificate programs will be on subjects like Data analytics, Project managementand User experience design. These online programs are created and also taught by Google employees. Students who want to apply for this program do not require a college degree and the best part is that this online certification program can be completed in three to six months.
This online certificate program is offered through the online learning platform called Coursera. Google says this is an opportunity to students who want to learn new subjects and could not attend the 4 year college. Google also says that this online certification course will be considered as a full college degree to students applying for the same roles in the Google Company anywhere in the world.
The vice president of Google, Lisa Gevelber says that this is in no means a revenue generating scheme for Google. She leads Grow with Google and also Google for Start-ups programs. She also mentioned that Coursera platforms is also very affordable for students as the current pricing starts at 49 dollar per month, but Google also understands that there are students who would want this opportunity and cannot afford it and for that Google has committed to funding nearly 100,000 scholarships on the basis of the students’ needs in any of the 3 career certificate programs. These individuals will be awarded with 10 million dollar grant to YWCA, NPower, JFF which are three non-profit Organisations that partnered with Google to provide workforce development individuals, especially women, veterans and underrepresented Americans.
Lisa Gevelber also said that Google chose theses specific fields of data analytics, project management and user experience because these are the most in demand career options and they can lead to high-growth, high-paying careers.
Google’s announcement of these scholarships and education programs comes at a time when the country is facing great unemployment issues. As of last month over 33 million people have collected unemployment benefits for the US labour department which is very higher than 6.6 million which happened at the time of Great recession. And while some of these jobs may return over time, the coronavirus pandemic has heightened fears that some jobs may not return for a variety of reasons, including cost-cutting measures, closing of businesses and also automation. Companies and employees are facing hiring freeze in every part of the world. Huge companies are filing for bankruptcy, stores are being closed and thus unemployment is rising to new high levels.
Technology has been a top career option for a while and with this low-cost certificate programs individuals who could not afford to go to college can learn the same skills from home or anywhere in the world. Nothing can replace a college degree as they have more value, but not many people have access to college education and thus Google’s low cost certificate online program will be helpful for the majority of individuals who have no access to college education but have the zest of learning and growing.
In 2018, Google launched a similar certificate program for those interested in IT. Google launched this program to diversify their workspace and teach or educate the non-traditional applicants, and it looks like Google was successful in that s 58% of the individuals who applied for IT certificates were either Black, Latino, female or veterans or 45% of those made less than 30,000 dollars a year. The company claims that 80% of participants say the program helped them advance their job search or career within six months, including getting a raise, finding a new job or starting a new business.
By Deepika Agarwal
