The 1 Million Youth project

sarah_infographic_final_14-05-2014 ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________

A case study on how to replicate Sarah’s career story 1 million times

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________

ICWFD (International Commission on Workforce Development), which is affiliated with the United Nations, announced a noteworthy initiative called “1 million youth trained”.

ICWFD’s objectives

There were multiple objectives that were set forth, including:

1. Provide distance learning to masses in the developing nations. The pilot markets that were identified included: Pakistan, Bangladesh, and St. Lucia.

2. Engage the local universities to create their own distance learning diplomas and offer it in their countries. The universities can instantly build their distance learning portfolio by leveraging the online courses produced by SkillSoft

3. Candidates can take a qualifying test and earn a certification endorsed by the local university.

ICWFD’s challenges

The challenges to this initiative was for ICWFD to build a robust testing platform, which contained a expansive catalog of test, and which could be white labeled used by all participating universities.

Universities’ requirements

A set of key conditions set forth by the universities were:

1. All testing should happen at the university’s testing centers

2. The testing must take place through the university’s official website

3. After the tests, the student should instantly receive a certificate (issued) from the university

ICWFD’s assessment of Tested Talent

ICWFD studied the testing platform owned by Tested Talent and discovered 3 things that would further ICWFD’s “1 million youth trained” initiative:

1. Tested Talent’s catalog of 5,000 tests corresponds directly to the courses offered by SkillSoft. This means that the initiative can start immediately, without any content development

2. Tested Talent’s white label approach allows its API can be integrated with most technologies

3. Tested Talent’s testing platform has been used in several projects by the public and the private sector, and is capable of supporting over 10,000 users being tested simultaneously

Tested Talent’s solution to satisfy all stakeholders

Taking into account all ICWFD’s challenges and the universities’ requirements, Tested Talent came up with a solution to develop a customized API that can be integrated with 20,000 different universities. The custom technology development would mean that an application be created where

1. ICWFD can add and manage universities, and candidates

2. Universities can create test administrators, provide professors access to create their own tests (or use any the Tested Talent catalog). In addition the universities should be able to control all registration, testing, issuance of certificates directly from their own official website

3. Candidates can register online (directly from the university’s official website), then take the test online (at a university computer lab), then receive a certificate issued by the university. In addition, candidates should be able to re-take the test

________________________________________________________________________________