Athens, Ga. – University of Georgia faculty, staff and students will have more free, online training options when Skillsoft and Books 24×7 become available May 20.
“Skillsoft and Books 24×7 are comprehensive resources that allow students, faculty and staff to enhance their career-related skills at their own pace while preparing for a variety of certifications in business, technical and desktop skills,” said Lynn Latimer Wilson, associate CIO for planning and engagement with Enterprise Information Technology Services.
Skillsoft is a provider of e-learning and performance support solutions with online courses, books, simulations, exams and videos.
Skillsoft will replace ElementK as an online training tool for the university and the UGA community will no longer have access to ElementK. University-created training courses in ElementK will not be transitioned to Skillsoft. Faculty who are using ElementK in their courses should contact the EITS Help Desk for information about similar courses in Skillsoft. Also, any ElementK professional development transcripts should be printed before May 16.
UGA users will have access to Skillsoft’s collections for business skills, technical skills and desktop skills.
“Skillsoft prepares users to take industry-specific tests,” said Judy James, a senior human resources manager in Training and Development at UGA. “That’s a very valuable asset because university departments may not have the resources to train their students, faculty and staff for certifications. The university will have access to the most up-to-date training materials available from numerous published works.”
Along with Skillsoft, UGA is also offering free access for students, faculty and staff to Books 24×7, which has about 40,000 online titles currently available. Recent additions include titles on enhancing personal career skills, management, marketing, project management, web development, networking, Windows 8 and iOS 6, among others. New titles are added weekly.
Users may also view online books with their mobile devices, bookmark and annotate key sections within books for tracking, and create personal folders to organize titles by interest or project.
In Skillsoft, available courses include topics in human resources, management, communications, finance and accounting, Adobe, Microsoft Office, Apple Mac OS X, web design, software development and server technologies.
“Students can use Skillsoft and Books 24×7 to develop their career skills, including searching by specific topics or reading particular chapters,” James said. “Students can also integrate the materials into their coursework, using the Skillsoft resources as references.”
She added that faculty and staff can also use Skillsoft and Books 24×7 for professional development.
“You get the training you need to do your specific job,” James said. “Let’s say you’re an administrative professional, but you haven’t had the recent opportunity to learn more about financial accounting. With Skillsoft, you can learn at your pace to understand that concept.”
EITS is offering Skillsoft and Books 24×7 via the My UGA Portal, www.my.uga.edu. After users have accessed Skillsoft and Books 24×7 with their computers once, they can access them with their mobile devices.
UGA’s offering of Skillsoft and Books 24×7 is made possible by the Student Technology Fee. Along with Skillsoft and Books 24×7, UGA students, faculty and staff also have free access to lynda.com and Microsoft IT Academy. EITS has more information about these online training tools available at www.eits.uga.edu.
For more information, see skillsoft.uga.edu. For support questions, contact the EITS Help Desk at 706/542-3106 or helpdesk@uga.edu.