By April Lanux

CertificationPoint, currently provides college students nationwide with a viable resource to gain real-world experience irrespective of their career field with an initial focus on individual and small group coverage. The premise here is that closing the knowledge-to-experience gaps will assist in each student becoming more confident and self-sufficient and achieve maximum benefit from the program while completing college courses. An overall benefit of this program is in assisting college students to find their future career field of interest sooner through completion of real-world STEM-related (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) assignments in which they are also earning income. STEM-related paid work projects is currently a standalone course offered at colleges by CertificationPoint, but awarded work projects from our website can also be injected into college coursework by instructors as a graded group project.

At this time most colleges offer internships, online continuing education courses, service learning partnerships with businesses, and student work study. The Career Gateway Path Program offers a combination all the aforementioned programs. The Career Gateway Path Program runs 5-6 weeks, within a mentor-led group setting, at the beginning of each Fall and Spring semester. The beauty of the Career Gateway Path Program lies in helping students to learn to sell themselves to prospective real-world clients via RFP's and project bid submissions. Once awarded a project work tasking, in a mentored group setting, the students complete their various roles in the project and at completion the approved business partner submits payment to the group through the CertificationPoint payment gateway. A client review, group-based peer review, and a lesson's learned submission by each student is initiated following the completion of a work project. The review information collected is databased and made available to students nationally to use for future projects. Another offering that the Career Gateway Path Program provides is the ability for intra-regional collaborative project opportunities. The collaborative capability is only provided regionally at this point in time. An cross-regional initiative which allows students to engage with students at other colleges to complete a prospective business client's project is in the works. (example: Bossier Parish Community College/UCLA/Ohio State Univ. project collaboration).

The Career Gateway Preparatory Program program serves as a way of connecting college students with local, national and global businesses as well as a way for students to gain real-world experience. All work projects will have a qualified project manager and mentor to ensure both jobs and projects meet the required objectives of the businesses involved. Building trust between college students and hiring businesses is important when it comes to allowing students to complete business projects and CertificationPoint has a great working model. CertificationPoint, via the CGPP, will continue to help college students develop real-world knowledge in our defined list of important skill areas.

This is a patented process that has received venture funding and currently awaiting federal level funding. Once a student has completed the program they are able to continue working through the site for future for-pay projects as a college professional. A major gain for the student is the additional depth of tangible resume experience and gained networking opportunities while in college. As they say give a person a fish and they'll eat for a day, teach a person to fish and they'll eat for a lifetime. Ask your college about enrolling in the Career Gateway Path Program (CGPP) today!

By Richard Thompson

On October 24, 2024, Nevada State University brought together developers from across the country, local business leaders, government officials, and key stakeholders to officially launch its SMART Growth Initiative, setting the stage for accelerated campus growth aligned with Nevada’s evolving educational and workforce landscape.

“We know that Nevada State University is the future of higher education in Nevada, and we must intentionally develop our campus to support the vital role we play in educating our community and developing the workforce that our state requires for its continued growth,” said Dr. DeRionne Pollard, President of Nevada State University. “The SMART Growth Initiative is a unique opportunity to build an innovative campus that benefits our students, the surrounding university community, and Southern Nevada.”

At its founding, the federal government granted land to the City of Henderson intending to build a robust, mid-tier institution of higher education. The current campus footprint accounts for 60 of those acres. The SMART Growth Initiative seeks to thoughtfully develop the remaining 452 acres of Nevada State’s campus in collaboration with the private sector, regional stakeholders, and the surrounding community.

More than 160 attendees learned more about the vision for Nevada State University, which is guided by the campus master plan most recently updated in 2023. Along with leadership from Nevada State University, representatives from WT Partnership, Nevada State Campus Lands Corporation, City of Henderson, and TSK Architects provided insights on the future development of Nevada State’s campus as well as the surrounding community

As laid out in its master plan, Nevada State projects the student population to grow to 20,000 by 2047. Accommodating this growth calls for new academic buildings, student housing, and other state-of-the-art facilities to foster innovation and collaboration with key industries in the region.

To facilitate this effort, Dr. Pollard formed the Nevada State Campus Lands Corporation (NSCLC) and convened a board of trustees with broad representation from finance, law, development, government, and non-profit administration to provide guidance on developing Nevada State’s campus in alignment with the university’s academic mission and the State’s workforce development goals. NSCLC bridges the gap between higher education and the private sector, helping Nevada State leverage mutually beneficial public-private collaborations and innovative advancements in procurement, design, and financing.

The initiative aligns seamlessly with recent efforts by the City of Henderson and the Regional Transportation Commission of Southern Nevada in the University Area Livable Centers Study, which was unanimously approved by the Henderson City Council. The study was a comprehensive review of a 1400-acre area that includes Nevada State’s 512-acre campus, 85 acres of vacant, City-owned land adjacent to the university, the Harry Reid Union Pacific Railroad Trail, and nearby residential neighborhoods and recognizes the current and future needs of the broader university community, ensuring that students, faculty, and neighbors will have dedicated spaces to live, learn, work, and thrive.