For students interested in the business, the Laspa Center is proud to provide complimentary access to the Forte Career Ready Certificate program, a great opportunity for Scripps students to learn more about the industry and develop career skills. The Forté Foundation is an organization that seeks to help women succeed in business and provides programming to help undergraduate students develop career skills. The Forte Career Ready Certificate program, one of their main offerings, is an online course designed to introduce students to the world of business and prepare them through skill development. It is made up of 16 units, which each include 3-4 readings or activities. They cover topics like building your communication prowess and supporting diversity and inclusion in the workplace. As a partner school with Forté, Scripps students have complimentary access to the program. I recently completed the Career Ready Certificate, and I want to share my experience to make more Scripps students aware of this opportunity and to provide information so they can know if this is the right program for them.
The course starts with a fundamentals unit which includes an assessment of career-ready skills, along with some information on specific challenges faced by women in the workplace. Like most of the modules, it ends with a discussion post to the cohort forum. The next four modules are focused on skill building, including strengthening your brand, networking, communication, and salary negotiation. This section ends with a case study analysis activity. The next three sections cover issues within the business sector, including diversity and inclusion, sustainability, and building an entrepreneurial spirit. The final three units are investigations into three sectors of business: finance, consulting, and technology. The entire course wraps up with an interview and role model activity. Overall, the entire course takes 15-20 hours and can easily be completed in a period of a few weeks.
After my experience taking the course, my key takeaway is that the course is well organized, and contains a good amount of basic fundamental knowledge on going into business. It would be most useful for 1st and 2nd-year students who know they have an interest in a business career, but feel like they lack a knowledge base. It is very helpful in explaining the different paths one can take within the business world, which can help students further hone in on what they want to do post-grad. I would also recommend starting the course right when they are accepting a new cohort, which they do in the fall and the spring at the beginning of the semester. This allows participants the most time to complete the course and will ensure the forum is active and they will be getting responses to their posts.
To conclude, the Forté Career Ready certificate represents a great opportunity for Scripps students who are looking to know more about the basics of a business career, and want to build up their foundational knowledge of the industry. If this sounds like you, the Laspa Center encourages you to check out this program to see if it’s a good fit for your career journey.
