Online courses directory (841)

Discover the careers in sports and recreation and learn to deliver a simple client-focused session.

Learn to proactively take control of your workplace and projects by making more strategic decisions and plans.

In this course, Tina Seelig reveals a set of tools and conditions that we each control - our Innovation Engine - that allows us to increase our own creativity and that of our teams and organizations. She shows that just as the scientific method demystifies the process of discovery, there is a...

Good decision-making is an essential life skill most people acquire through trial and error. Few have had the benefit of formal training in decision making or are aware of decision science. This course demonstrates how a framework to help us make better decisions, decision quality, can help...

In economics, the term "labor" refers to workers.  As a factor of production, labor earns wages for the services that it renders.  As such, students of labor economics have traditionally set out to understand wage formation, the level of employment, and all elements that go into the making of a wage relationship.  Over the years, the social and economic contexts in which labor markets operate have become increasingly complex; nowadays, labor economics is no longer limited to the study of wages.  Modern labor economics instead seeks to understand the complex workings of the labor market by studying the dynamics between employers, employees, and their wage-, price-, and profit-making incentives.  In other words, modern labor economics explores the outcomes of the labor market under the assumption that workers strive to maximize their wellbeing and firms strive to maximize profits.  It also analyzes the behavior of employers and employees and studies their responses to changes in government policies and/or…

This course introduces major theories of economic development and to place them in a historical context. In his contributory introduction “Economic Growth, Economic Development and Human Development” in The Development Economics Reader (2008), edited by Giorgio Secondi and published by Routledge, Secondi defines economic development as the “branch of economics that studies relatively poor countries.” In the same book, Mahbub ul Haq, writing under the title “The Human Development Paradigm,” suggests that the “basic purpose of development is to enlarge people’s choices,” which is in line with the views expressed by the Nobel laureate Amartya Sen. Whether development is simply studying poor countries or expanding people’s choices in poor countries, one of the essential requirements is that there must be a means for making the choices available. This means that economic development must include growth, but growth can take place without economic development. Without economic growth, the choices…

Public Finance rests at the intersection of two disciplines: Public Economics and Public Choice.  Public Economics deals with issues of social optimality: how much of a good (or ill) does a society desire (or tolerate), and how do we incentivize producers and consumers to attain that amount?  Public economics concerns itself with externalities, which are costs that are borne by persons not involved in a market transaction.  There are both positive and negative externalities; public economists want to know how we get more of the good and less of the bad.  Public choice is the field of economics that looks into the behavior of voters, politicians, and bureaucrats and studies how they choose given different policy institutions. The field of Public Finance studies the interaction between these two disciplines, asking questions like: How do the incentives of the political actors shape the policies they craft?  How does that in turn affect the outcomes in the marketplace?  Alternately, students of Public Fi…

This course surveys major topics and theories in the field of Industrial Organization.  As part of the applied microeconomics structure, Industrial Organization uses the basic tools of microeconomic theory and game theory to study the structure and behavior of firms and their strategic interactions with one another in the marketplace.  Industrial Organization also studies the impact that those interactions have on market structure and welfare. Different kinds of market structures (perfect competition, imperfect competition, monopoly, oligopoly, and so forth) present different scenarios in which firms strive to acquire and use market power for their strategic advantage.  While perfect competition and monopoly are two market structures on opposite ends of the spectrum, imperfect competitionwhere a limited number of firms attempt to manipulate their rivals or consumersis a more realistic set-up.  This course will emphasize market structure analysis and the strategic behaviors of competing firms, including…

Good decision-making is an essential life skill most people acquire through trial and error. Few have had the benefit of formal training in decision making or are aware of decision science. This course demonstrates how a framework to help us make better decisions, decision quality, can help...

By Leticia Britos Cavagnaro

Decision Quality (DQ) is a practical and systematic approach that methodically breaks down barriers and improves the quality and speed of important decisions.In this five-week introductory course, you’ll work in teams to learn the DQ approach, which draws from the disciplines of business,...

Entre más irreversibles son las decisiones que un proyecto involucra, mayor esfuerzo debe asignarse a la valorización de sus distintas alternativas. Este curso muestra como evaluar proyectos utilizando las metodologías financieras tradicionales de flujos de caja descontados, incorporando en las...

This course will provide you with an analytical framework for the study of international trade.  Historically, international trade has played a critical role in enabling countries to grow, develop, and become economically powerful.  Through international trade in goods and services, the economies of different countries are more closely linked to one another now than ever before.  At the same time, the world economy is more turbulent now than it has been in decades.  Keeping up with the shifting international environment has become a central concern in business strategy and national economic policy.  This course uses the same fundamental methods of analysis deployed in other branches of economics, as the motives and behavior of individuals and firms remain the same whether they are in the context of international trade or domestic transactions.  You will learn, however, that international trade introduces an entirely new and different set of concerns as well. This course will cover a broad array of rel…

Professional Writing is designed to provide adult learners with the basic skills they need to write effective documents in the workplace.  In this course, you will learn how to analyze your audience so that you can write prose that is both clear and persuasive.  You will practice writing common business documents, such as emails, memos, proposals, and presentations.  You will also learn how to effectively edit these documents for maximum impact. This course is part of the Professional Development Program (PRDV), which is designed especially for adult learners who are ready to gain and apply skills demanded by today’s employers.

This course is designed for the novice who has little or no word processing experience.  The course provides an introduction to word processing.  You will explore word processing skills while also learning to create a basic business letter and a business memo.  Although the resources in this course use Microsoft Word 2010, it should be noted that all of the basic skills and tasks that you will be asked  can be done on any word processing program.  If you stay flexible enough in your own word processing program to search out the commands and icons on whatever software you are using, you will succeed.  The most current version of Microsoft Word was selected, because it would be most beneficial to the job seeker.  In addition most colleges, universities, and some public libraries are using a newer version of Word.  You can complete this course using any word processing software, but if you are using an older version of Word, you may also want to seek out a resource where you can interact with the newer v…

This course will provide you with a comprehensive introduction to spreadsheets. The course is designed for first-time users with very little or no exposure to the subject. For this course, you will use Microsoft Excel as the software. The course will explore the following fundamental topics: an introduction to spreadsheets, terminology in Excel, components of a spreadsheet, what a cell consists of, and the creation of a spreadsheet for practical use.  You will examine sample files, videos, and books that will enable you to gain practical knowledge about spreadsheets that can be used in daily life, either at work, school, or home.

This course is the first in a series of four courses under the Job Search “umbrella” that include Job Search Skills, Resume Writing, Interview Skills, and Professional Etiquette.  The Job Search Skills course is intended to give you a solid beginning to this exciting time of self-exploration with finding a job.  Whether you are seeking your first job, wish to take the next step in your existing career, or desire to begin a new career, you will obtain the necessary information about yourself to turn this desire into a successful job search.  If, for example, you think of yourself as a product that you are trying to market to potential employers, you will realize that you can only be successful if you know the product thoroughly and how this product can meet the needs of the consumer (the employer).  This course will guide you to information on how to target jobs and/or careers that are desirable and realistic for you and that fill a need for employers in today’s challenging job market.

By Kay Giesecke

By Shahid Ansari and Jan Bell

By Stephanie Marrus and Naeem Zafar