Challenge
Preparing young people for the professional world
To continue the Nobel family’s legacy of recognizing and rewarding excellence, Claes Nobel and James Lewis established NSHSS in 2002. NSHSS is a distinguished academic honor society, recognizing and supporting student scholars in 26,000 high schools. Since its inception, NSHSS has helped over 2 million students from over 170 countries learn and develop vital leadership skills that empower them to thrive in schools, workplaces and communities.
To ensure that its programs are meeting the needs of students and employers, NSHSS regularly consults with industry experts and carries out a biennial Career Interest Survey with over 10,000 high school and college students. The survey aims to track the future interests and decision-making factors of high school students at the start of their academic and non-academic careers.
In 2022, industry experts, parents and education leaders spotted an emerging pattern: Gen Z and younger students demonstrated amazing proficiency with new technologies but often lacked the communication, teamwork and adaptability that are vital to succeeding in the workplace. With 82% of 2022 student survey respondents saying that they expect to complete an internship as they forge their career path, NSHSS wanted to help its students get the most out of these opportunities by preparing them for the professional world.
Committed to providing the most relevant and effective curriculum, NSHSS launched a pilot of an online learning program designed to equip students with a toolkit of skills vital to successful internships and professional development, known as the Intern Readiness Certificate Program.
“When we initially built a pilot of the IRCP, we instantly saw that it had tremendous potential to positively impact students’ lives,” explains Margot Miller, program manager at NSHSS. “However, we frequently ran into issues with our learning management system provider and struggled to move the course from a pilot initiative to a fully-fledged program. We had a lot of work to do to update the program based on feedback from the pilot, but we felt like we lacked a partner to support us through a series of administration headaches, user experience issues and workflow challenges.”
Solution
Finding an expert learning partner
As the contract for its existing LMS solution drew to a close, NSHSS looked for an alternative LMS provider—a partner that could help transform the IRCP from pilot to a live public course available to students around the world. After exploring multiple LMS solutions, the organization decided to uplift the program using D2L Brightspace.
When we reached out to D2L, we were pleased to find that the people there were just really authentic and genuine. It truly felt like we were having a conversation with a partner that was on our side of the equation. We were also confident in the integrity and history of D2L as a company to get the best program out to our users.
Margot Miller, program manager, NSHSS
Leveraging the best of learning science, D2L’s Learning Services team tapped into their expertise to audit a course for a more effective learning experience.
“With so many kids learning online, they have their own expectations of how things should look and work. So, it was really helpful to have someone with an instructional design lens to review all the ways we are using the tools and give suggestions on what to add and how to present the content better,” adds Miller. “For example, it’s about 60 to 90 minutes of content for each module, and it used to be a long scroll for ages to get to the bottom. It makes the biggest difference to just break down the content into pages to reduce cognitive overload for students.”
This attention to structuring content for optimal learning is echoed by the students themselves, who found the modules both engaging and highly effective in clarifying their academic and career paths.
I have enjoyed the structure of the modules as I find them very informative. I love the graphic organizers and drawing them into my notes. Since I began the IRCP with an unclear vision for my future internship and career, this program has pushed me to think deeper and take my future steps more seriously.
Leo Chavez, alumnus, Intern Readiness Certificate Program
Harnessing the power of integration
With the IRCP offering a blended learning style combining 10 online modules and two live virtual panels given by a wide variety of industry leaders, NSHSS wanted a solution that could offer extensive flexibility to host interactive lessons, resources, assessments, discussions and live sessions right in the module in the correct sequence of the course.
“Our previous platform didn’t integrate well at all with Zoom,” comments Lindzy Sanford, program support assistant. “This led to a lot of confusion and time spent helping students navigate the different systems. Today, we have full Zoom integration, which makes it really simple for us to link students to live sessions via their homepage on Brightspace, track attendance and post recordings after sessions are completed.”
At the same time, the organization aimed to ensure seamless integration between a learning platform, a payment solution and its custom-built customer relationship management system. Between Brightspace, D2L Course Merchant and D2L Onboarding Services, D2L met the unique technical requirements and streamlined day-to-day workflow and user experience.
Our implementation consultant was amazing in getting our SSO in place. We always felt like we had an advocate and a teammate on the D2L side that could really help make our priorities known and find a solution for when there was a hiccup.
Margot Miller, program manager, NSHSS
NSHSS also adopted the Integration Pack for Student Information Systems (IPSIS), enabling the organization to give access to parents so they can track their child’s progress on the course.
“Parents typically pay for their children’s courses, and they rightly want to see that their child is getting value out of the program,” explains Miller. “With the IPSIS integration, we can let parents log in and see how their child is progressing. This means parents have full visibility and that we also have fewer parent questions filling up our inbox.”
Result
Inspiring students to succeed beyond the classroom
After the pilot course and a year on the previous learning management system, NSHSS has launched the program, which runs on Brightspace.
Since its launch, the impact of the program on students, educational institutions and employers has been substantial and consistently delivered positive outcomes, including:
- Increased Employability: Participants of the IRCP report enhanced employability and confidence in their professional skills, which will lead to higher success rates in securing internships and job opportunities.
- Skills Development: Students enrolled in the program demonstrate significant improvements in key areas such as communication, critical thinking, leadership and time management, all of which are essential for success in the workplace. IRCP certificate holders continue to report benefits from the skills and knowledge acquired during the program.
- Expanded Reach: The IRCP has reached a diverse audience of students across different geographical regions and educational backgrounds. Offering multiple cohorts start dates throughout the year and recorded materials of live sessions, students can participate at their convenience.
The program has received overwhelmingly positive feedback from students and parents.
“Our students are especially pleased with the IRCP,” reflects Sanford. “We ran a student feedback survey after one of our first live sessions, and they reacted incredibly positively and felt that the information they had learned in the modules was very insightful and practical. As course designers, it’s always great to get this kind of feedback; it proved that the content is working as it should and is helping students challenge themselves and become better leaders. One student even described the course as an essential preparedness course for anyone planning to do their first internship.”
This course opened my eyes to BIG hitters in the workplace. These skills will help me be successful beyond my work life. I will be able to communicate with anybody and develop meaningful relationships. I feel this course made a positive impact on my future, and I have recommended it to many of my peers.
Luchiano Fernando, alumnus, Intern Readiness Certificate Program
Increasing program registrations and certifications
Streamlining user experience has also contributed to a boost in program registrations.
Our previous LMS required students to have different logins for three distinct systems, which made navigating programs quite complicated. Now, with a single sign-on, students only need to remember one password to access all our resources. Since then, we have recorded a 27% year-on-year increase in new registrations—and we think making the registration process easier has been a significant contributing factor to this rise.
Margot Miller, program manager, NSHSS
A single intuitive platform means students are less likely to miss out on key content. “In previous years, when it came to issuing certificates, there would always be a few heartbreaking moments when we would have to withhold certification from a student because they hadn’t posted in the discussion boards as a course requirement—even though we could see they had attended all the sessions and read through the module content. Now, because all the course information is now contained in one easy-to-use dashboard for students, they are regularly reminded to take part in post-session discussions and successfully complete the program.”
Fewer administrative headaches
By streamlining the day-to-day administrative workflow and student communication with intelligent agents, NSHSS can spend less time troubleshooting and more time thinking about the future.
“We are seeing significantly fewer questions to be answered, which really speaks to the improved flow and user experience for both students and parents. We are spending less time on manual tasks, and that frees up a lot of time to further explore program enhancements, corporate partnerships, and future fee-waivers,” concludes Miller. “Looking ahead, we are seeking opportunities to offer the program outside of NSHSS and support more students and professionals looking to upskill in all stages of their career.”
INTERVIEWEES
- Margot Miller, program manager
- Lindzy Sanford, program support assistant