How do Certify Academy courses, quizzes and badges work?

Courses in Certify Academy are free and self paced. You can stop at any point and pick up where you left off next time you sign in.

How a course is laid out

A course, such as the Digital Badge Practitioner pathway, is made up of modules followed by a final project. Each module has:

1. Reading lessons of about 7 to 8 minutes each, ending with key takeaways.
2. A practical task of 25 to 30 minutes, where you apply what you have learned, for example inspecting and verifying a real badge, or designing a badge for your organisation.
3. A module quiz.

You work through the course in order. Submitting the practical task opens the module quiz, and finishing a module opens the next one. The final project opens once every module is finished.

You can look through the course outline without an account. To record your progress, submit tasks and take quizzes, sign in.

Practical tasks

Each task explains what to do and what to submit, with a short checklist to run through before you send it. You write or upload your work in the box on the task page. There is usually no single right answer: what matters is that you can explain your reasoning.

Quizzes

When you finish a quiz you see where you went wrong. If you do not pass, you can retake it as often as you like.

Badges and the certificate

• Pass a module quiz and you earn that module's badge.
• Finish every module and the final project and you earn the pathway certificate.

Your badges and certificate are issued on the Certify platform, in the name on your Academy profile, and sent to your Academy email address. You can then share them, add them to LinkedIn and let anyone check they are genuine, just like any other Certify credential:

• How is a digital credential received?
• How do I add a credential to my LinkedIn profile?
• How can others check that my credential is genuine?

Your credentials are yours to keep. They are not affected if you stop using the Academy, delete your Academy account, or a course is later withdrawn.

Honest work

Credentials are only worth something if the person holding them did the work. Your quiz answers and submissions must be your own, and you must not share quiz answers or let someone else take a course for you. If a credential was earned dishonestly, or issued by mistake, Certify can revoke it. We always email you first to explain why and, in most cases, give you at least 14 days to reply. The full rules are in the terms of use.

Reminders

If you start a course and do not come back, we may send you one reminder email about it. You can turn these off on your account page.