[Bf-education] Organizing / supporting education (2)

[Tom M]

On Mon, Dec 19, 2011 at 3:36 AM, Ton Roosendaal <ton at blender.org> wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> Let's try to summarize the current state of discussions. I think
> there's three main approaches we can evaluate.
>
> (I also don't propose to rush in decisions in this holiday season, but
> try to find a good way forward mid january 2012?).
>
> ---- (1) Product approach ----
>
> Proposed by Ivan Paulos Tomé (discussed with me in Brazil too).
>
> Basically it means to develop a course book (or package) for teachers,
> to allow them to efficiently teach Blender to students. Targeted at
> students without real 3d experience.
>
> Ivan could use help from others for it. A good project plan can also
> result in BF to help funding it. We can sell the book via Blender
> estore, or make deals with other publishers.
> The contents for this product itself can be open/free licensed too.
>
> ---- (2) Free/Open Certification approach ----
>
> Proposed by Octavio Mendez, Carlos Santana.
>
> Challenge will be to find a way to have volunteers cooperate in
> developing a standard Certification test, which can be freely handed
> out to educators and institutes to use. The test will be standardized
> and "BF certified", the certification itself issued by the testing
> facility.
>
> For this to work, a strong and active team of volunteers need to
> cooperate.
>
> ---- (3) Centralized Certification bizz ----
>
> Laurent David (sort-of) and others proposed this.
>
> It's based on common practices in training centers, schools and
> universities. For many people it's their living and a viable business
> model. For many software companies a great model for income too
> (Adobe, Autodesk). In order to develop training with good quality, a
> lot of time and money has to be invested. ROI can take 1-2 years even.
>
> For this to work, a BF "licensed" entity should be setup to organize it.

Personally I favor 3 since I think it gives artists, instructors, and
employers the most confidence in the quality and relevance of the
certification.

A question I think is important to answer is what audiences we are looking at?
There is a world of difference between the training for arch viz,
industrial design, character animation, visual fx, and motion
graphics.

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