Large tech companies are increasingly chipping in on boot camps and certificate programs to grow the tech talent pool. Meta is the latest, with the company announcing it's rolling out new entry-level courses covering skills like front-end and back-end development on Wednesday.
Meta is partnering with Coursera to launch courses teaching development for front-end, back-end, iOS and Android as well as a fifth class on database engineering. The courses will be available on Coursera in June and July.
“We’re working to remove barriers, so that anyone regardless of education, background or experience can land a high-growth, in-demand job and grow a rewarding career," Judy Toland, Meta’s VP of Global Customer Marketing, told Protocol. "People can learn the most up-to-date skills and break into tech more quickly than previously before. It's one of the ways we’re helping to build a more inclusive and equitable job market.”
Toland said the programs were created by the company’s software engineers. Meta partnered with the online education platform to offer “affordable access” and scholarships to people with financial need so the courses will be as widely available as possible. “These career certificate programs are helping fuel the growth of a new generation of professionals and the fast pace of a career track in tech means more opportunities for upward mobility for all,” she said.
Meta had already introduced career certificate programs in social media marketing and marketing analytics. More than 63,000 people have taken the company's certificates, and about 70% of people who took those courses reported a “positive impact on their career, life or business,” Toland said.
Meta isn't the only company working with Coursera on upskilling and reskilling programs. Google designs and sells certificate programs through the education platform, and AWS works with the company to offer cloud training and other services. Coursera also works with IBM, Intuit and others on professional certificates.
Betty Vandenbosch, the chief content officer at Coursera, said the company's partners are responsible for the content of the courses, meaning Meta will set out the goals, teachers, assignments and more. Vandenbosch said many of these courses are integrated into a university's degree program (some of Meta's certificates count toward college credit), which helps put participants on track to pursue a degree in whatever field they're studying.
"The whole thing is a path to success," she told Protocol.
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