How We Do It
By the time COVID hit in Nigeria and lockdown was enforced, we had already figured out the right way to do online CIPM classes. About 8 weeks into our programme, the Institute officially mandated that all study centres transition to an online model. Many did, delivering their lectures live via Zoom. The tutor delivers his lecture for an hour or more. Ask questions if you have any. Go to the next class. Repeat. And oh, you also have to pay the normal fee, as though you were attending actual physical classes.
There’s just one problem with this approach: it tries to fit the online experience into how classes work in the physical world, and that’s incredibly flawed. For one, live Zoom lectures require that students are online at exactly the same time. If an Organizational Behaviour class is scheduled for 3 p.m. on Tuesday, every student taking that class must be available at 3 p.m. on Tuesday. In communications jargon; we say this kind of class is synchronous, because everyone participating in it must be available at the same time. If you joined at 3:30 p.m. instead of 3 p.m., you missed half the class. And if you didn’t join at all, you missed the class entirely. With live Zoom classes, this problem persists, and Zoom’s recording feature only partially minimizes it. Even if you could get all the students to be online at the same time, variations in the quality of their internet services can meaningfully degrade the experience. We found a better way.
How it Works
We designed a system that allows students prepare effectively for CIPM exams, within the constraints of their busy lives. When students come to us, they always ask us the same question: “I’m busy; can I really be ready for exams?” We always answer with a question of our own: “can you spare 60 minutes everyday to study? If the answer is ‘yes’, then you can be will be ready for exams.” Here’s how it works.
Everyday we give each student a PowerPoint presentation to read. This should take between 30 to 45 minutes, depending on how quickly a student reads. Then we give each student a quiz to do, to reinforce what they have learned. The quizzes are based on past CIPM examination questions, so as students answer them, they learn what real examination questions look like and how to approach them. Each PowerPoint material also comes with an explanatory video, in which the instructor visually walks students through the material. We try to ensure that the videos do not exceed 30 minutes, so it doesn’t get boring. Some of our students prefer to read the PowerPoint material, some prefer to watch the videos, and others prefer to do both. We encourage our students to do whatever works for them. Now here’s the kicker. Our daily lessons are asynchronous rather than synchronous, meaning that we don’t tell you when to be online. You have the flexibility to decide when during the day you will complete your lessons.
Why it Works
Our approach works because we designed it to fit into your life as it is. You have a job, so you are short on time. You have other obligations that you must fulfil, maybe you’re even getting a Master’s degree. And oh, life happens to you too: sometimes you fall ill, get pregnant, get married, or have a baby. You need a system that helps you prepare for exams in spite of all of these, not one that assumes you have nothing else going on in your life. Our approach works because we designed it to help you make a little progress everyday, knowing that taking one small step daily and consistently is much better than making one giant leap at a go.
When you think about it this way; suddenly it makes sense that we prefer to stick with our online model. You realize that we are not competing with physical classes at all: people who prefer physical classes no matter what are never going to come to us, because they need all the hand-holding and the interaction that can only happen in a physical setting. Our real competitor is self-study, and our customers are students who are confident in their own ability to study for the examinations on their own, but need a structure and a rigor for doing it more efficiently. That’s what we do. We provide a structure for learning everything you need to know to ace the CIPM exams, presented to fit within the constraint of your busy life.
Don’t hesitate to reach out to us on WhatsApp if you have any questions; we’re always happy to help. The number is 08095915015. We look forward to helping you succeed.
