LINGOs and eCornell: taking learning to new places

Eric Berg, the chairman of LINGOS visited our office last week and provided our staff with a compelling presentation of how the eCornell courses are having an impact in many international NGOs. Through our partnership with LINGOs, employees of NGOs such as CARE, Habitat for Humanity, the World Wildlife Federation and dozens more have access to courses authored by Cornell faculty where they live and work. They are using these courses to make significant improvements in how they deliver the critical services provided by their organizations in some of the world’s most demanding environments. And as Eric points out, even a small improvement in how an NGO delivers its services can save thousands or millions of dollars, and in this challenging environment for philanthropy, it may be a life saving difference.

We learned about the refugee camp manager who is completing a Financial Management certificate to be able to be a better financial steward of the resources he has received in order to house and feed hundreds of people. We also heard of the park ranger for World Wildlife Fund who is using the project leadership skills he learned in his eCornell course to better manage a conservation project aimed at saving gorillas and their habitat.

In our hyper-connected world, it was amazing to hear about people running 150 feet of power cord from their solar panels to their makeshift office in order to power the computer to take online courses. The demand for new knowledge and skills is incredible, and it is humbling to be able to serve some small component of that knowledge through eCornell.

We look forward to expanding our relationship with LINGOs and will keep you posted on how online learning is making a difference through these professionals.