Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1153097
30 DESIGN007 MAGAZINE I AUGUST 2019 "Let me tell you what I'm going to tell you, let me tell you, and then let me tell you what I told you." To present the material in this fash- ion produces many slides. So, I question the need to have so many repetitive slides. If the instructor goes through every slide, it ends up being a long day, so again, my question is do we really need all that material to certify the individual? Shaughnessy: And you're talking about 200– 300 slides. Lambert: Yes, and if it could be reduced by a number of slides, it would eliminate most of the duplications being experienced. Because of this repetitive process, the instructors have to balance the class during the day to compen- sate for the total time of the presentation. This also involves taking into consideration where the students are coming from, as we get stu- dents traveling on Sunday. Therefore, by hav- ing students and instructors around the coun- try, we can help save the students' travel time. The other thing we're looking at is online train- ing; we've done some, but it hasn't caught on in our industry. Shaughnessy: What do you see as the value in online learning? I don't think it will ever re- place face-to-face training. Lambert: There's definitely some value in on- line training. Anything picked up and learned is going to add value to the programs. What they, the students, want is to keep the training program interesting by having video snippets in the PowerPoint slides. With the lecture, you could also have a 30-second video to show you how it's done. We've mentioned it to the de- velopers that they need to have physical dem- onstrations to provide some perspective of the application as it changes the concept of under- standing. Do you remember the days when we used overhead projectors? Then, we went to the 35-millimeter slides and PowerPoint? Some of the comments we hear today with the exist- ing training media include "death by Power- Point." So, we're focused on the methodolo- gy of changing the programs and the needs of the students who are going to be younger and have learned differently than we did years ago. Shaughnessy: Are you seeing an influx of younger people in your classes? Lambert: Yes. Unemployment is so low today that the new people coming in have no knowl- edge of this technology; they're learning a new dictionary with new words. Many of these peo- ple used to work at retailers, restaurants, etc., so we have to learn how to be patient and pres- ent the information in a new and interesting manner. The technique of teaching is going to change. Shaughnessy: How involved is IPC with you as far as the actual techniques of teaching? Lambert: One of the steps that happened back in the day was each student who was going to be an instructor had to give a platform dem- onstration. They had to take a section of the book and explain it by creating a beginning, a middle, and an end to the short presenta- tion. But if you have 10 students at six min- utes apiece, that's an extra hour. IPC started cutting the section as it became time-consum- ing, and there was no metric to measure its effectiveness. There are programs on how to train the trainer, which are important and should be considered for new instructors. From our ex- perience, many military people appear to have gone through some of those programs, but not as many commercial people have. This train- ing has to happen, and IPC hasn't mentioned The other thing we're looking at is online training; we've done some, but it hasn't caught on in our industry.