Exploring WordPress Certifications

Over the years, there have been a few discussions about creating formalised certifications for WordPress, most notably in 2013 as seen on Torque and WP Tavern. While those discussions are nearly 10 years old, they are still relevant and, now that an open learning platform for WordPress exists, this is a good time to revisit those conversations.

Before we get anywhere near implementation, let’s take a step back and gather some initial thoughts on how a WordPress certification should be approached. Certifying open-source software has some inherent challenges, but also some wonderful advantages. With that in mind here is some interesting content to review:

Feedback

Since this is an exploratory post and not a proposal for anything concrete, please comment with your answers to the questions below, as well as any other thoughts you have about this topic:

  • What benefits would certifications provide?
  • What would be some effective ways to use certifications in the WordPress space?
  • What potential pitfalls need to be kept in mind, should we proceed?

Contributor Spotlight: Oneal Rosero

Welcome to another edition of the Training Team’s Contributor Spotlight!
In this series, we introduce one of our many valued contributors and invite you to learn more about their journey.

Meet Oneal!

Today’s featured contributor is Oneal Rosero!
Based in the Philippines, Oneal volunteers as a WordPress Training Team Faculty Admin and WordPress Community Program Support.

He also serves as a co-facilitator of the #WPDiversity workshops and assists the DEIB working group.

Training Team contributor Oneal Rosero dressed as a Star Wars Stormtrooper

In what is quickly becoming a tradition, in recent months, Oneal has been busy helping organize WordCamp Asia 2024, just like he did in the 2023 edition.

When not contributing to the community, Oneal works as a Project Manager, Agile Coach, and IT Instructor. He also manages WordPress sites for family members, non-profit groups, and charity organizations.

May the Force be with you

Oneal is a big Star Wars fan. Actually, that’s what led him to WordPress in 2007: he volunteered to build a website for a global fan club.

How did you discover WordPress, and why did you start using it for your projects?
“I used Drupal to build a website for my costuming group but found WordPress easier for non-technical users, with more community support. It was also better supported by developers in the community.”

After migrating the first site, Oneal continued using WordPress to build websites, blogs, and community membership sites for family members, small businesses, and other charity and community organizations.

His passion for George Lucas’ epic series still burns: Oneal spends his weekends building and wearing Star Wars-themed costumes for charity events, fundraisers, and children’s hospital visits.

Training for the Training Team

Oneal’s online journey has often involved training. In the 1990s, he ran an internet cafe, teaching people how to use the internet, join chatrooms, and play and run LAN games. Then, he trained co-workers on doing customer support over the phone, Skype, and IRC.

Eventually, he joined one of the biggest logistics companies in the Philippines as an IT Learning and Development Specialist, training thousands of people each year. 

What motivated you to go beyond using WordPress and start contributing to the open-source project? What drew you to the Training Team?
“I discovered the global WordPress community during the pandemic. I had been using WordPress since 2007, but my work hours prevented me from getting involved in the local WordPress community. The lockdowns in 2020 left me with free time to join the Training Team meetings. Then, Courtney Robertson asked me to run one of the Team’s online meetings.”

Oneal also helped Jill Binder organize the #WPDiversity workshops. He’s run events in the Philippines, Indonesia, Southeast Asia, India, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, and Switzerland, and helped Jill run workshops in South America. 

In July 2022, Oneal was invited to join the Training Team faculty as an Administrator, where he currently helps vetting Training Team online workshop facilitator and training presenter applications. 

He is also on the WordPress Community Program Support Team, helping vet WordCampWordCamp WordCamps are casual, locally-organized conferences covering everything related to WordPress. They're one of the places where the WordPress community comes together to teach one another what they’ve learned throughout the year and share the joy. Learn more. and MeetupMeetup All local/regional gatherings that are officially a part of the WordPress world but are not WordCamps are organized through https://www.meetup.com/. A meetup is typically a chance for local WordPress users to get together and share new ideas and seek help from one another. Searching for ‘WordPress’ on meetup.com will help you find options in your area. applications.

What was your first contribution, and how did seeing your work reach so many people feel?
“I helped run online meetings, edited meeting notes, and supported team members running online workshops. It made me feel like I’m part of the community of contributors. The WordPress community is not only made up of developers or coders—there are many avenues of contribution where anyone could make a difference.”

Could you share any challenges or obstacles you faced when starting to contribute and how you overcame them?
“Time zones are a big challenge. I’m based in the Philippines (APAC timezone), and many meetings I helped run were usually in the US or UK timezone. l had to be awake at 1 am to join; eventually, the Training Team shifted to a two-meeting arrangement, accommodating contributors across the globe.

Another challenge is the cost of attending WordCamps and Meetups. “In the US and Europe, you can drive to an event. If you want to attend a WordCamp in Asia, you have to fly, which not only costs money but also means taking time off from work.”

Nonetheless, when Oneal heard about WordCamp Asia 2023 in Bangkok, Thailand, he decided that this had to be the first WordCamp he would attend in person. “I applied as an organizer, and for almost a year, 50 of us took time out of our week for meetings and prepared a flagship WordCamp in another country.”

Were there any specific resources that helped you along your journey as a contributor?
“A great resource in WordPress is the vast amount of content created by the Training Team. There are workshops and videos on every aspect of WordPress, and many are translated into multiple languages for broader reach.

But the best resource is the people in the community. There are people who will guide you and those who will bend over backward to help you, and there are those who will sit and listen to you. They are the greatest assets, and why many of us still contribute.”

Can you share any memorable moments or achievements while contributing to WordPress?
“One of the most satisfying times was when I was asked to contribute to an online workshop, discussing how the Training Team Faculty admin performs the vetting process for content contributors and how to ensure they comply with the GPLGPL GPL is an acronym for GNU Public License. It is the standard license WordPress uses for Open Source licensing https://wordpress.org/about/license/. The GPL is a ‘copyleft’ license https://www.gnu.org/licenses/copyleft.en.html. This means that derivative work can only be distributed under the same license terms. This is in distinction to permissive free software licenses, of which the BSD license and the MIT License are widely used examples..”

What advice would you give someone who wants to start contributing to WordPress?
“Jump in! Just join any team you feel you can contribute. Everyone is friendly and willing to help. There is always something to do, and there are many areas where you can make a difference. The community is dynamic and always moving, and people are welcoming and encouraging.

WordPress is not just software, code, ones, and zeros. WordPress is people. WordPress is a community. That is what makes WordPress stronger and keeps people coming back.”

Thank you, Oneal, for all your dedication and contributions to the Training Team and the WordPress Open SourceOpen Source Open Source denotes software for which the original source code is made freely available and may be redistributed and modified. Open Source **must be** delivered via a licensing model, see GPL. Project!


Are you interested in contributing to the Training Team?
Check out our Getting Started guide or join the Guide Program for mentorship with an experienced contributor. We’d be happy to have you join us!

#contributor-spotlight

Project Thread: Learning Pathways on Learn WordPress

Project Objective: Create and launch progressive user-friendly learning pathways tailored to different types of Learners on Learn WordPress.

Project Overview

The WordPress Training Team recognizes the need for a clear, structured, and user-friendly approach to presenting Learn WordPress content. This need has been confirmed by feedback from the individual learner survey and WordCamp EU Contributor Day attendees. As a result, this project aims to deployDeploy Launching code from a local development environment to the production web server, so that it's available to visitors. an improved Learn WordPress website experience that provides an easy-to-navigate, goal-oriented learning environment that caters to learners of different roles and skill levels.

This project will serve as a foundational start, establishing a framework and functionality that will allow for the expansion and growth of the learning system over time. To meet our objective, this project includes a website redesign that offers clear learning pathways to reach target Learners such as Developers, End Users, and Designers. We will also focus on making relevant content easier to find and the inclusion of a framework that classifies content by skill level. We believe this will enhance user engagement, improve learning outcomes, and increase user adoption of Learn WordPress resources.

Our journey will not end with the initial deployment of the new site. Rather, it is just the beginning of an iterative process of continuous improvement and expansion, leveraging feedback and data analytics to enhance the user experience continually.

We hope that this project will help us better serve the wider WordPress community by promoting knowledge transfer and ensuring a thriving community with diverse skills and abilities.

Thank you to @courane01 for getting this work kicked off in your Creating Learning Pathways for Learn WordPress and subsequent GitHub issue.

Project Members

Project lead: TBD

Members: @jominney @piyopiyofox @west7 @psykro @courane01

Project Timeline

Start: July 24, 2023

End: July 2024

Project Deliverables

  • Develop a website redesign for Learn WordPress that delivers a clear, user-friendly pathway for learners of different levels, roles, and use-cases.
  • Enhance the discoverability and searchability of relevant Learn WordPress content through the integration of new search filters and content organization strategies.
  • Establish a skill level classification framework for Learn WordPress content that enables clear content filtering and search results based on learner needs.

Tasks

Planning

Tasks in this section scope out project parameters and requirements for the success of this project.

Project Management

  • Recruit project members
  • Establish cross-team collaboration points of contact

Information Architecture

  • Create outlines and storyboards that detail learning pathway components based on the proposed information architecture
  • Map out content to provide a proposed information architecture (i.e. content types, taxonomies, relationships) that integrates Pathways
  • Conduct targeted user research to validate content decisions such as language, information architecture, outlines/storyboards

Deadline: September 18th 2023

Content Creation

Cross-team collaboration point of contact: @west7

These are tasks that Training Team Content Creators can help us accomplish

  • Outline specific skill levels and learning outcomes for each pathway.
  • Identify existing content that can be used within pathways.
  • Create outlines and storyboards that detail learning pathway components. (Either Miro or Google Jamboard will be used)
  • Develop a content creation guidelines that enable the Learning Pathways to scale, with a clear process for developing, reviewing, and updating content.

Deadline: November 2023

  • Develop new content where gaps exist.
  • Develop clear and concise learning pathways for target Learners.

Deadline: March 2024

Design

Cross-team collaboration point of contact: @fcoveram

These are tasks we will need to do in collaboration with the Make WordPress Design Team.

  • Develop a cohesive design concept for the Learn WordPress site.
  • Develop visual language for skill level classifications.
  • Ensure that the site design aligns with the learning pathways vision and goals.
  • Ensure that all visual elements are accessible and meet accessibilityAccessibility Accessibility (commonly shortened to a11y) refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design ensures both “direct access” (i.e. unassisted) and “indirect access” meaning compatibility with a person’s assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessibility) standards, such as color contrast ratios and readable typography.

Deadline: January 2024

Development

Cross-team collaboration point of contact: @adamwood

These are tasks we will need to do in collaboration with the Make WordPress MetaMeta Meta is a term that refers to the inside workings of a group. For us, this is the team that works on internal WordPress sites like WordCamp Central and Make WordPress. team and Training Team developers.

  • Ensure that the Learn WordPress site redesign accommodates various learning pathways and skill levels.
  • Build out any new functionality required to support learning pathways and content classification.
  • Collaborate with content creators to ensure that the site structure and content is optimized for user experience.
  • Ensure that the site is optimized for searchability and discoverability of content
  • Implement user tracking and analytics features to capture data on user behavior and engagement with Learning Pathways.
  • Ensure that the site is optimized for fast page load times and is easily accessible on various devices, including desktop, mobile, and tablet.
  • Ensure that the Learning Pathways are integrated with any relevant third-party tools or services that may further enhance the user experience, such as social sharing, reminders and bookmarking tools.

Deadline: May 2024

Marketing

Cross-team collaboration point of contact: @sereedmedia

These are tasks we will need to do in collaboration with the Make WordPress Marketing Team..

  • Develop a strategic marketing plan for promoting Learn WordPress learning pathways.
  • Identify target audiences within the three groups of Learners and develop targeted campaigns for each group.
  • Develop clear messaging that speaks to each Learner group’s specific needs and pain points.
  • Track engagement and optimize marketing efforts over time.
  • Partner with the content creators and designers to create promotional materials, including blog posts, social media graphics, and email marketing campaigns, to promote the Learning Pathways effectively.

Deadline: July 2024


Thank you to the following contributors who helped shape this project plan: @courane01 @bsanevans @jominney @digitalchild @fcoveram @ardianimaya @tobifjellner @yvettesonneveld @askdesign @west7 @lesleysim @sereedmedia

Discussion: possible collaboration to transform learning pathways to Skill Trees

During the feedback/discussions around Learning Pathways, @skilldisplayflo has offered to help transform our learning pathways to a skill tree format.

The Skill Tree format appears to be something available from the SkillDisplay platform, where they have collaborated with other open-source projects, including TypoCMS.

I would recommend that folks interested in this discussion read the original comment linked above, and the rest of the threaded conversation, to understand the benefits.

The idea here is that the skill tree format could allow teachers to “cherry pick the skills (aka learning path tree nodes) they really need, instantly render their own curriculum for a handout and get matching learning resources that are tailored towards her use case.”

Converting Learning Pathways into Skill Sets would involve using the SkillDisplay tool to create the Skill Set and then hosting the Skill Set somewhere on the Learn.WordPress.orgWordPress.org The community site where WordPress code is created and shared by the users. This is where you can download the source code for WordPress core, plugins and themes as well as the central location for community conversations and organization. https://wordpress.org/ website.

I want to invite anyone interested in this process to read through the suggestions and share their thoughts in the comments on this post.

If this is something we as a team would like to consider, then we might want to decide on:

  • when we want to do this
  • who will be managing the process

Please leave your thoughts in the comments on this post by by Friday 22 March, 2024.

Brainstorm: What trends about Learn WordPress leaners do we want to observe?

The Learning Pathways project was kicked off after an extensive survey of WordPress users and their needs. It was a step by the Training Team to pivot towards a more data-informed content planning strategy.

In order for the team to continue a data-informed content planning strategy, let’s brainstorm what learner trends we should start observing in order to best serve their needs. In the comments below, please note the following:

  1. What data would be relevant for the Training Team to surface?
  2. How would surfacing that data better serve our learners, team, and community?
  3. What considerations would be needed in order to surface that data?

We’ll close the initial round of comments on February 25th and consider next-steps.

Discussion: Translation Plugin on Learn

As our work progresses on the Learning Pathways on Learn WordPress project, I’d like to start a discussion to help us address one of our 2024 team goals: Figure out a method to manage localized content translation

While the WordPress project aims to have native multilingual features in Phase 4, with the understanding that this is still a few years away, I’d like to explore interim solutions together to facilitate multilingual management on Learn WordPress.

I understand that numerous plugins are available that could enable us to better handle multilingual functionality, but we need the one that best suits our specific needs. Given our current requirements and Content Translator work, we are more inclined to those plugins that offer effective translation management rather than automatic translation.

To help bring perspective to this conversation, I’d like to invite you to share if you have any experience with such translations plugins on WordPress? If you have, please share your experiences and recommendations. Specifically, we’d like to know:

  1. What pluginPlugin A plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party did you use?
  2. How user-friendly and efficient it was in managing translations within WordPress?
  3. What notable benefits did it bring to your site?
  4. Were there any drawbacks/limitations?
  5. Are there any other recommendations or considerations you can share?

Your insight will be incredibly valuable in helping us decide the best temporary solution so we can continue our mission to cater to a broader, multilingual audience as soon as possible.

Thank you team in advance for your invaluable help. 🙂

Training Team Goals for 2024

You can find our asynchronous discussion on Team Goal Setting for 2024 here.

Vision

In 2024, the Training Team will shift Learn WordPress from theory to outcome/project-based learning, explore new streamlining technologies, improve team processes and increase global community/contributor engagement.

Values

The Training Team’s values are DEIB, Collaborative, Sustainable Growth, Impact, and Empathy. Folks can read more about them on our Team Values handbook page.

Goals to roll over from 2023

Listed below are goals session participants thought would be good to roll over into the 2024 goals.

  • Continue work on Learning Pathways
    • Create a Marketing Campaign for Learning Pathways with Marketing
    • Work with the Community team to promote Learning Pathways
  • Establish monthly recurring onboarding Online Workshops in different time zones for training team roles
  • Continue involvement with the redesign work happening on Learn
  • Audit Handbook

Milestones

The new goals session participants would like to see the Training Team work on this year are listed below. The next step is for folks to volunteer and take ownership.

Q1 – January to March 2024

Q2 – April to June 2024

  • See Learn redesign to completion with Learning Pathways as the focus
  • Create and maintain shared resources that promote the Training Team and Learn
  • Create or update a handbook page that clarifies where people’s contributions to the team will appear/be displayed
  • Any goals rolled over from the previous quarter.

Q3 – July to September 2024

  • Work with the Community team to promote Learning Pathways at Meetups
  • Figure out a method to manage localized content translation
  • Launch Learning Pathways on Learn WordPress
  • Migrate/Deprecate Learn content
  • Run 1-2 outcome/project-based course cohorts
  • Any goals rolled over from previous quarters.

Q4 -October to December 2024

  • Create a system for better surfacing Training Team member’s contributions
  • Audit Handbook
  • Any goals rolled over from previous quarters.

Stretch

Props:

Attendees: Thanks to @bsanevans, @piyopiyofox, @lada7042, @devmuhib, @ardhrubo, @westnz, @sierratr 

Proofreading: Thanks also to @bsanevans and @piyopiyofox for proofreading this summary of the goals for 2024.

#goals, #learn-wordpress, #learnwordpress, #training-team

Discussion: Bringing accessibility-first approaches into content development

At WordCampWordCamp WordCamps are casual, locally-organized conferences covering everything related to WordPress. They're one of the places where the WordPress community comes together to teach one another what they’ve learned throughout the year and share the joy. Learn more. US 2023, @jominney, @newcomer22 and team published the Training Team Accessibility Checklist 🎉 I’ve recently been considering how we can bring accessibilityAccessibility Accessibility (commonly shortened to a11y) refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design ensures both “direct access” (i.e. unassisted) and “indirect access” meaning compatibility with a person’s assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accessibility)-first approaches into the team’s content creation/review processes better.

What would it take for the team to be able to say “We’ve given our best effort to ensuring all content on Learn WordPress is accessible” when we relaunch the site with Learning Pathways in July this year? I’ve dropped some thoughts below, but this is just to get the conversation going. Let’s discuss in the comments until March 9th (Friday), and then consider next steps after that.


I noticed the WordPress project’s accessibility statement says:

WordPress aims to make the WordPress Admin and bundled themes fully WCAGWCAG WCAG is an acronym for Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. These guidelines are helping make sure the internet is accessible to all people no matter how they would need to access the internet (screen-reader, keyboard only, etc) https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/. 2.0 AA compliant where possible.

  • Question: Is striving for WCAG 2.0 AA compliance a reasonable standard for content on Learn WordPress, too?

The team’s current Accessibility Checklist has some items that go beyond the scope of WCAG 2.0 AA, but is also missing some items within scope. Below is my personal take on what content creators specifically would need to be mindful of in order to create content that is fully WCAG 2.0 AA compliant.

(Note, I’m specifically considering what can be achieved in the content creating process – mostly conducted within the WordPress Editor. There are other coding-related considerations that must be made in the theme etc., which is worth its own separate conversation.)

  • Question: Is the following list an accurate representation of what content creators would need to be mindful of to create WCAG 2.0 AA compliant content?
  1. All non-text content has a text alternative. (Guideline 1.1 – Text Alternatives)
  2. Captions and transcripts are provided for all videos. (Guideline 1.2 – Time-based Media)
  3. Audio description is provided for all prerecorded video content. Or, narration in video content describes all important visual details, including actions, scene changes, and on-screen text. (Guideline 1.2 – Time-based Media)
  4. Instructions do not rely solely on components such as shape, color, size, visual location, orientation, or sound. (Guideline 1.3 – Adaptable)
  5. Color is not used as the only visual means of conveying information, indicating an action, prompting a response, or distinguishing a visual element. (Guideline 1.4 – Distinguishable)
  6. Text and images of text have a contrast ratio of at least 4.5:1. (Guideline 1.4 – Distinguishable)
  7. Unless essential, text should be used instead of images of text. (Guideline 1.4 – Distinguishable)
  8. No content flashes more than three times/second. (Guideline 2.3 – Seizures and Physical Reactions)
  9. The purpose of each link can be determined from the link text alone. (Guideline 2.4 – Navigable)
  10. Headings describe topic or purpose. (Guideline 2.4 – Navigable)

Points 3 (audio descriptions for video content) is currently not included in the team’s accessibility checklist.

  • Question: In the context of video content on Learn, what would adding audio description to videos look like? Is it possible to publish videos where all necessary content is included in the narration?

Finally, I think it would be great if we could move the accessibility checklist from being a final check made on content to something embedded in content development and review processes.

  • Question: How can we bring accessibility-first approaches into our content development and review processes?

#accessibility

Discussion: Training’s contribution to the 6.5 release (and beyond)

The WordPress 6.5 release squad has been announced. This next release is scheduled for March 26 and now’s a great time for the Training Team to discuss how we’d like to be involved.

Below is my proposal to kick off the discussion. Let’s discuss this in the comments below until February 5th. Team reps will then summarize the discussion by the team meeting that week.

Prioritize Learning Pathways content

The Learning Pathways project is a priority for the Training Team this year, with a scheduled launch for July 2024. Considering the limited number of content creators we have on the team right now, we do not have enough resources to meet that deadline and create a lot of release-related content at the same time.

Proposal around priorities

  • Continue to prioritize developing Learning Pathways content.
  • Identify no more than 3-5 pieces of high-impact content related to the release and clearly list these in the team.
  • Find opportunities to onboard additional content creators who can assist with this content development work.

Modifying GitHubGitHub GitHub is a website that offers online implementation of git repositories that can easily be shared, copied and modified by other developers. Public repositories are free to host, private repositories require a paid subscription. GitHub introduced the concept of the ‘pull request’ where code changes done in branches by contributors can be reviewed and discussed before being merged be the repository owner. https://github.com/ triaging processes

Historically, Training’s focus during releases has included identifying content needing updates as a result of the release. This has been done by reopening GitHub issues and, if the original assignee is unresponsive, re-assigning issues to new assignees.

As the team has started to track and analyze GitHub data (see Training Team 2023 Year In Review), we’re finding this process of reopening issues and changing assignees skews important metrics that represent team health – such as the “time to close” on an issue. To ensure the team can track and report accurate metrics, I propose the following changes.

Proposal around changes to GitHub triage processes

Once again, let’s discuss this in the comments below until February 5th.

#procedures

Learning Pathway outlines

The Learning Pathways project is gaining momentum!

For those who may not have had the opportunity yet, I would like to direct your attention to the Project Thread: Learning Pathways on Learn WordPress, where you can find information about the project’s goals and strategies. The primary objective of the Learning Pathways project is to develop and launch dynamic, user-centric learning pathways tailored to diverse learner profiles.

We have drafted learning pathway outlines tailored for Users, Designers, and Developers. Our community feedback initiative began on August 24th when we reached out, seeking input through the post titled: Looking for feedback: Learning pathway outlines. The closing date for feedback was on the 15th of September. Following this, we consolidated the feedback received and utilized it to enhance and update the outlines.

Herewith are the proposed learning pathways (please use the tabs below to navigate to the relevant outline):

You are welcome to continue sharing any feedback or ideas to improve the pathways. We will make every effort to incorporate them; however, please understand that once we begin creating content for these pathways, our ability to review feedback might be limited until after the initial launch period. Your understanding and patience during this process are invaluable, and we are committed to considering all input to improve the pathways in subsequent reviews.