Recently launched online courses and Portuguese classes at Bermuda College are set to continue this Spring after a positive reaction from students.

Tawana Flood, director of the Professional and Career Education division (PACE), said the school has both expanded it’s online work development offerings and continued the Portuguese classes due to public demand.

“We try to be very progressive as far ensuring that the College is in tune with what is needed in the community and in the workplace, and I think that is the reason these classes are popular,” she said.

She said the Conversational Portuguese classes, which launched last semester with the support and assistance of the Vasco de Gama Club, were overwhelmingly popular.

“It was actually oversubscribed,” Ms Flood said. “It’s doing very, very well, to the point where we had to add a second cohort.

“It was popular to the point where we had to turn people away, so we will be offering that again this semester.

“They learned about the Portuguese cuisine, there was a Portuguese poetry session in the library.

“It was very good. It’s a very popular course. There are some people who are preparing to go to the World Cup.

“The students were very passionate about it, and so we will be offering it again and we are hoping to get the same numbers.”

Ms Flood said the school’s online work development certificate programmes — which also launched during the Fall semester — were also popular, attracting a wide variety of people looking to update both their skill sets and their resumes.

“They want their employers to see them as being current, that they do know about social media and they do know how to implement it into a strategy,” Ms Flood said.

“It’s making them more marketable because every employer wants someone who is current, who understands the importance of not only the traditional way of doing business, but also someone whose trendy.

“We had people from different sectors of the community. We have had teachers, we had someone from a dental office, we have had civil servants. We had a small-business owner and a bartender, so it was a wide range.

“We have students who will put aside time on the weekend to do it, and it takes around four to six hours on a weekend.

“We also have people who schedule one hour every night. It is flexible, and that’s one of the reasons it’s popular.

There are parents who kids down to bed and then go online. Press play, and off you go.”

While the first courses introduced focused largely on social media, this semester Ms Flood said the college has expanded its offerings to provide a wider range of opportunities.

Among the new courses being offered are Time and Productivity Management, eMarketing Essentials, Mobile Marketing, Spanish for Healthcare professionals and Cyber Security for Managers.

“The Cyber Security course is definitely a hot course for those who are interested in that. If you have your own small business, it’s good understanding not just the importance of apps, but also the risks and how to remedy them,” Ms Flood said.

“More and more people are doing their banking online, doing their education online and even healthcare online, but it’s important to understand the risks associated with conducting business online,”

She also said she was excited about the Mobile Marketing Certificate programme, saying it will teach those enrolled how to create an app and use it effectively for their business.

Those interested in registering for Conversational Portuguese must do so by the end of today, while registration for the online programmes will continue until the end of the month.

Those interested in learning more about these courses, or any others offered by Bermuda College, can visit www.college.bm or e-mail padmin@college.bm.