Frequently Asked Questions

This certificate program is designed to provide a flexible, highly accessible educational training opportunity to help individuals develop and maintain professional competencies and competitiveness in the workforce. Graduates of research administration programs have found employment in a diverse number of fields, including data analysis, grant writing, clinical research, patient care, mental health, epidemiology, clinical trials, collaborations, personnel management, and more.

There are four courses, and each will be offered once a year so that participants can complete the certificate in a one year period.

No. Participants can take the courses at their own pace, and may take up to three years to finish the program.

What if I’ve never taken an online course? What kind of technological support do you offer? 

We know it can be difficult to attend classes while also working, whether that be in the workplace or at home, as well as balance your busy personal life. That’s one of the main reasons we decided to offer this program completely online.  You will not need to attend any sessions onsite, nor will you need to ‘attend’ a lecture online at a set time.
  
This built-in flexibility allows you to complete the coursework when it is convenient for you, perhaps first thing in the morning before you go to work or late at night after your children have gone to bed.
  
That being said, we know people are more likely to reach their goals if they have some structure in place. To help you stay on track, we’re offering each course over a set 15-week or 8-week (Summer) period. You will have one week to complete each of the class modules. Within each week, you get to decide when you want to engage with the course material.
  
We believe this provides you with the best of both worlds— flexibility and structure—setting you up to successfully complete the program in one year. We have also done our best to schedule classes around the major holidays and to give you some time off between each class.

Yes! Although your interaction will not be face-to-face, we have designed the courses in such a way that you will have ample opportunities to interact with your instructors and one another, particularly through online discussion forums. Many participants have said that interacting in this way has made their learning experience richer than a conventional classroom-based program.
  
Offering the program online also means that participants across the nation, as well as across the world, can participate. This creates a wonderfully diverse context for learning and discussing topics in research administration.

No. Each course can stand alone (i.e., independent of each other) and, therefore, participants can elect to take these courses in any order and start the program in either the Fall or the Winter/Spring. Note that although one of the courses takes place over the Summer, there is no Summer enrollment.

International participants are not eligible for F-1 participant visa sponsorship from the University of Maryland, Baltimore due to the entirely online curriculum of the certificate program; however, students can participate in the program from outside the US without a need for a US participant visa.