#50000Chances: Halftime For Current Round Of Scholarship Initiative
In the second round of its “#50000Chances” scholarship initiative, Bertelsmann offered 1,600 participants the chance to earn a full Udacity nanodegree. They could choose between three degrees: “Cloud Developer with Azure,” “Predictive Analytics for Business” and “AI Product Manager.” The six-month courses are now halfway over.
Bertelsmann introduced the “50000 Chances” Udacity Technology Scholarship Program to support the development of future-critical tech skills over a period of three years. This year, in the second part of the global scholarship initiative, 5,000 participants successfully completed the Challenge Course in March. The completion rate of 33 percent was significantly higher than the average rate of around 25 percent for other external scholarships of this kind. The completion rate for Bertelsmann employees was once again well above that of overall participants, rising even further to 48 percent.
Bertelsmann Chief Learning Officer Steven Moran said: “I’m especially pleased again this year to see the high participation rate of Bertelsmann employees. Their sustained motivation to further their training and acquire important skills in these tech disciplines, driven by the accelerated digitization of our businesses, is something I’m very happy about.” 1,600 of the participants in the Challenge course were given the chance to subsequently earn a full Udacity nanodegree. “Cloud Developer with Azure”, “Predictive Analytics for Business” and “AI Product Manager” were the degrees available for selection. These courses recently celebrated their half-way mark, so it’s been more than three months since they started. This year, due to Corona restrictions, the lively interaction between students is taking place entirely in the virtual realm: Learners worldwide meet for self-organized online learning groups, and the corporate divisions also organize virtual networking sessions to support the exchange among the students.
