Technical Writing Certifications

[Yves JEAUROND]

[further reading / ad, sort of]
   
  Fyi, about certification, Jane Jacobs has invented a new word to disparage the practice when it is meaningless: "credentialing" (sic). There's a whole chapter of mostly negative opinion about it in _Dark Age Ahead_, Random House/Vintage, 2004.
  The title of chapter 3: "Credentialing Versus Educating" :-)
  Jacobs makes a nice tie between "credentialing" and the Great Depression, and that very North-American consensus "never again will we suffer the meaningless disaster of mass unemployment." 
   
  How credentialing can dominate an education system "Teachers could not help despairing of classes whose members seemed less interested in learning thasn in doing the minimum work required to get by and get out."
   
  One less thing on my "to read" list. After seeing Moore's _Sicko_, one wonders if the US worker's anguish to obtain medical insurance has crept into obtaining "employment insurance" in the form of a certificate?  :-)
   
  Regards,
   
  YJ