Google UX Design Certificate Program First Impressions
Hi again! I’ve been exploring the Google UX Design Certificate program on Coursera for a few days now. I’ve completed the first two weeks of the first course, Foundations of UX Design, and I have some impressions.
First, I appreciate the clean look of Coursera’s platform across all devices. I’ve used Coursera on my Android phone, my Mac, my Android tablet, and my iPad. Each looks and behaves the same, which is great for continuity. I love picking up where I left off on any nearby device without having to re-learn how to navigate the app. It’s also nice that I don’t lose any functionality between desktop and mobile.
Most of the content I’ve seen so far has been videos, but there are readings, quizzes, and discussions sprinkled throughout to keep things varied and hold students’ attention.
The videos and other content are high quality — which isn’t a surprise given Google produced them! Michael, the primary host in most of the videos, speaks slowly and clearly, and he has a warm presence. He’s easy to understand and easy to listen to, which I appreciate. There are also several guest speakers from quite diverse personal and professional backgrounds, which adds to the variety and depth.
Each video has a transcription below, and the transcriptions have some useful features. A live highlight of the text follows along with the video, marking the part of the video that’s playing in the transcript. Students can click any part of the text to move forward and backward in the video. This has helped me take notes. Sometimes I miss things, so I just find the text I want to hear again, click it, and the video skips back to that section.
Not everything is perfect, though. The structure of the course, at least as presented, is confusing at first glance. I thought the program contained seven courses, but the progress tree in the sidebar on the homepage only listed four: Weeks 1 through 4. Coursera only shows the student their progress within the course they’re working on, not their overall progress in the certificate. That’s fine, it just isn’t very clear.
Bugs abound, too, especially on the mobile apps. The discussion sections of the course that require the student to enter an answer to a prompt wouldn’t let me type anything in the field on my Android phone, Android tablet, and iPad. Anytime I typed something, the cursor would jump around and write over what I’d typed. Students don’t have to complete the discussions to progress in the course, so I’ve been able to bypass them, but it’s still frustrating. I’m also surprised that Google would include discussion sections without making them mandatory. What’s the point of having them at all? I couldn’t track or view notifications of interactions from other students on any of my discussion submissions either, which further makes me wonder what purpose they serve.
I’ve also run into problems with frames on the desktop version of the app. Sometimes surveys or readings show within a frame on the page, but I can’t scroll within the frame. Other times, there have been “continue” or “mark complete” buttons both inside and outside the frame, making it confusing which I’m supposed to be clicking.
These are minor quibbles that haven’t detracted from my ability to enjoy and learn from the course, and I’m sure Google and Coursera will fix them in future updates. The content is the most important piece of the puzzle, and it’s great. It’s high quality, free of typos or errors, and informative. Some of the initial content has been pretty dry, but that’s expected; Google needs to set the table and introduce terminology to get everyone up to speed first.
Last, I’ve seen some others online say that there’s terminology used by Google that isn’t used in the wider industry. Since I’m new to the industry, I can’t comment on that, but I wanted to mention it here.
Overall, I’m pleased with the experience (especially given the affordable price!), and I’m looking forward to getting through more of the course, which I’ll continue to blog about here. Thanks for reading!
