Courses

Learn about the concept of active listening and how to incorporate this skill into your workplace communication practices.

Explore the skills needed to be an effective interpretive coach. Coaching others to develop and deliver meaningful interpretation is rewarding because you multiply the opportunities for visitors to understand the relevance and significance of our resources. It gives you the chance to share your passion.

Learn about how to create effective performance reviews, first through defining performance reviews, describing the performance management cycle, and finally by going through the performance review process.

In this course you will learn how to turn difficult situations into opportunities for growth. While this course is aimed at supervisors who interact with difficult employees, the information and activities can be helpful for dealing with difficult people in other situations as well.

Promote meaningful communication by developing conversational leadership skills.

Gain an understanding on how to create successful proposals. This course focuses on sources of funding, types of proposals, and how to write the most effective proposals.

Gain a comprehensive understanding of how to develop an impactful webinar to engage clientele or staff.

Not a designer, but need to develop an interpretive media product? This course will teach you basic design principles that will help you put together a product that is both interpretive and eye-catching.

Gain an understanding of the use and purpose of Lunch and Learn Programs as a way to encourage informal learning in the workplace!

Gain a comprehensive understanding of sustainability and how to apply social responsibility in a business context to contribute to positive workplaces, communities, and futures.

This course has been created to make core facilitation skills better understood and readily available for your organization. It represents materials and ideas that have been tested and refined over twenty years of active facilitation in all types of settings.

Gain skills in recognizing safety and conflict situations in your parks and how to respond and de-escalate conflict.

This course will help participants learn why the way we deliver is feedback is important, how to deliver a message so that people accept it and make changes that may be needed, and how to accept feedback that we are offered.

This course provides a brief introduction to the benefits of facilitation in group settings.

This course will give you the skills and tools to hire successful candidates.

Do you have a strong background and understanding of interpretation (perhaps in programming) but want to dig deeper? Do you struggle with interpretive media or writing? Are you curious about what exactly ‘dialogic’ interpretation means? If so, this certificate program is for you!

The Intermediate Methods in Interpretation Certificate is entirely web-based and consists of five interpretive courses each culminating with an applied assignment that relates to your organization or site. This course of study provides you with the opportunity to receive feedback from your instructor(s) who review the elements of your portfolio. Additionally, if you apply for and are accepted into the cohort-based program, you will work with a mentor who has considerable experience in the interpretive field who will guide you as you develop your intermediate skills.

Stop! Before you register for this certificate program, are you an NAI member interested in completing it as part of a cohort and working with a mentor? The Eppley Institute and the National Association for Interpretation are recruiting students to participate in a cohort program that typically begins in January of each year. Applications are now available. If you are interested in learning more and applying, please click here. If you would like to join NAI, please visit their website.

New to interpretation? Want to refresh your understanding of the basics of interpretation? This course is for you!

Explore guided interpretive programs, which can take many forms: walks, hikes, house tours, canoe trips, bus tours, cave tours, just to name a few.

Explore a new approach to interpretation – dialogic interpretation. This course discusses three methods interpreters are using to present dialogic programs to visitors and guests.

The visitor is sovereign. Interpreters may hear this very basic but very important concept many times during the course of their career. What does it mean? It means that each visitor or guest brings a unique level of knowledge, interest, and care each time they visit a site.

Gain an understanding of how to have productive and safe difficult conversations with your employees and teammates.

This course will teach managers and supervisors how to prepare employees for the virtual workplace, create telework programs, build virtual teams, leverage technology, and overcome cultural barriers.

Build a foundational understanding of facility management practices, particularly as they apply to parks and public lands agencies. The certificate program follows the Asset Management Process, an approach used by the National Park Service.

Understand laws, regulations,and agency policiesrelating to health and safety and recognize common health,safety, and conflictsituations that may arise in parks.

Learn about various types of threats and hazards you may encounter as a park employee and strategies for responding to them.

This course introduces you to industry-standard project management practices, including the phases of project management and useful strategies that keep a project on track.

Gain understanding on how to effectively manage public relations and create comprehensive strategy regarding PR technique.

This course is aimed at improving your skills and learning new techniques that will give you the persuasive edge when you are making a presentation, fielding difficult questions, or presenting complex information.

Explore how social media can be used interpretively to expand your reach.

Gain valuable skills that will help you train impactful interpreters. Interpretive trainers support interpreters in connecting people to parks, museums, zoos, and other places.

Explore important situations or concepts that public agency communicators are likely to encounter in their work.

Learn about the need for communicating with the public and how doing so impacts the success of your agency.

Obtain a background understanding of importance pertaining to the various communication tools available to and used by public agency communicators.

Learn the basic information you need to know before learning more about how to interact with the media.

Explore important situations or concepts that public agency communicators are likely to encounter in their work.

Explore the main elements of a communications plan, as well as how to create successful plans.

Learn how to use technology to your advantage by effectively integrating technology into your processes and procedures.