Frequently Asked Questions

A: The Contact Us on the IBM Skills Academy landing page is a good place to start to reach out to an IBM representative for more information.

A: Contact your school learning administrator, faculty member or staff for details on course availability.

A: Program Registration is by Institution. Contact Us or your curriculum administrator for details for your institution.

A: Select course tracks are available in Chinese, Spanish and Portuguese with more coming soon.

A: Maintenance schedules, availability and status of services are available from the IBM Cloud website.

A: Access requires an IBMid. This is the same id that you used to register for the IBM Academic Initiative or IBM Cloud or other IBM product page. If you have not previously registered for an IBMid follow the prompts on the IBM Skills Academy site to create and IBMid.

A: After you have accessed your Learning Dashboard, you will find the "Apply Token" option on the upper left corner of the page.

Upon clicking this option, you will receive a prompt to enter your token (access code or feature code). Input your token and click "Apply".

You should receive a pop up notifying you of the amount of time you have to complete the course. Click Yes if you are ready to proceed.

You will know that you have successfully applied the access code when you are routed to your Student Dashboard and the course you have enrolled is now available.

A: After applying the token, you will now find your enrolled course on your Student Dashboard. You may now start your learning!

A: University, College and Continuing Education students who are degree seeking and non-degree seeking are eligible when their institution is part of the program. Contact your local institution for more details.

A: From your Skills Academy Learning Dashboard Click on the course tile for the course you are interested. Next click on the learning module for the course. Review the Lesson Menu. Notice each lecture includes an accompanying notes lecture. Select the notes lecture you wish to review.  In addition, some courses included a video folder with replays from the T3 sessions.  These videos, when available can be found below the course module.

A: The IBM Skills Academy simulations make use of Articulate. Please follow the guidelines below to ensure the best experience possible when accessing the content.

A: Confirm that you have logged in using the IBMid associated with profile you used to apply the token for a course for the IBM Skills Academy. Students with multiple IBMids have reported that they have logged in using the incorrect id. To confirm the current, authenticated IBMid Click your name to reveal the profile menu then select profile. Confirm the email address is associated with your IBM Skills Academy course. If not, log out of the IBM Skills Academy and log in with the correct email address.

There are two potential scenarios and solutions:

1) You can convert your personal Cloud trial account to a Cloud Lite account by providing the email address that's associated with your IBMid at https://cloud.ibm.com/registration/startUpgradeToLite

No credit card is required for a Lite account

2) When a feature code is applied from IBM Academic Initiative, or if you use other IBM resources such as a $200 credit, your account becomes a trial account, instead of the lite account as used by Skills Academy. After some days (usually 180), the trial period expires and you are asked to provide billing information for a full account. If that happens, open an IBM Cloud support ticket at https://watson.service-now.com/x_ibmwc_open_case_app#!/create and ask to reactivate the account. After this is done, you need to apply a new feature code, otherwise it will block your account again after 10 days

Per previously announced Global University Program policy, course labs are moving to a simulated environment. With this method, students are given screen-shots of the actual software and asked to enter a response. The correct answer will continue the lab. All software exposure is as the product would show as of the date of the lab preparation. This method provides several benefits.

Students can not get lost in deciphering various, and sometimes not beginner level, error messages from their wrong responses, thus help to keep them on track to learn the lab goal.

For some courses, the simulated lab also avoids local software installation on the student’s computer. This local installation sometimes incurs one or more of the following situations:
- Students have not done software installations on their computer
- Students do not have permission to do so
- School issued computers may have IT administrative policies that prevent the local installation
- School issued computers may have network access rules that prevent certain types of LAN traffic used in some labs

Many labs rely on Cloud-based software that can be updated automatically. Sometimes that affects the operation of the lab. Sometimes features are shifted in the lite level of the Cloud account that is used in Skills Academy, resulting in changes to the lab.

Even if a cloud-based software update does not affect the operation of a function or API, the on-screen view of the software may change from the photos in the Lab Guide, confusing the student.

As of this date, the Cyber Security course has simulated labs, and the Cloud course will have them soon.

For some courses, the traditional labs will remain accessible in the course outline, for those wanting that experience. However, this will be a transition process, and eventually, those labs will be removed from the Skills Academy Portal.

The number and format of the simulated labs may not be the same as with the original version; however, the same educational benefit is retained.

As a further improvement, the Lab Guides will be made printable, so students can have a paper copy, to avoid taking up screen real estate on a laptop computer. The ability to print also makes it easier to make notes during the progress of the lab.

A: Upon successful completion of the required learning modules workshops and exams students are eligible for a badge. Contact your faculty guide for completion criteria and receipt of a badge.

A: Course materials may be available to students for a limited time based on your institution's participation in the program. Contact your faculty guide for more information.

A: Course materials may be available to students for a limited time based on your institution's participation in the program. Contact your faculty guide for more information.