I am still catching up with news from the MESA International North America Conference this week. All living organisms and organizations seem to have periods of growth and then periods of consolidation. MESA International seems to have renewed leadership energy, focus and new growth potential.

Arguably its most significant achievement over the past couple of years has been the Global Education Program. I’ll have a podcast interview posted by the first of the week with Mike James who led the development of the program. It has been successful–but mostly in Asia followed by Europe and Africa. The uptake in the US has been less than other places. We need to evangelize more over here the benefits of implementing MES/MOM solutions.

The new announcement is that the new B2MML & Integration Fundamentals training is ready to launch, as are online classes, which will allow students easier access to classes and offer them two options for earning a MESA Certificate of Awareness (CoA) online.

The B2MML & Integration Fundamentals program is a significant new education product and the result of the 2012 merger between MESA and WBF. It will detail the fundamentals in plant-to-enterprise integration and the fundamentals and methodologies of using the MESA B2MML (Business-to-Manufacturing Markup Language) and ISA-95 standard. The IACET-accredited program will be available in both classroom and online settings and offer a MESA Certificate of Competency (CoC) for successful completion in either format.

MESA is also preparing to release a schedule of online classes for nine existing GEP courses. All such courses will be instructor-led (known as synchronous online training) to allow for student interaction with a MESA-authorized instructor and will offer IACET Continuing Education Units (CEU). Online courses can be taken as an individual class, based on topic and timing, or as part of a bundle or certificate program. The Business Awareness CoA will now be available completely online, and a new certificate, the MES/MOM Foundation CoA, will also be offered.

The announced enhancements build on MESA’s success of the last two and a half years. Over this time, MESA started the Global Education Program from scratch, educated hundreds of professionals across five continents, translated the program for German-speaking countries, and earned IACET accreditation. The B2MML offering now adds integration fundamentals education to the pool of available training. Making it, and existing courses, available online will make the training easier to access for students, and give MESA more options for providing subject-specific bundles of classes and new certificates.

MESA believes strongly in the need for this education and remains committed to its role as a leader. MESA’s president Mike Yost commented, “These enhancements to the MESA GEP show our continued commitment to establishing a worldwide baseline of knowledge for the MES/MOM space. When we get educated buyers working with educated solution providers, everyone will win, and the value of these solutions will be globally understood.”

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