Ever wanted to go to school and learn about BlackBerrys all day long? Well, two bits of news for you: one, you’re crazy. Two, RIM is officially offering curriculum to academic institutions under app development, support, and administration branches. This can help you provide students the knowledge they need to achieve those dreams of making the killer app, ruling a BlackBerry rollout with an iron fist, or manning a soul-draining tech support cubicle. Instructors can use the textbooks, labs, and materials to teach the courses in whole semesters, or piecemeal as modules in other courses.
This is a really interesting strategy on RIM’s part, and reminiscent of their past efforts in certification programs. Plugging into legitimate educational institutes ensures that the hard skills necessary to maintain RIM’s infrastructure in the big wide world don’t die, and young tech professionals recognise the platform as a valid and real path to make a living. I’m interested in seeing the quality of graduates versus other IT professionals who have fallen into BlackBerry after finishing nonspecific courses…
For more information, hit up www.blackberry.com/academic, and be sure to stay tuned over the coming week for more information from the 2009 BlackBerry Developer Conference.