ADOBE has announced a new global initiative that expands the Adobe Digital Academy’s focus to equip next-generation learners and teachers with AI literacy, content creation and digital marketing skills to thrive in the modern workforce. Expanding on the Adobe Digital Academy’s decade of success in upskilling and creating new career pathways, the program will provide training, certifications and access to Adobe Express with a goal of helping 30 million learners globally develop these in-demand skills by 2030.
Training and certificates will be available through Adobe’s collaborations with Coursera, NGOs, K-12 schools, colleges and universities and alternative education organizations. Adobe will fund scholarships and NGO grants to help ensure that emerging professionals from all backgrounds can benefit from the training, tools and direct pathways to future careers.
The rise of the creator economy and breakthrough AI technologies have unleashed a wave of new opportunities in content creation and marketing across every industry. Emerging professionals are eager to carve out their place in this fast-evolving landscape and specialized training and certifications signal expertise to future employers.
“Adobe’s mission has always been to design products that create opportunities and empower people from all backgrounds to change the world,” Stacy Martinet, vice president, marketing strategy and communications at Adobe. “We want AI to bridge the digital divide not widen it, and this program will open doors for emerging professionals to succeed in the future workforce with AI literacy, content creation and marketing skills.”
The program builds on Adobe’s commitment to empower learners of all backgrounds to succeed in today’s job market and unleash creativity for all. Adobe has committed more than $100M this year in donations, scholarships, product access and partnerships across this and other initiatives to enable people and organizations around the world to tell their stories.
Adobe has designed a range of curricula for this program covering topics including Generative AI Content Creation and Creative G AI Skills, with information on using AI responsibly and ethically, Social Media Content, Multimedia Content, Content Marketing and Multi-channel Content and Advertising. Learners will gain the ability to create high- quality content effortlessly with tools like Adobe Express and learn how to harness the power of generative AI to better express themselves creatively and visually.
The first courses are now available globally on Coursera, a best-in-class online learning platform, to enable anyone to learn and gain creative and digital skills at their own pace. Aspiring learners can pursue Content Creator and Graphic Designer Professional certificates, with additional certificates in Digital Marketing available in early 2025. Adobe is committing $250,000 in scholarship licenses that will be distributed through nonprofits in the first year of the program to access Adobe courses and certificates on Coursera.
The coursework will be coming soon to Adobe Express and is in development for the Behance community. Adobe is providing new donations to an expanded network of alternative education and youth-serving NGO collaborators including DECA, NPower, Build.org, the Prince’s Trust, AVID, Girl Scouts of Western Washington and Pratham. These new investments will provide millions of students served by NGOs with exposure to essential workplace skills and integrate skilling opportunities into their extracurricular offerings.
"Adobe is the ideal partner for DECA as we amplify our quest to prepare students for college and careers,” said Christopher Young, CAE, chief program officer, DECA Inc. “This initiative will empower our student members to learn and apply the creative skills they need for their future careers in marketing and business. Adobe Express is the perfect tool for DECA students to apply their creativity and experiment with AI to create content relevant to preparing for their careers."
In addition, Adobe is focused on creating direct paths for future careers. Adobe will expand its partnership with existing Digital Academy collaborator General Assembly, a leading tech talent and training provider, to add bootcamps for marketing and content creation to its offerings.
