Frequently Asked Questions

Technical Issues Who do I contact with technical problems? You can contact the Prepare Iowa Learning Management System Coordinators at prepareiowa@uiowa.edu or visit our Contact Information When I click on "launch course" from "My Courses", I get a "page not found" error. Some users who attempt to access a course from behind a firewalled network with strict security policies have problems viewing certain courses in the LMS that are delivered in 3rd-party content managment systems. If this happens to you, please contact us at prepareiowa@uiowa.edu to discuss solutions to this problem. Where do I find my username & password? When you first filled out your registration form, you provided a username and password, if you click on Edit Profile, the system will bring up your registration form. You will be able to see your username, however, you will not be able to see your password. If you have not yet created your account, click on Register with Us and complete the registration form. When creating your username and password, it is advisable not to use special characters or spaces in between letters or numbers. If you still cannot find them, please e-mail the system administrator at prepareiowa@uiowa.edu How do I change my username & password? You can't change your username, however, you can change your password. To do this, you need to log in and select Edit Profile under the Welcome sign - this will bring your registration form up, enter in your new password twice and remember to hit SAVE. Also, your password can be changed by emailing the Learning Management System Coordinator at prepareiowa@uiowa.edu I forgot my username and/or password, how do I get it? If you remember your username, or your password, you can use the Password Retrieval Tool to recover them. Otherwise, you may Contact Us to help. What is ICON? ICON is a course development tool used at Prepareiowa.com to deliver courses and course content online. Visit ICON's Frequently-Asked-Questions (FAQs) What internet browsers work with Prepare Iowa? Currently, only Microsoft Internet Explorer version 5.0 or later will provide full compatibility with the Learning Management System. Other browsers may work for some tasks, but will not work the entire site. What e-mail address should I provide? Technically, you can provide any e-mail address that you have regular access to. However, it is advisable to use a work e-mail on a dedicated mail server, as opposed to an internet account (i.e. name@hotmail.com, name@yahoo.com). These types of accounts can sometimes prove unreliable and present problems through inbox size constraints, spam filters, and virus problems. Why won't my certificate print? Certificates are available in .pdf format. They are viewable and printable using Adobe's Acrobat Reader, free to download by clicking the button.   If you're still having troubles, it may be that Windows has not been fully updated on your machine. Because of recent security concerns, software updates are more and more frequent and many times are required in order to make things work properly. Top

Learning Management System How do I log on? First, you need to Register. Once you've completed the registration form and click "Submit your application", the system will automatically sign you in. Your username and password will be sent to the email address that you provided. Once you have both, come back to the Home Page and enter your username and password in the spaces provided there. How do I begin to take a course? Once you've submitted your competencies from the My Assessments page, the system will display recommended courses for any of those competencies where you rated your confidence level lower than a 4. When you click on one of those recommended courses, you are given more information about that course and the option to register. Once you are registered in a course, it is added to your personal list of courses, viewable in "My Courses". You will also receive a confirmation email with your registration information. Once you're registered in a course, all you need to do begin the course is click on the course title. This will take you into the course contents. How do I submit an event to the calendar? The calendar feature has been revised! You can now submit an event directly online by: logging in clicking on Calendar clicking on Submit an Event Once you submit the popup form here, your request will be reviewed and approved for display in the online calendar within 1-2 business days. How much will these courses cost? Currently, the online courses being offered are free of charge provided you have a connection to internet and a compatible browser. In the future, some online and face-to-face trainings may incur associated costs due to: proprietary rights resources/materials travel expenses etc. Why am I redirected to courses at Public Health Learning website when I launch a course? Some of our course content is shared to and from similar Learning Management Systems in other states. The Learning Management System has been built specifically to accommodate this sharing of course resources. Do I become enrolled in Public Health Learning's website? Do I have to pay more? No, you are only taken to the Public Health Learning site to take a pre-existing course. When you have finished the course, or when you temporarily suspend your learning session, you are returned to Prepareiowa.com. You do not have to pay anything to Illinois or to Prepareiowa.com for these specific online courses. What is a non-LMS course? Non-LMS courses are related training or courses that you would like to be included in your personal training portfolio on Prepareiowa.com. This is simply for your record-keeping and will not be imported or counted in the LMS itself. You may, however, print an LMS Activity Report (View Sample), which can include those courses taken outside of Prepare Iowa. This is useful for keeping records of all training and education in one handy spot. How often will courses be offered? Some on-line courses will be available 24/7 anywhere you have an internet connection. Other on-line courses will be available for only a certain registration period, as designated by the instructor, and publicized on the calendar, or in other media. Face-to-face courses and conferences will also have a registration period on-line. What texts or materials will be required (if any)? This can vary from course to course. On-line courses can sometimes require purchase of textbooks or other materials. Face-to-face trainings usually incur travel and other related costs, and may also require texts or special materials. To find out what, if anything, is required for a course you are interested in or taking, please refer to the course details. Will there be credit offered for these courses? What type of credit will be offered? Upon successful completion of most courses, a certificate of completion will be issued to you. You may then be able to have a certification board translate the certificate into CEU's. Please note that we can make no guarantees about specific CEU amounts, or even whether a request will be accepted. This is entirely up to the accreditation board you are working with. What's in a course number? Using the example "ICN2007": ---------------------------- "ICN" - refers to the delivery method of the course (maximum 3 characters): A – Audio CD – CD-ROM/CBT C – Conference D – Drills FF – Face to Face O – Online S – Satellite V – Video WC – Web Conferencing W – Webcast/Streaming WK - Workshop ICN – Iowa Communications Network ---------------------------- "2" - Indicates the learning level (1 character): 1=Awareness level 2=Operations level 3=Technical level 4=Leadership level ----------------------------- "007" - Sequential number of courses as entered into the LMS. In this case, the course would have been the seventh entered into the LMS. There may be skipped numbers at times in this sequence, and otherwise has no real meaning. Its main purpose is to be unique. **NOTE - there are some exceptions to this numbering system. These are courses that were entered prior to formalizing a numbering system. It was decided to keep them as they were to avoid confusion in finding them or system glitches. I have a question that is unanswered in the FAQ's. Where can I send my question to be answered? You can find us on the Contact Us page, or send any questions, comments or suggestions for improvement to prepareiowa@uiowa.edu. I am not finding a conference that I'm looking for in the course catalog. Conferences are now held in a separate Conference area, accessible in the navigation menu on the left. Where can I find the latest news on the PrepareIowa Learning Management system View the latest edition of the LMS newsletter. View past editions. How do I begin my online course To access an online course, you must first be registered for that course. You can do one of two things: Go to the My Courses link (on the blue left side menu), under your Current courses heading, see the course you want to access and click on the Launch Course link underneath the course title and next to the Drop link. OR Once logged in, on the Home page in the right column displays your Current, Required, and Recommended Courses - in the Current Courses box, click on Launch Course to access your online course. Where can I download a full description of your competency sets? Here Top