Harpak-ULMA, the industry leader in smart, connected packaging solutions, announced that its Harpak-ULMA Packaging Academy is now accredited by the International Accreditors of Continuing Education and Training (IACET). As a result, participants completing Academy coursework are eligible to receive professional Continuing Education Units (CEUs).

Harpak-ULMA Packaging Academy is the first and only packaging industry vendor to achieve this status.

IACET is the only standard-setting organization approved by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) for continuing education and training. Its rigorous validation of training policies and processes against an ANSI benchmarked framework assures that the accredited provider is committed to learning process excellence, continuous improvement, and a superior learning experience for adult learners. A standards-based approach to professional training offers the additional benefit of supporting recognized Continuing Education Units (CEU) for Learners. CEUs are transferable between cooperating organizations since they confer an assurance of quality content programming and standards-based record keeping. IACET has accredited more than 545 continuing education providers across multiple industries and organization types.

“The accreditation is an important milestone to the Academy — as well as the packaging industry,” stated Cliff Fitzgerald, manager, Harpak-ULMA’s Packaging Academy. ”Knowledge transfer is essential to the success of every automated packaging solution – but it’s too often an afterthought for some OEMs. The quality of the training has a direct and measurable impact on a customer’s packaging operations effectiveness and cost. We aim to improve staff learning curves while dramatically improving applied knowledge retention. A standards-based training program is a solution — requiring a strategic commitment and formulaic investment in people, processes, and tools to deliver a scalable, sustainable, and successful training experience.”

While accreditation is often seen as the domain of independent instructional institutions, the Harpak-ULMA team hopes that more equipment suppliers will follow its lead as today’s increasingly smart industry 4.0 solutions drive demand for well-trained operators and maintenance staff. “We offer end-to-end training around specific packaging line configurations, as well as a variety of content that targets production optimization, equipment sustainment, hygiene standards, and safety practices as they apply to our solutions,” added Fitzgerald. He noted that the Academy is incorporating Augmented Reality (AR) as a training tool as, we fully expect to commercially introduce optional AR-enabled monitoring and servicing capabilities across many of our smart, connected packaging platforms in 2023.