By graduate degree, I am a BFA Applied Art graduate. I know the UX field has existed in India and World longer than I know, but I learned of it at my first job around 2007. I am a multidisciplinary designer.
I opted to do User Experience Design/User Interaction Design/Human-Computer Interaction Design certification around 2016. I have been going through HFI’s website since the year 2012.
HFI has three main certifications Certified Usability Analyst (CUA), Certified Certified
Certified User Experience Analyst (CXA), Certified Digital Persuasion Analyst (CDPA).
My observation was HFI was increasing the cost of Certification every year by 15% to 20%.
When I first visited their website, the cost was INR 75,000/-, But when I registered for the CUA course, it was INR 1,08,000/- Immediately the following year, they increased rice to almost INR 1,20,000/-.
My experience with classes was fast-forwarded speed, Experts teachers were going through textbooks as if nobody cared, and they were not taking questions between.
Renowned government design institute like Industrial Design Center (IDC) has two years courses in HCI, which costs INR 2,00,000/- per year. And HFI is selling the same knowledge in a session of 10 days, i.e. two weeks, with a cost similar to IDC.
I agree that doing HFI is better than pursuing video-based courses online for learning UX. But, unfortunately, now there is a trend that any dumb guy comes forward to put his course on the internet to sell UX crash courses. And not even yesterday did you know that person existed, and there is no proof that the crash course content creator is giving valid input that may land you a high-paying job as he promised in Apple/Microsoft/Google and whatnot.
HFI has a rule: you must score more than 70% on average to get CUA/CXA/CDPA certification. One observation in my class we were 20 students, and two got certified at the end. So the success rate of getting certified was 10% after spending lakhs of rupees just for a 10-day course. Somehow it proves HFI’s teaching doesn’t promise that you will get certified by attending their classes.
Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) is an Art and Science. So to acquire a skill like this, you must spend at least ten years of your professional life dedicated and working in this domain. So better join graduation, post-graduation, or Master’s degree college that teaches this in length than just five days of learning, hoping 1.5 lahks will help you get there.
I live in Maharashtra, so there are institutes like IDC, JJIAA, Rachana Sansad, Raheja School of Art in Mumbai, SID, and MIT in Pune who has specialised full-length course like this. You will surely get a list of colleges on the Mumbai University website.
I hope this helps you decide to get into this field of HCI.
Thanks & Regards
Mandar Apte
