By Hank Huber


For many college seniors, graduation means the end of their formal education. However, as they hang their diplomas and mothball their robes, college graduates should be aware that they will never stop learning.

Even if someone has never pursued a college education, there are still many times when schooling is required. The Continuing Education program at Buffalo State College provides a structured environment for both credit and non-credit courses in diverse areas ranging from swimming lessons for children to Web page building and computer-aided design.

“We go where the demand is,” Cathleen Nasca, continuing education registrar, said about various courses available.

Past courses and certification programs have included:

• AutoCAD, a computer-aided design class
• heating, ventilation and air conditioning
• supply management
• tree care seminars
• aspects of business insurance claim practices
• commercial property and casualty insurance
• career development facilitation and job coaching
• creative writing
• free-lance journalism

Class sizes are small, generally limited to 14 students.

“That’s always an advantage,” said author and writing/journalism course instructor William Powers.

Any larger than that and close interaction between students and instructor becomes difficult to achieve, according to Powers.

“It gets too impersonal,” he said

Powers was an adjunct professor at Canisius College for 10 years, and has published several novels, the first of which, “A Succession of Days” was nominated by Prometheus Books for the Editor’s Book Award that was sponsored by Plowshares.

He has published profiles, features, travel articles, and short stories in a wide range of magazines and newspapers, and has been teaching continuing education writing classes off and on for 14 years.

This year the creative writing and freelance journalism classes have been merged due to lack of interest in freelance publishing.

The creative writing courses are always more popular than the non-fiction courses, according to Powers, although he said the market for articles edges out the market for short stories 50-to-1.

“There’s so much more potential doing non-fiction,” he said.

Class availability

Classes are offered year-round, and are often paid for by employers wishing to advance the skills of employees.

The Business 412 class, Income Taxation, or “biz 412” as it’s known, is offered by the Buffalo State continuing education office for mostly adult learners who need to pass CPA exams. Classes for BUS 412 are held in Vancouver, Toronto, Asia and Saudi Arabia, according to Nasca.

Not every class is offered consistently, but some classes, such as the driver education program and income taxation, are permanent fixtures, and can always be counted on to be available for sign-up.

In addition to providing courses for revenue, the Continuing Education Office also provides some courses as a matter of service.

Although there is still a fee for registering for the classes, the cost of publication, printing informational pamphlets, and running the course offset any possible monetary return, according to Nasca.

“Whatever income we generate we use to pay our own people,” she said.

More information on available courses can be found by calling (716) 878- 5907, or by visiting www.buffalostate.edu/academics/cenc.