The DAU (www.dau.mil) is the Department of Defense's (DoD) main education tool for its corps of acquisition professionals. The DAU consists of an actual "bricks and mortar" schoolhouse in Virginia and an extensive online component, accessible either through the DAU webpage or the new "master" site for defense acquisition information, the Defense Acquisition Portal (https://dap.dau/mil). The DAU acts as the primary educating body for civilian and military employees of DOD and the services, as well as for contractors to the DOD In the words of its current president, Frank J. Anderson, the DAU provides "…a full range of basic, intermediate, and advanced certification training, assignment-specific training, performance support, job-relevant applied research, and continuous learning opportunities". What this means, boiled down to its basics, is classes; DAU offers training and educational classes in over 16 different fields, or disciplines, including Program Management and Systems Engineering.

 

What will interest the A&D project manager the most, of course, is probably the DAU Program Management (PM) course of study. This extensive series of classes is designed to lead to a certification - by the DAU - in Program Management. While DAU PM certification is allowable only DOD employees, contractors are allowed to take any or all of the classes offered in the curriculum. The DAU PM curriculum covers most of the material that one would find in the typical training class that leads to PMP certification, even though the two types of certifications (DAU and PMP) are not "recognized" by the other certifying body. These classes are a great way to "refresh" some old skills that an A&D professional finds might have gotten rusty, or to learn entirely new fields of study. The DAU PM curriculum offers an unbeatable value (classes are free), easy access (online, 24 -7 studying) and an extensive curriculum (over 100 classes in 16 different fields of study). If you haven't already, then I would strongly encourage all A&D professionals to bookmark the DAU home page and see if its resources can help you to plan, monitor and control your next project.