Best Classes Grand Rapids, MI

Find & compare hands-on courses near Grand Rapids or live online in coding, design, business, and more. We’ve chosen over 100 of the best tech courses from the top training providers to help you find the perfect fit.

Explore the Best Classes in Grand Rapids

Grand Rapids, Michigan, is the second-largest city in Michigan. Best known for furniture-manufacturing, the city is home to prominent manufacturers such as Herman Miller, Steelcase Inc., and American Seating. The largest employer is Spectrum Health, employing over 27,000 people. Job prospects are also very good in research and health sciences, with prominent research entities such as the Valley State University’s Cook-DeVos Center for Health Sciences and the Van Andel Research Institute. The region also boasts excellent apple, blueberry, and peach farming.

Known as the “Great Lake State” and a “Water Winter Wonderland, ” Michigan is known for its natural beauty and diverse and dynamic landscape. Grand Rapids, bordered by its gorgeous namesake and a short drive from the depths of Lake Michigan, is perhaps the best representation of all that Michigan has to offer. Spend a day or lifetime exploring the metropolitan area Outside Magazinecalls “America’s Best River Town.” Scale the impressive dunes around Lake Michigan or kayak or paddle down the calm waters of the Grand Rapids river throughout the summer while enjoying the silence and tranquility of the mild yet snowy winters. 

Those who enjoy the rush and benefits of urban life will also find a home in Grand Rapids. As the second-largest city in Michigan, Grand Rapids has a bustling downtown area with a thriving theater scene and museums such as the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Museum, the African-American Museum and Archives, The Grand Rapids Art Museum, and The Grand Rapids Public Museum. Discover why Thrillist Magazinecalls Grand Rapids “Michigan’s Food City” by sampling the many flavors of the over 130 restaurants in the downtown area. As the previous “Furniture Capital of the United States, ” Grand Rapids provides the right tools to build a spectacular life. 

Tech Careers in Grand Rapids

Whether you are looking to build a career in one of the area's well-known industries or advance your professional growth by networking on the many golf courses around the city, Grand Rapids is the ideal place for young and established professionals. Fortune,000 companies in the area include names such as Spartan Stores, Inc, Steelcase Inc., and Universal Forest. Job availability is also about to skyrocket as large companies such as Amazon and Whole Foods are planning to develop major facilities in Grand Rapids soon. 

Grand Rapids is not a well-known hub of technological development and innovation in the United States. Consequently, tech professionals are frequently paid less in Grand Rapids than they are in other cities, with most professionals making $45,000-110,000 per year. This pay range is significantly higher than the average individual annual income of $26,000. Those in the technology industry that have skills applicable to multiple industries such as User Experience Designers and Data Scientists, tend to have the highest wages among these careers. Those aspiring to enter a tech career in the Grand Rapids area can maximize their chances of securing employment by diversifying their skills in one of the many live online and remote instruction training centers in the area. 

Tech Schools in Grand Rapids

Many people assume that entering the tech industry requires years of expensive schooling. Nevertheless, several training centers offer short-term remote instruction and live online classes in Grand Rapids. 

Take a break from perfecting your golf swing at the Cascade Hills Country Club to attend one of the short-term remote instruction sessions at the ONLC or Certstaffix training centers across the street. ONLC Training Centers offer one to five-day courses that cover programs and skills in Adobe Creative Cloud, AutoCAD, Data Analytics, and Microsoft Office Suite that are perfect for professionals looking to take their careers to new heights. In addition to remote instruction classes in business skills and computer programming, Cerstaffix Training also provides onsite instruction in programs such as AutoCAD, Excel, and QuickBooks. These classes are available to students at every level of computer and technological expertise, preparing them for immediate employment and long-term success. 

Michigan-based company Grand Circus also offers online training in coding to students all over the state. This 10-week program transforms novice students into competent software developers. Students also have access to the company’s career services, which have helped over 90% of the program’s graduates acquire employment in the technology industry. 

Virtual Tech Schools

If you are interested in a more flexible learning environment than the traditional classroom or computer labs available for remote learning, consider looking into live online software training. Like in-person classes, live online courses are taught by industry professionals in real-time on your computer anywhere in the world. Students can ask their instructors questions in real-time and can have more difficult subjects explained on their screens as the professors can control and see their screens (with permission). 

Noble Desktop, the creator of this tool, offers live online software training to students from their Manhattan campus. Students across the country thrive in Noble Desktop’s small class setting and “learn and then practice approach.” Many students frequently report having the opportunity for one-on-one mentoring in many of the certificate programs, preparing them to successfully enter the workforce in several industries. 

With classes that run from several weeks to multiple months, Noble Desktop has relevant courses for students of varying levels of technological expertise and schedule availability. Most Noble Desktop programs are available full-time during the weekday or part-time during the evenings and weekends. Students searching for a short-term program may want to consider enrolling in the three-month part-time (three to four week full-time) Graphic Design Certificate or Data Science Certificate or the four-month part-time UX & UI Design Certificate or Digital Marketing Certificate. Looking for a longer and more comprehensive program? Consider taking Noble Desktop’s five-month part-time (five-week full-time) Web Design Certificate or 10-month part-time (17-week full-time) Full Stack Web Development Certificate. Each of these courses will prepare you for new or expanded job opportunities in the technology industry. 

Several other training centers offer online training to residents of the Grand Rapids area. NYIM Training offers 10-100-hour live online classes in topics ranging from graphic design and project management to data science and software programming. Career Centers likewise provide 6 to 210-hour live online courses for learning various uses of Python Programming language. Students interested in coding, data science, and web development classes should look into Practical Programming’s 6 to 288-hour training courses. 

Younger students ages 13-21 can also learn important technical skills such as data analysis, investing skills, and graphic and web design through NextGen Bootcamp's summer computer classes for high school students. Taught by leaders of the technology industry, these 30-110-hour courses employ an active learning approach to maximize student learning and long-term retention. The classes are all live online, allowing students to choose their preferred classroom environment throughout the summer. 

Corporate & Onsite Tech Training in Grand Rapids

With so many training opportunities available, it may be difficult to design a curriculum that will help your workers successfully manage and have the technical skills to bring a project to fruition. Noble Desktop’s Corporate Training Program is here to help! 

Train your workers using Noble Desktop’s on-site or live online via teleconferencing courses that work to maximize worker retention and productivity through immersive and interactive training. Students will also be able to keep handouts and workbooks to use as reference after the course’s completion. Corporations can also purchase vouchers for Noble Desktop’s many open-enrollment courses for their employees and even receive a discount when they purchase multiple. Start your company’s next chapter by contacting a Noble Desktop representative for a free consultation today!

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Grand Rapids Tech Topics

  • Design

    Graphic Design

    Graphic design is visual communication through artwork or combining images and text. Graphic designers create logos, ads, social media graphics, magazines, books, websites, apps, and more.

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    Web Design

    Web design combines elements of user experience design (how the website works), visual or user interface design (how the website looks), and coding (how the website is actually built and made to function properly). Some web designers touch on all three areas, while others focus on one specific skill. If you like to design or write code, there's a role for you in web design. With billions of unique websites and more being created every day, web designers continue to be in high demand.

    Explore Web Design Classes in Grand Rapids

    Video Editing

    Video editing is about telling a cohesive story through combining different video clips, footage, and effects. Video editors are able to achieve this using programs such as Adobe Premiere Pro, Avid Media Composer, and Final Cut Pro.

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    Photoshop

    Adobe Photoshop is widely known as the best photo editing software for photographers and photo retouchers. It's also used by digital painters as well as graphic designers for creating a wide variety of designs such as social media graphics, web designs, app designs, graphics that will be animated in Adobe After Effects, and much more.

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    After Effects

    Adobe After Effects is the industry standard for video post-production, compositing, effects, and animation. It's one of the most important apps for motion designers and can be used for creating animations and videos for social media, YouTube, websites, TV, and movies.

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    UX Design

    User experience (UX) designers work on creating functional, meaningful, and enjoyable user experiences. UX design focuses on ease of use, navigation, and functionality of products (which are commonly digital products such as websites and apps).

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    Adobe

    Adobe Creative Cloud is a collection of industry-leading apps dedicated to creativity, including Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, After Effects, and many more. Adobe Creative Cloud has what you need to create projects using photo editing, bitmap or vector illustration, digital design, animation, audio, augmented reality (AR), and more.

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    InDesign

    Adobe InDesign is the industry-leading layout design tool for print. Publishers of magazines, books, newspapers and other media rely on InDesign for page layouts and graphic design. InDesign can also be used to create digital documents such as PDFs and eBooks.

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    Premiere Pro

    Adobe Premiere Pro is the leading choice for video editing for TV, movies and the internet. It allows users to weave together video clips, graphics, and audio to produce professional grade video projects. It offers seamless integrations with Adobe Audition, After Effects, Photoshop and more.

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    Motion Graphics

    Motion graphics refers to animated graphic design. It blends together text, sound, motion, animation, and visual effects to communicate a message or tell a story.

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    Illustrator

    Adobe Illustrator is one of the most popular vector graphics applications. With seamless integrations across Adobe Creative Cloud, Illustrator is widely used by individuals and organizations to create resizable illustrations, design elements for videos and motion graphics, all through its powerful vector creation tools.

    Explore Illustrator Classes in Grand Rapids

  • Coding

    Web Development

    Web development encompasses all of the layers involved in building a website or web application. Websites are made up of two parts: the front-end and the back-end. Web development is used to create beautiful, interactive, and functional websites in nearly every industry.

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  • Data

    Data Science

    Data science is one of the fastest-growing career fields, with competitive salaries and nearly endless opportunities for specialization. Data science uses machine learning algorithms, statistics and other analytic tools to understand data.

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    Python

    Python is an easy-to-read, versatile object-oriented programming language. It is often compared to Java, Ruby, and Perl. It is available under an open-source license and is a favorite among programmers.

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    SQL

    SQL is short for Structured Query Language and refers to a programming language designed for relational databases. SQL organizes data and allows for queries and sorting of data.

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    Excel

    Microsoft Excel is the leading spreadsheet application and data analytics tool. With Excel, you can create charts, tables, automate workflow, track budgets and financials, and much more.

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    Data Analytics

    Data analytics is the process of analyzing raw data to draw conclusions. Data analytics are used to study all kinds of data, including productivity, production, profit/loss and much more.

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    Power BI

    Power BI is a collection of software that works together to convert multiple sources of data into usable information. Using the Power BI Desktop, the Power BI service, and the Power BI mobile apps, businesses can analyze data, create visualizations, and make sense of it all. Leaders can use these critical insights to forecast, plan, and make informed decisions. This dashboard has the power to uncover critical business insights needed to drive decision making.

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  • Digital Marketing

    SEO

    SEO is the practice of optimizing your pages and website for search engine ranking. With a variety of SEO strategies and techniques, you can boost your websites ranking to start bringing in organic traffic. In SEO classes, participants will learn the fundamental ideas of SEO and strategies to succeed in the search engines.

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  • Business

    Microsoft Office

    Microsoft Office is a suite of software with an integrated collection of applications for word processing, and creating spreadsheets, databases and other media. Many offices, schools and individuals use Microsoft Office.

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  • Web Development

    Front-End Web Development

    Websites are created by writing code. Web browsers read that code, and in turn create a webpage like this page you're currently reading. The code which affects what you see in the browser is called front-end code. People who write that code are called front-end developers.

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Training Locations in or Near Grand Rapids

    Careers and Salaries

    Learn in-demand technology and computer skills to launch a new career in design, programming, marketing, business, and more. See the career pages for more information on required skills, tips for landing a job, typical day-to-day work, and where to find job postings.