Instructional designer (ID) preparation ranges from short workshops to graduate academic programs, all with a common goal of providing the knowledge, skills, and attitudes necessary to succeed as an instructional designer. This entry concentrates on academic programs because the range and quality of workshop and informal learning is far too broad to discuss meaningfully. It is likely that workshops and informal learning lag behind academic programs, in general.

A review of goals of such programs or of the instructional designer competencies by such organizations as the International Board of Standards for Training, Performance and Instruction leads to a broad and somewhat flexible understanding that IDs employ a systematic way of thinking with the goal of creating instructional and performance improvement interventions. ID encompasses analysis, planning, design, ...