The CORE Academy training library is the full catalog of certifications, workshops, and development programs we deliver in Wilkes-Barre and across Northeast Pennsylvania. This page helps you find what you need by category. Some categories are designed for individuals. Others are designed for teams and organizations. Professional development from a Pennsylvania Quality Assurance System (PQAS) Approved Organization and a Pennsylvania Department of Education Act 48 Approved Provider. Applications are in process for CEU and CPE credits. The CORE Academy provides opportunities for professional and personal growth in the following areas:
American Red Cross CPR, First Aid, AED, and BLS certifications are The CORE Academy’s foundational training offerings. CPR and AED certification fits non-clinical workplace roles, school staff, coaches, and childcare providers. First Aid covers injury response and sudden illness. The combined First Aid + CPR class is the most common workplace request because it covers the broadest range of emergencies in a single session.
BLS is the advanced certification built for nurses, medical assistants, EMS roles, and clinical staff. All certifications run as standalone classes for individuals and as group certifications for organizations that need multiple staff certified at once. The CORE Academy is an American Red Cross Licensed Training Provider (LTP), independently licensed to teach and certify.
Mental Health First Aid is a national certification program offered by The CORE Academy through certified instructor Andrew Miller. This is not a mental health clinical credential – it is a practical training program that teaches individuals how to recognize the signs of mental health challenges and substance use issues, and how to provide initial help and connect people with appropriate care.
The 5-hour training results in a 3-year certification from the National Council for Mental Wellbeing. The CORE Academy delivers MHFA nationally, and also brings on-site Mental Health First Aid training directly to your school, business, or daycare anywhere in Pennsylvania and across Northeast Pennsylvania including Luzerne, Lackawanna, Wyoming, Wayne, Columbia, Montour, Lycoming, and Sullivan counties. Mental Health First Aid is one of the most impactful development investments an organization can make for staff who interact with the public, work in schools, or operate in high-stress human services environments.
Training for supervisors, emerging managers, and senior leadership teams across Northeast Pennsylvania. The work centers on the practical daily skills that turn job titles into actual leadership: decision making under pressure, communication that lands with different audiences, holding people accountable without breaking trust, and managing change without exhausting the team. Most leadership engagements at The CORE Academy work with first-time supervisors who were promoted because they were good at the work, mid-level managers stretched between competing priorities, and senior teams trying to lead through a transition.
We run leadership training as standalone workshop series and as a core component of larger organizational engagements. Most clients find that leadership development is where the visible problems start, and so we often start the broader work here.
Development training for the broader staff layer of an organization. Where leadership development focuses on the people running the team, employee development focuses on the people doing the work. The topics cover communication, conflict resolution, accountability practices, team dynamics, and the everyday skills that determine whether staff function as a team or just a group of individuals sharing a workspace.
Useful as standalone training sessions for individual professional growth and as components of broader organizational engagements where leadership and employee work happen in parallel. We build employee development around the actual situations your staff encounter, not abstract scenarios.
Focused programs for HR teams, leadership groups, and organizations rethinking how they handle the people side of the business. The work covers workplace culture, communication systems, retention practices, conflict and feedback, onboarding, and the soft infrastructure that determines whether staff want to stay. This is HR consulting and training, not HR certification and not legal compliance instruction.
We are not interpreting labor law and we are not preparing your team for an SHRM exam. We are helping leadership see the systems underneath the symptoms, so you can build a workplace where the right people stay and the right work gets done. For organizations whose HR function has grown without intentional structure, this is often where the consulting engagement starts.
Training for schools, care teams, agencies, and any organization whose staff face high-stress, complex behavioral situations as part of their day. The work is grounded in trauma-informed care and built around the actual situations your staff encounter, from de-escalation to behavioral response to managing teams through repeat incidents.
Behavioral management is professional staff education, not clinical training, therapy, or diagnosis; we are clear about that boundary because it matters. Common clients include private and charter schools, behavioral health programs, residential care teams, and community service organizations. Training is delivered as a focused engagement when an organization needs a specific intervention or as a longer-term partnership tied to broader leadership and staff development.
Educational workshops for professionals and organizations whose staff need familiarity with diagnostic categories and the language clinicians use. These workshops are common for school staff working with students who have mental health diagnoses, residential care staff, behavioral health support staff, case managers, and educators in roles adjacent to clinical care.
Content reflects the DSM-5-TR (text revision) to stay current with best-practice guidelines. Importantly, these are educational sessions, not clinical training. We do not credential anyone to diagnose, treat, or provide therapy. The workshops give your staff a shared vocabulary so they can recognize what they are seeing, communicate with families and clinicians more effectively, and respond within their scope. Delivered as standalone workshop series or as a focused component within a larger behavioral or organizational engagement.
Workshops for individuals and small groups focused on the durable skills that carry across roles, organizations, and careers. Topics include self-awareness, communication style, emotional regulation, professional presence, conflict navigation, and the practices that separate steady professionals from reactive ones.
We run personal development courses as an open workshop series for individuals registering on their own, as small-team sessions when an organization wants to invest in specific staff, and as a component within larger engagements where individual growth supports the broader team work. Common participants include emerging professionals, mid-career staff in transition, and team members whose role requires high-trust interpersonal work.
For organizations whose situation does not fit a standard catalog category, The CORE Academy builds custom engagements scoped to your specific operating reality. Most custom engagements begin with an organizational assessment, often including a SWOT analysis and staff interviews, that gives leadership a written read of what is actually happening before any training gets recommended. From that assessment we build a strategic plan with the training and development work sequenced over weeks or months if nothing in the training library fits as-is.
Engagements range from a single multi-session workshop tailored to one team to a year-long partnership that combines leadership development, staff training, behavioral work, and certifications across the whole organization. This is the kind of work The CORE Academy does best, and it is where most of our long-term client relationships start. The consulting page walks through how engagements are structured in detail.
For individuals, the library is organized by what you need. Find the category that matches your goal, click into the dedicated page for class details, scheduling, and registration. Most individual training paths run through Certifications (for compliance-required credentials), Leadership Development (for new supervisors or career growth), or Personal Development (for the durable skills any role benefits from).
The library doubles as a planning tool. Browse the categories most relevant to your team to get a sense of what is possible, then talk to us about scoping the actual work. Most organizations end up combining categories rather than ordering from one, because real workplace problems rarely fit a single training area. A school dealing with staff retention will often need leadership development, behavioral management, and employee training braided together. A nonprofit growing into a new operating scale will often need HR and workplace culture work alongside leadership development. The library shows you what we can deliver; the consulting conversation is where we figure out the right combination for your situation after selecting course in the training library.
For longer guides on certifications, workplace training, and behavioral topics, read The CORE Academy blog.
The CORE Academy is based in Wilkes-Barre and delivers across Northeast Pennsylvania, including the Wyoming Valley, Scranton, Hazleton, Pocono region, and the smaller communities in between. For individual certifications, classes happen at our Wilkes-Barre training space. For organizational engagements, on-site delivery at your location is the norm because that is what consulting actually looks like when the goal is changing how a team operates. The practical difference between a local training catalog and a national LMS subscription shows up in the responsiveness; when you reach out, you get the same person who will deliver the work, not a sales pipeline. That is the model we built for.
The Leadership Ecosystem is the leadership program in our training library
Course Description: Effective leadership extends far beyond managing tasks and overseeing productivity. This course examines the essential responsibilities of leaders, including communication, accountability, ethical decision-making, coaching, and creating psychological safety. Participants will explore how intentional leadership behaviors establish credibility, build trust, and inspire high-performing teams.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Whether intentional or not, every leader communicates through their presence. This course explores how professionalism, emotional presence, communication style, and personal credibility influence trust, relationships, and organizational culture. Participants will examine how perception is formed and develop strategies for presenting themselves with confidence, authenticity, and professionalism.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Great leaders begin with self-awareness. This course combines reflective leadership practices with emotional
intelligence to help participants better understand their behaviors, emotions, and leadership impact. Through
practical exercises and guided reflection, participants will develop greater resilience, emotional regulation, and
interpersonal effectiveness.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: People communicate, solve problems, and respond to change differently. Using the DiSC® assessment framework, this course helps participants understand behavioral styles while improving communication, collaboration, and workplace relationships. Leaders will learn to recognize individual strengths, adapt their communication, and create more cohesive, productive teams.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Leadership requires navigating both everyday responsibilities and unexpected challenges. This course explores the essential “C”; that define successful leadership and provides practical strategies for managing communication, fostering collaboration, coaching employees, leading through change, resolving conflict, and maintaining stability during uncertainty. Participants will leave with a practical leadership toolkit applicable across industries.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Organizations thrive when people continue to learn, grow, and reach their potential. This course explores strategies for developing individuals while creating high-performing teams that embrace continuous improvement. Participants will learn how coaching, mentoring, feedback, and intentional development contribute to long-term organizational success.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Accountability is not about punishment, it is about ownership, clarity, and shared responsibility. This course explores how leaders establish expectations, encourage accountability, and create cultures where employees are empowered to take responsibility for their work. Participants will learn practical techniques for balancing support with accountability while strengthening team performance.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Leadership influence extends far beyond formal authority. This course examines how leaders shape motivation, engagement, productivity, and organizational culture through intentional behaviors and effective communication. Participants will learn evidence-based strategies for inspiring performance, encouraging initiative, and creating environments where employees can thrive.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Transitioning from coworker to supervisor presents unique opportunities and challenges. This course prepares new leaders to establish credibility, set healthy boundaries, manage former peer relationships, and confidently lead with fairness and professionalism. Participants will gain practical tools for navigating one of the most significant leadership transitions while building trust and accountability within their teams.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Effective leadership begins with recognizing that sustainable performance requires healthy people, not exhausted ones. This course explores the organizational and personal factors that contribute to burnout while equipping leaders with practical strategies to promote resilience, psychological safety, and employee well-being. Participants will learn how leadership behaviors directly influence workplace stress, engagement, retention, and overall organizational health.
Learning Objectives
The Employee Focused Library brings the training library to the broader staff layer
Course Description: Professionals who dedicate themselves to helping others often absorb the emotional weight of the work they do. This course explores the signs, symptoms, and long-term effects of compassion fatigue and vicarious trauma while distinguishing them from burnout. Participants will develop practical strategies for maintaining empathy, protecting their own well-being, and sustaining a fulfilling career without sacrificing personal health.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Success is more than simply making it through the day. This course challenges participants to move beyond survival mode by examining mindset, purpose, resilience, and personal growth. Through self-reflection and practical application, participants will learn strategies for cultivating fulfillment, increasing engagement, and achieving sustainable success both personally and professionally.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Being busy does not always mean being productive. This course helps participants evaluate how they manage time, energy, priorities, and competing demands while reducing stress and increasing efficiency. Participants will learn practical tools for organizing workloads, improving focus, and making intentional decisions that maximize productivity without contributing to burnout.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Trauma influences how people think, communicate, respond to stress, and engage with others. This course introduces participants to trauma-informed principles that promote safety, trust, empowerment, and compassionate interactions across workplace settings. Participants will learn practical strategies for recognizing trauma responses while fostering environments that support healing, collaboration, and positive outcomes.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Personal well-being is shaped by more than just workplace responsibilities. This engaging and interactive course explores the connection between enjoyment, nutrition, rest, focus, and overall performance. Participants will discover practical, evidence-informed strategies that improve energy, concentration, resilience, and job satisfaction through simple, sustainable lifestyle habits.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Setting healthy boundaries is essential for maintaining professionalism, productivity, and well-being. This course teaches participants how to communicate limitations confidently while preserving positive working relationships. Through practical communication techniques, participants will learn to say “no” respectfully, manage expectations, and advocate for themselves without guilt or fear of conflict.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Resilience is not about avoiding adversity, it is about learning how to recover, adapt, and continue moving forward. This course explores the science of resilience and provides practical tools for managing stress, overcoming setbacks, and maintaining emotional well-being. Participants will develop strategies that strengthen adaptability, confidence, and long-term professional success.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Achieving balance requires intentional habits rather than occasional time off. This course explores realistic approaches to managing competing personal and professional responsibilities while reducing stress and preventing burnout. Participants will learn practical strategies for creating sustainable routines that support productivity, well-being, and overall life satisfaction.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Growth rarely occurs within our comfort zones. This course encourages participants to view discomfort as an opportunity for learning, development, and increased confidence rather than something to avoid. Participants will explore strategies for embracing feedback, navigating uncertainty, and building the courage necessary to pursue professional growth and new opportunities.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Many professionals have come to view constant exhaustion as a measure of dedication, but chronic stress comes at a significant personal and professional cost. This course helps employees recognize the warning signs of burnout while exploring practical strategies to improve resilience, establish healthy boundaries, and prioritize well-being. Participants will leave with actionable tools to sustain both personal health and workplace performance over the long term.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Human Resources professionals are often at the center of workplace relationships, conflict resolution, and organizational change. This course explores how emotional intelligence enhances communication, decision-making, employee relations, and leadership effectiveness. Participants will strengthen their ability to navigate complex interpersonal dynamics while fostering trust, engagement, and psychologically healthy workplaces.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Meaningful employee engagement begins with authentic connection. This course equips HR professionals with practical strategies for moving beyond routine check-ins to conversations that build trust, psychological safety, and meaningful relationships. Participants will learn communication techniques that strengthen employee engagement while supporting performance, accountability, and organizational culture.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Today’s workforce continues to evolve, bringing new expectations surrounding flexibility, purpose, communication, well-being, and organizational culture. This course examines emerging workforce trends and explores how HR professionals can adapt policies, practices, and engagement strategies to meet changing employee needs. Participants will leave with practical approaches that strengthen recruitment, retention, and organizational commitment.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Employee well-being is no longer simply an employee benefit, it is a measurable business strategy. This course examines how investments in workplace well-being influence engagement, retention, productivity, absenteeism, and organizational performance. Participants will explore evidence-informed approaches that position HR as a strategic leader in creating healthier, higher-performing organizations.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Many workplace wellness programs fail because they prioritize perks over meaningful organizational change. This course challenges traditional wellness approaches by focusing on culture, leadership, workload, psychological safety, and employee experience. Participants will learn how HR can lead sustainable initiatives that improve well-being while supporting organizational performance.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Organizational culture is one of HR’s greatest opportunities for influence. This course explores how employee well-being, organizational values, leadership behaviors, and workplace culture collectively shape performance and retention. Participants will examine practical strategies for building environments where employees feel connected, supported, and empowered to contribute to organizational success.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Human Resources professionals play a critical role in recognizing, preventing, and responding to workplace burnout. This course explores organizational contributors to burnout, including workload, leadership practices, role ambiguity, and workplace culture. Participants will learn evidence-informed strategies for designing policies, supporting leaders, and creating environments where employees can thrive without sacrificing well-being or organizational performance.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Before we can help others regulate their emotions, we must first understand our own. This course explores the science of co-regulation and how a professional’s emotional presence directly influences the behavior, safety, and emotional stability of those they support. Participants will learn practical techniques for managing their own responses, reducing escalation, and fostering calm, therapeutic interactions that strengthen relationships and improve outcomes.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Recognizing the early signs of crisis allows professionals to intervene before situations escalate. This course examines the behavioral, emotional, and environmental indicators of crisis while providing practical strategies for assessment, intervention, and de-escalation. Participants will strengthen their confidence in responding safely, effectively, and compassionately to individuals experiencing behavioral or emotional crises.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Effective behavioral intervention begins with understanding the purpose behind behavior. This course introduces evidence-based intervention strategies designed to reduce challenging behaviors while promoting skill development, emotional regulation, and positive outcomes. Participants will explore proactive and responsive techniques that support individuals across a variety of behavioral health, educational, and human service settings.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Exceptional care depends on effective teamwork. This course focuses on strengthening communication among multidisciplinary teams to improve continuity of care, reduce misunderstandings, and enhance outcomes for the individuals being served. Participants will develop practical strategies for professional communication, collaborative problem-solving, and maintaining shared accountability across clinical settings.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: The physical and social environment significantly influences behavior, emotional regulation, and learning. This course examines how environmental factors contribute to behavioral success while providing practical strategies for creating spaces that promote safety, engagement, independence, and positive interactions. Participants will learn proactive approaches to reducing behavioral challenges through thoughtful environmental design and structured supports.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Transitions can be some of the most challenging moments for individuals receiving services. This course explores why transitions often trigger behavioral difficulties and provides practical strategies for increasing predictability, reducing anxiety, and supporting successful movement between activities, environments, and routines. Participants will develop techniques that improve consistency while minimizing disruption and escalation.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: High-quality documentation is an essential component of ethical practice, effective communication, and quality care. This course introduces participants to the fundamentals of objective, accurate, and legally sound documentation while emphasizing the importance of professionalism, person-centered language, and clinical relevance. Participants will leave with greater confidence in documenting services that support continuity of care and organizational compliance.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Meaningful behavior change begins with connection rather than punishment. This course introduces restorative practices that emphasize relationships, accountability, empathy, and repairing harm while fostering emotional growth and community. Participants will learn practical strategies for addressing conflict and challenging behavior in ways that preserve dignity, strengthen relationships, and encourage long-term positive change.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Professional growth begins with personal awareness. This course explores how our beliefs, experiences, values, and behaviors influence the way we lead, communicate, collaborate, and respond to challenges in the workplace. Participants will examine the dynamic relationship between personal and professional development while identifying practical strategies for intentional growth in both areas.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Assumptions shape how we interpret situations, interact with others, and make decisions, often without our awareness. This course explores the cognitive, emotional, environmental, and interpersonal factors that contribute to negative assumptions while introducing a holistic framework for challenging unhelpful thinking patterns. Participants will learn strategies for approaching situations with greater curiosity, empathy, and objectivity.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Resilience is often misunderstood as simply pushing through adversity. This course challenges that narrative by exploring the relationship between resilience, personal responsibility, recovery, and sustainable well-being. Participants will examine how intentional rest, healthy boundaries, and personal accountability work together to support long-term growth and effectiveness.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Many individuals spend years waiting for permission to pursue opportunities, establish boundaries, embrace their strengths, or become the person they already have the capacity to be. This reflective course encourages participants to recognize internal barriers, challenge limiting beliefs, and confidently step into authentic personal and professional growth. Through guided reflection and practical application, participants will leave empowered to lead with greater confidence, purpose, and self-compassion.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Personal growth begins when we recognize the role we play within our own experiences. This course invites participants to explore how thoughts, emotions, behaviors, and life experiences shape their perspective and influence relationships, decision-making, and personal development. Through intentional self-reflection, participants will gain greater insight into their own patterns while identifying opportunities for meaningful change.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Our strongest emotional reactions often provide valuable insight into our beliefs, experiences, and unmet needs. This course explores how emotional responses can serve as opportunities for self-awareness rather than something to avoid or suppress. Participants will learn practical strategies for understanding their reactions, managing emotions effectively, and using self-reflection as a catalyst for personal growth.
Learning Objectives
Course Description: Resilience is not something people either have or lack, it is a set of skills that can be developed over time. This course explores the science of resilience and challenges common misconceptions that equate resilience with toughness or independence. Participants will discover practical strategies for strengthening adaptability, emotional flexibility, healthy coping, and confidence while building a sustainable foundation for personal and professional well-being.
Learning Objectives
Every course in the series is titled ‘Understanding’ followed by the diagnosis. Each session provides an overview of one diagnosis: its defining characteristics, common signs and symptoms, contributing factors, and potential impact on daily functioning. Participants explore evidence-informed information about how the diagnosis may affect thoughts, emotions, behaviors, relationships, and overall well-being across the lifespan, with emphasis on reducing stigma and promoting compassionate, person-centered interactions.
By the end of any course in the series, participants can describe the defining features of the diagnosis, recognize how it may influence emotions, behavior, communication, and daily functioning, identify common misconceptions, apply person-centered support strategies, and understand where professional assessment and treatment fit alongside their own supporting role.
Courses available in the series include:
The CORE Academy is actively pursuing accreditation through multiple professional boards and credentialing organizations to offer continuing education credits for select courses in the training library. Applications have been submitted, and additional approvals are being added as they become available. Approved courses will clearly identify the continuing education credits offered and the applicable licensing or credentialing boards.
