Start the school year strong with the Postman Student Expert Program

APIs power business-critical applications in countless industries, which makes API literacy an important skill for anyone who wants to pursue a career in software. In this blog post, we’ll discuss how Postman’s free trainings and certification, which we offer through the Postman Student Expert Program, can help you level up your API skills and start the school year strong.

But first, let’s take a closer look at why we created this program.

Why should students learn about APIs, Postman, and the API-first methodology?

APIs are the building blocks of modern applications, and they are changing the way we work, communicate, and live. Postman’s 2022 State of the API report, which is based on survey responses from over 37,000 developers and API professionals, surfaced several trends that underscore the importance of API skills to anyone looking to start or advance a software-oriented career. Three of those trends are:

1. APIs touch a wide range of industries and roles

While some may believe that API literacy is only necessary for developers, our report revealed that product managers, data engineers, business analysts, and customer success managers interact with APIs, as well:

Many of these professionals work in the technology industry, but a significant number of them work in business, banking, healthcare, education, and retail:

These trends suggest that API literacy can help advance a range of career paths beyond those that are traditionally associated with APIs.

2. API-first companies will continue to hire API-savvy employees

Even though two-thirds of survey respondents described the current economy as “not so good” or “poor,” 76% of CEOs, CIOs, and CTOs predicted that hiring, retention, and internal spending on APIs would increase or remain the same in the coming year. Interestingly, leaders at API-first companies were 35% more likely to expect an increase in hiring. This correlation between business confidence and the API-first methodology, which emphasizes the development of APIs before the development of dependent applications, suggests that API skills will remain in-demand—even as economic outlooks ebb and flow.

3. Postman is the industry standard tool for working with APIs

When asked which API tools they use, 89% of survey respondents mentioned Postman. Additionally, Postman is used by over 20 million developers and 98% of Fortune 500 companies. These facts indicate a high likelihood that new graduates will encounter Postman on the job. Learning how to work with the full Postman API Platform, including Postman Collections, Workspaces, and Monitors, will give you a leg up and set you up for success.

How can students start learning about APIs and Postman?

The Postman Student Expert Program is a self-paced, hands-on training curriculum designed to improve your API literacy and Postman proficiency. It takes approximately 1.5 to 3 hours to complete, and there is no prerequisite for getting started. Students of any discipline are encouraged to enroll.

The Student Expert Program includes two courses, created by the Postman team:

• Intro to APIs and Postman: provides hands-on activities that help you build a solid foundational understanding of the API landscape, API-first principles, the Postman API Platform, network requests, variables, scripting, and making API calls in code.

• Postman API Fundamentals Student Expert Certification: puts your newly acquired API skills to the test and awards a digital badge on completion, which you can showcase on LinkedIn or your resume.

When you enroll in the Postman Student Expert Program, you will get exclusive access to Postman meetups and events, and have the opportunity to connect with your peers in the online Postman Student Community Discord. Those who receive the API Fundamentals Student Expert Certification will also be eligible to advocate for API literacy on their campus by becoming a Postman Student Leader.

Get certified today

You can sign up for the Postman Student Expert Program as an individual here. You can also invite your professor to sign up for the Postman Classroom Program, which will enable them to share the curriculum with your whole class and monitor student progress. Additionally, educators in the Postman Classroom Program receive access to other Postman resources, such as a free Postman plan for education.

We encourage all students to join our Postman Student Community Discord here for support, fun community events, live streams, and giveaways. Feel free to reach out to us with any Student Program-related questions by email at studentprogram@postman.com.