Certification

The courses offered by WEI are recognized by the Event Planners Association and the Institute has membership of both National and International educational organizations to ensure the training offered is at the highest standard as offered by organizations approved by the U.S. Government Department of Education.

The Institute is nationally and internationally recognized as a professional Wedding and Event training organization. All students who successfully complete a Certified Course with WEI will become ‘Certified’ by the Institute in their chosen area of study.  As a ‘Certified’ member of the Institute you will receive a Certificate and a Certified Accreditation Logo that you can use to demonstrate your own professionalism to prospective employers and clients.  Our industry recognition and memberships with organizations such as The Event Planners Association make this accreditation meaningful.

The Institute has its own International Certification Program as follows:

- Certified Wedding Consultant - Certified Wedding Planning Course

- Certified Event Planner - Corporate Event Planning Course

- Certified Event Designer - Certified Event Design Course

- Certified Wedding Consultant and Stylist - Certified Wedding Planning, Styling and Design Course

- Certified Wedding and Event Consultant - Certified Wedding and Event Planning Course

The Institute recognizes the importance of formal accreditation and the importance of demonstrating to YOU our own standards of excellence and professionalism. The Institute has sought membership, recognition and accreditation through the following professional industry and education bodies:

LERN (Learning Resources Network) LERN is an international association of lifelong learning programming, offering information and resources to providers of lifelong learning programs.

USDLA (United States Distance Learning Association) - USDLA is a nonprofit organization that supports Distance Learning research, development and praxis across the complete arena of education, training and communications. They focus on all legislation impacting the Distance learning community and its varied constituencies.

EPA (Event Planners Association) EPA is the national trade association for professionals in the event and amusement industries, which includes professional meeting planners, event and wedding planners, rental companies, florists, caterers, DJ’s, entertainers, venues and more.

Course Sample

For a Sneak Peek of what you can expect from our courses click on the links below. This will let you have a small preview of 4 or 5 pages of one unit from within each course along with the assignment related to that unit:

nb - these courses are best viewed using either Firefox or Internet Explorer and are not currently supported by Safari or Google Chrome.

Certified Wedding Planning Course - For many planning weddings for a living is a dream job, however the reality is that the hours are long, the work is hard and there is allot more to this job than meets the eye. A planner needs to have superior organizational skills, excellent attention to detail, the ability to work through very stressful situations and a huge knowledge bank that only training will give you. This is just scratching the surface. Most wedding planners will be running their own business and being an expert planner doesn't mean you will automatically be a great business person. This course will not only help you to understand all aspects of planning weddings for a living, but will also give you the tools to launch and run your own successful wedding business. To view some sample course material please click here.

Corporate Event Planning Course - A Corporate Event Planner is responsible for the planning of many different types of events including conferences, meetings, product launches, awards nights, trade shows and seminars. Although the basics are the same when planning a wedding and planning a corporate event it is the details that differ. This course covers the extras that aren't required in a wedding, such as registration software, booking professional speakers, corporate gifts, conference merchandise and event branding and PR. You will need to have a working knowledge and understanding of audio visual, staging, lighting and IT so you can communicate with your vendors on behalf of your clients. This is the most hands-on and comprehensive course available and will equip students with the knowledge they need to work as Professional Corporate Event Planners. To view some sample course material please click here.

Certified Event Design Course - An event designer is someone who will design and execute an overall look for an event. Event designers are used for their creative flair and often work alongside event planners, wedding coordinators and event managers. You need to be creative with a good eye for color. The ability to think outside the box and look at a venue as a blank canvass is a must so you can effectively create something out of nothing. Working to deadlines under pressure is helpful as is being organized and having great attention to detail. There is more to design and styling than colors and floral arrangements and this course will build on your natural ability and enhance your skills so you can design professional events. By giving consideration to the ‘design of an event’ you create an event that stands out from the crowd as unique. To view some sample course material please click here.

Certified Wedding and Event Planning Course - A Certified Wedding and Event Planner has the knowledge and skills to plan any type of event from a wedding or private party to a conference or awards night. This course allows you to combine a love of weddings and parties with a passion for corporate events giving you a broader skill set and allowing you to appeal to a wider client base. The units from the Certified Wedding Planning Course and the Corporate Event Planning Course have been combined including the all important business units to give you the most comprehensive course currently available in the industry. You will learn how to work with technical vendors such as audio visual contractors and staging providers, as well as the more wedding orientated suppliers such as bridal retailers & cake designers. This is the ultimate course for those wishing to pursue a career in planning weddings and corporate events and will equip students with the knowledge they need work as a professional wedding and event planner. To view some sample course material please click here.

Certified Wedding Planning, Styling and Design Course - Are you a creative genius with penchant for planning? If so this course will show you how to understand color, design from a blank canvass whilst also honing your planning skills to produce and create weddings that are both stylish and planned to perfection. You will learn the theory behind lighting, understand how to apply special effects to a wedding design and be able to incorporate many elements together to create fabulous tablescapes. In order to really style and design weddings you do need to have a thorough understanding of how everything comes together, the vendors roles, how to liaise with a venue and the planning that is required to pull off a flawless event. This course will take you behind the scenes of wedding planning and once you graduate you will be able to work as either a stylist or planner and even combine your new skills to create a full consultancy. To view some sample course material please click here.

Instructors

The Instructors at WEI are all wedding and event professionals who work in the industry and have done for a minimum of 5 years. They have a wealth of information to offer and will quickly become your guide and mentor as you work your way through your course.

The thing to remember with all the courses @ WEI is that the course material and the information receive is only half of the value of the course. The other half is your instructor. It is one thing reading information, listening to podcasts and watching videos, but it is another thing entirely to put all that into practice and apply it to a wedding or event brief. The Instructors are invaluable as they are there to answer your questions and help you with any area of your study that you need assistance with.

You will always receive detailed feedback on your assignments highlighting what you have done well and what you have missed. More often than not the Instructor will also give you an example of how they would approach the assignment, especially at the start of the course when you are still finding your feet. This feedback is very important as you will find you will need to apply it to the following assignment and this is how your marks will keep improving through the course.

Upon enrollment you will be allocated your own Instructor who will be an expert within your chosen field of study and you will work one on one with them throughout you course. As well as your own Instructor you will also have access to other WEI Instructors through our Social Center forums. You will be able to ask them questions and read the pre-prepared FAQ's relating to your course, as quite often students all ask them same questions and get stuck in the same areas, so you may find that your question or query has been asked before.

As working professionals all our Instructors have been where you are now and therefore have the experience to advize and help you so they will be your biggest asset as you go through your course and launch your business at the end of it.

Payment Options

We offer a range of payment options here at WEI and try to be as flexible as possible, so if you don’t see an option that works for you please contact us and we will see what we can do to help you.

Below is a list of our currently available payment options:

Credit Cards (online): We accept payment via MasterCard and Visa. We do not charge any processing fee for using credit cards. You can opt to pay using your credit card online using the Enroll Online sign which can be found throughout the site.

Credit Cards (phone/fax): We also accept credit card payments via phone (you can enroll online then call us to provide your card details - or you can just call us to enroll). Some students simply email in their enrollment form and then ring in to give us their credit card details over the phone.

PayPal: WEI accepts payment via PayPal. Simply enroll online and then you will see a link to PayPal to complete your payment.

Cashiers Check or Money Order: For some students it is simply easier to pay using either a Cashiers Check or Money Order. If this is your preference you can enroll online and choose the option "Cashiers Check or Money Order" during the checkout process. You will be presented with an order confirmation and total payable, then all you need to do is send payment as per the details below:

Mail your payment to:
Wedding Design Institute LLC
12188 Central Avenue
Suite 500
Chino
CA 91710

Wire Transfer: We have a number of students who prefer to pay for their course by using their bank account and depositing the funds directly into our bank account. If this is your preference you can enroll online and choose the option "Wire Transfer" during the checkout process. You will be presented with an order confirmation and total payable, then all you need to do is use our bank account details to make the payment using your name as the reference and then email us to let us know that is what you have done. Please see details below:

U.S. Routing information:
Beneficiary: Wedding Design Institute LLC
Bank: Wells Fargo Bank, N.A
Routing/transit#: (RTN/ABA) 121000248
Physical Bank Address: 420 Montgomery, San Francisco, CA 94104
Account #: 5053941778
SWIFT CODE: WFBIUS6S

We also offer a variety of payment plans as follows:

• Payment in full – this allows you to pay for your course outright benefiting from a discounted price.
• Two Payments – pay 50% upfront and the balance the following month. 
• Four Payments – split your payments over 4 consecutive monthly payments.
• Ten Payments – split your payments over 10 consecutive monthly payments.