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Vision care is a growing industry and having skilled professionals with always-on access to continuing education and professional development curated by subject matter experts will help advance the industry and provide the world with the best in eyecare and eyewear. According to Dr. Millicent Knight, senior vice president of the Customer Development Group for EssilorLuxottica North America, this is the rationale behind Leonardo (Leonardo.EssilorLuxottica.com), which offers all the fundamentals in optics and practice management at an ECP’s fingertips, meaning every device, anytime, anywhere.





Designed to support eyecare professionals at every level and every role, Leonardo delivers more than 7,000 hours of video, interactive courses, podcasts and virtual classrooms in more than 15 languages, with custom recommendations to each individual user based on their interests and needs. The platform becomes smarter over time, recommending content, showing the most popular learning modules among other ECPs and employees in “top 10” and “trending now in vision care,” tracking favorites and highlighting skill-based modules that employees in an optical practice might need or benefit from.

“Because we know that education cannot be static—it needs to be a living breathing thing—Leonardo will always be evolving and adapting, changing, improving and bringing fresh and relevant content to learners,” said Alessandra Senici, head of Leonardo at EssilorLuxottica. “Users can expect to find new and compelling content that truly reflects the complexities of our industry today, coupled with an intuitive and user-friendly experience.”

Since launching in January 2022, Leonardo users have completed 1.13 million hours of both on-demand content and virtual classes, with two-thirds of those hours completed by learners in the U.S. The platform is seeing an average of 9,000 unique visitors per day—almost half of those visitors from the U.S.—and completing 21,000 lessons daily.

Leonardo continues to expand to meet the needs of the North America market most recently adding ABO courses for dispensers and opticians. It also contains clinical courses for doctors such as “Moving Beyond Myopia Correction to Control.”

In September, users will find a presbyopia certification course and a Varilux specialization with a deep dive on Varilux technologies. Each time EssilorLuxottica launches a new technology, Leonardo will support its rollout with dedicated content to give all stakeholders comprehensive information and education.

At the same time, each new branded frame collection that is launched will be accompanied by Leonardo content that includes key selling points of each new model, with the ultimate goal of cultivating brand experts at the practice level.

Leonardo has just released “The New Hire Program,” a specific training course to support three different staff roles in practices: front desk professionals, eyecare dispensers, and practice managers, among other offerings,” Dr. Knight said. “In the great resignation era, businesses both big and small value the platform as a key tool to attract and retain resources. Starting the optician journey with an investment in their training creates immediate engagement and value for the practice and its new hires and helps give the practice a competitive edge,” she said.