A Deeper Dive into Skills
What are the problems and opportunities we are addressing?
Students and Workers Lack Mobility
Without a shared language to capture learning, it is difficult for students and workers to build toward their goals. They must navigate a multitude of training programs, courses, transcripts, and job postings, and much of their learning and growth gets lost in the process.
Student Demands Are Changing
Students increasingly seek education and training that is just-in-time, fits their busy lives, recognizes their previous experience, and leads to a clear employment goal. This is especially true for “new majority learners” who have competing demands on their time such as jobs and family care responsibilities.
Hiring Practices Are Changing
Employers increasingly hire based on industry-recognized credentials, micro-credentials, portfolios and competency-based assessments. Data show declining trust in traditional degree-centric models, and employers are beginning to move toward alternative signals of job readiness.
Learning Opportunities Are Proliferating
Learning opportunities are proliferating, both formal (credentials, degrees) and informal (badges, MOOCS). A shared skills language allows for better crosswalks between these experiences, as well as recognition of prior learning and competency attainment.
Growth of Lifelong Learning
The average person will change jobs 8+ times in their lives. We need an education and workforce ecosystem that is excellent at recognizing prior learning and allows students to flow in and out throughout their lifetime, building and weaving their education and employment seamlessly.
How do we envision a way forward?
Broad Adoption of a Shared Skills Language
Organizations such as the Open Skills Network and EMSI are developing an ontology of Rich Skill Descriptions and working nationally on broad adoption by both industry and education providers.
Modular Curricula Based on Skills
"Unbundling” curricula into modules based on a shared skills language enables just-in-time, personalized, and competency-based learning – all critical for the New Majority Learner.
Emerging Technology and Learner Employment Records
New technology enables more granular matchmaking between an applicant’s skills and a hiring manager’s skill needs. This includes 21st century skills such as teamwork, critical thinking, and creative problem solving.
A Learner Employment Record (LER) is a critical – albeit nascent – piece of the skillification puzzle. These lifelong records of learning and skill development “live” in a single platform that is owned and managed by the individual. This stands in contrast to our current model, in which transcripts, HR records, industry-recognized credentials, badges and more might be distributed across a dozen or so institutions that cannot communicate with one another.
Read more here: Unlocking Education & Workforce Through Blockchain
A Comprehensive Education and Workforce Ecosystem
A skills-based language and shared LER platform is only as good as the partners that buy-in. Broad, regional (or beyond) ecosystems of training providers and employers must agree to adopt these tools, and shift their teaching, credentialing, and hiring practices accordingly, for such a system to work.
Competency-Based and Personalized Learning
With an unbundled curricula, competency-based and personalized learning become possible. Students can control the speed at which they progress through a learning experience based on their personal preferences and life circumstances, following a path tailored specifically to their goals – think Guided Pathways 2.0.
What is the result?
The intended aim is a new model of learning and working that values prior learning across an individual’s lifetime, and gives the individual greater, more equitable control over their learning and working journey.
A case study
Jordan is a single parent in their mid-30s. They have a child and a part-time sales associate job at a small clothing store. Jordan wants to go back to school and has a specific goal in mind – to become a graphic designer. Jordan has limited time – they want to keep their job while in school and have a hectic parenting schedule. They need an education program that fits their life.
A couple months ago, Jordan took an Intro to Photoshop course through a Continuing Education program at Bellevue College as well as a Typography 101 course through the School of Visual Concepts. They have also earned a Microsoft Office Certification through their work at the clothing store.
Jordan comes to the Seattle Colleges where the graphic design program uses the same skills language as Bellevue College and the School of Visual Concepts. Jordan is awarded credit for their previous learning and skill development, and they are presented with a personalized pathway to fill the gaps in their graphic design knowledge and skills, efficiently and precisely.
Jordan works their way through the personalized pathway – it is a competency-based pathway, so Jordan is able to slow down when they need to fill in as store manager for a couple weeks at work, and able to speed up through their Color Theory coursework after they catch on quickly.
As Jordan completes each skill on their graphic design pathway, the skill is added to their Learner Employment Record (LER) – Jordan’s lifelong record of learning and professional experience. Each skill record (e.g. a badge, industry recognized credential etc.) contains meta-data such as the date the competency was achieved, materials and work product demonstrating competency, and the awarding institution.
Jordan can access their LER through a user-friendly digital wallet. Applying for their first job as a graphic designer, Jordan grants access to their LER to the hiring manager as a digital resume. Many years later, Jordan enrolls at Continuum College to brush up on the latest graphic design technologies and techniques. They grant access to their LER to Continuum College, which is then able to assess skill and skill gaps, and provide a tailored pathway of study to Jordan.