What’s New in Competency-Based Higher Education?
CompetencyWorks Blog
Pushing the Field
- CNN’s Amy Laitinen discusses the problems that arise when structuring education around seat time, rather than actual learning, and she questions whether the current higher education system is worth the price.
- In his article Competency-Based Education 2.0, Steven Mintz calls for a commonly accepted definition of competency-based education, and he describes in detail the approach to CBE used in the University of Texas System campuses.
- Ryan Craig, in his article For Online to Really Matter in Education, We Need to Redefine Competency, describes how competency-based digital learning can bring transparency and simplicity to education, while structuring the system around mass consumption.
- Southern New Hampshire University’s President, Paul LeBlanc, has accepted a three-month appointment with the U.S. Department of Education as a senior advisor to Ted Mitchell, where he will focus on competency-based education. New Hampshire was also approved for performance assessments on higher ed.
Movement in the States
- The Texas Legislature is currently considering the “I CAN” (Incentivizing College Affordability Now) Bill, which would take the Texas Affordable Baccalaureate Program (TABP) statewide.
- Amy Crawford discusses how charter school approaches could fit into the landscape of American higher education and she discusses how Match Beyond, in Massachusetts, provides a hybrid model that could replicate very quickly.
Helping Students in Competency-Based Programs
- The article Competency-Based Education: 4 Considerations for Online Students advises students to compare costs of education programs and ensure they can obtain financial aid. Specifically, students should analyze program cost and setup, financial aid, their own learning style, as well as coaches and other supports.
- Ian Quillen provides 4 Tips to Finish an Online, Competency-Based Degree, from which higher education students in these programs may benefit. He suggests getting social, mapping out your time, asking more from your coach, and knowing your mission.
Resource
- In case you missed it, CompetencyWorks released Maximizing Competency Education and Blended Learning: Insights from Experts, written by Susan Patrick and Chris Sturgis. For an overview of the report, see Chris’s blog post.