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Zoho’s Vembu came to a similar conclusion, telling me, “I want to hold on to an employee for life. It is a total commitment. But it’s the commitment that makes a difference.”
could counter post-Boomer short-time employments
REPLACING THE AVERAGE IN HIGHER EDUCATION
HERE WE GO!
The calculation behind these sacrifices is both rational and practical: we believe, correctly, that higher education is the single most important gateway to opportunity in our society. We are willing to do just about anything to obtain a diploma because we expect that it will give us or our children the best possible chance for a good job, a good income, a good neighborhood, a good life. For anyone who looks at the value of a college degree in these pragmatic terms—and you can count me as one of them—the implicit purpose of higher education is to prepare students for their self-chosen careers
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operant paradigm
Too many graduates cannot find a job in their field (31 percent, in one recent study by CareerBuilder);2 too many employers cannot fill good-paying jobs (35 percent, according to the Manpower Group),3 and too many employers report that the graduates they do hire are not equipped for their jobs.4 And I doubt I have to try very hard to convince you that costs are out of control, but here is one telling fact: the cost of a college degree has risen 538 percent since 1985.
current effects of higher ed
Our contemporary universities are caretakers of an averagarian system they inherited that enforces the conviction that the system is more important than the individual and compels the standardization of all educational processes.
including methods of delivery and roles
goal—our existing system of higher education was designed a century ago very explicitly to sort students by ranking them based on their performance in a standardized curriculum.
key
The system is the educational equivalent of the Norma look-alike competition, since its relentless focus on one-dimensional rankings compels every student to do exactly the same things the average student does. Be the same as everyone else, only better.
TRUE
the system has done to people, this runaway system that compares everyone against an average. Kids try to doctor their essay, they take internships they don’t believe in. Overseas they cheat on their SATs. One of the most common questions I get is how many hours of community service do I need to do to get into this or that college. What I always tell them is that the only path to a life of excellence is by understanding and developing your own unique individuality. Instead, too many parents and kids focus on hiding their individuality instead of developing it, all because they are trying to
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effects of averaginarianism
You’re trading in your uniqueness to be like everyone else, in the hope that you can be a little bit better at the thing that everybody else is also trying to be. But if you’re just playing the averages, then, on average, it won’t work.”
another averaganarian effects list
or discovering a cure for cancer. But as long as everyone else is playing the game of averages—and as long as universities and employers continue to play the game—there is a real cost for any student who chooses not to play.
trapped AS A RAT in the maze
The promise of our averagarian system of higher education keeps going down, while the costs imposed by the system keep going up.
situation of inverse relationship
that students can be sorted by their rank—that a standardized, institution-centered system is necessary in order to efficiently separate the talented students from the untalented ones—then
false premises of status quo
To transform the averagarian architecture of our existing system into a system that values the individual student requires that we adopt these three key concepts: • Grant credentials, not diplomas • Replace grades with competency • Let students determine their educational pathway
CTE leads the way
To transform the averagarian architecture of our existing system into a system that values the individual student requires that we adopt these three key concepts: • Grant credentials, not diplomas • Replace grades with competency • Let students determine their educational pathway
transformation tools
as long as you log the necessary hours of seat time (and do not fail a class), you will get a diploma.
~ high school diploma or prison parole
It does not matter how well prepared you might be for a job as a mechanical engineer, if you do not complete every requirement set by the university, you don’t get a diploma. Conversely, you could fulfill all the requirements for a computer science degree from an Ivy League college—and still not be equipped for a job as a computer programmer.
two hellish outcomes of status quo
CTE students nightmares
awarding credit for the smallest meaningful unit of learning.
definition of credentialling
Some credentials can be obtained after a few classes or even one class, whereas some may take a year or longer. Credentialing offers a more flexible and finer-grained level of certification of your skills, abilities, and knowledge. Credentials can be combined (“stacked”) to create more advanced credentials.
how it can work
With credentialing there are no undergraduate programs that compel you to pay exorbitant tuition to a single university for four years to earn the necessary seat-hours for a standardized degree. Instead, you can pursue as few or as many credentials as you need to prepare for the career you want.
can status afford income losses ?
it has been an important part of skill-based education for a long time. For example, MIT already offers several credentialing programs (they call them “certificates”),
CBE
costs a total of $250 for each credential (the remaining costs are shouldered by industry, who are getting employees trained in the skills they need).
cost sharing increases career field participation and commitment AND insure cert program IS wanted and needed
they were merely those fields with a known shortage of qualified job candidates—and there is no reason that credentialing cannot be extended to include everything taught in higher education,
potential credential areas
Massively Open Online Courses, commonly referred to as MOOCs, are online courses offered by universities that do not require students to first be admitted into the university in order to enroll.
MOOCs
There are two related problems with relying on grades for measuring performance. The first, and most important, is they are one-dimensional.
problems w grades I
The other problem posed by grades is that they require employers to perform a complex interpretation of what a particular graduate’s diploma actually means. A transcript gives employers very little direct knowledge of a student’s skills, abilities, or mastery of a topic.
problems w grades II
credentials would be given if, and only if, you demonstrate competency in the relevant skills, abilities, and knowledge needed for that particular credential. Although the nature of competency will differ from field to field, competency-based evaluation will have three essential features.
competency based credentialling
The first is rather obvious: it should be pass/incomplete—either you have demonstrated the competency or you have not. Second, competency evaluations must be institution-agnostic. This means you should be able to acquire the necessary competency for a credential in whatever way you like.
competencies
right now under the current system. If you can acquire the competency online, on your own, or on the job, that’s great—you do not need to pay for a course. The third feature of competency-based evaluations of performance is that they should be professionally aligned. Obviously, that means professional organizations, as well as employers who will be hiring individuals with the credentials, should have some input into determining what constitutes competency for a particular profession-related credential.
stakeholders ~ CTE
right now under the current system. If you can acquire the competency online, on your own, or on the job, that’s great—you do not need to pay for a course. The third feature of competency-based evaluations of performance is that they should be professionally aligned. Obviously, that means professional organizations, as well as employers who will be hiring individuals with the credentials, should have some input into determining what constitutes competency for a particular profession-related credential.
CB credentials
Western Governors University.
WGU
The curriculum at WGU is entirely online, enabling students to move through material at their own pace. And though WGU grants degrees rather than credentials, students earn credit toward a degree by demonstrating competency, not by earning seat time in class. WGU also allows students to get credit for material they already know through competency exams without having to sit through an unnecessary course. Tuition at the school supports the notion of self-pacing: $6,000 covers as many courses as you can finish in two semesters of time.
WGU procedure
WGU has a two-step process for defining competency in a particular subject. The first is the “Program Councils”—panels of industry and academic experts who, together, define what a graduate in that area should know and be able to do to succeed at a job. The second is the “Assessment Councils,” which consist of national experts who work to create competency exams that assess whether students have mastered the necessary material. Most important, WGU relies on industry-accepted assessments whenever possible rather than inventing its own.22 Since WGU graduates have demonstrated competency in their
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WGU competence definition teams ~ CTE advisory boards
two additional features of the higher education system. First, students should have more educational options to choose from than the ones offered by any single university. Second, the credentialing process should be independent of any particular institution, so that students have the ability to stack their credentials, no matter how or where they earned them.
two necessities for pathways to work gets ready to respond to future fields which don't exist yet
In this system, students should be able to take a course anywhere: online or in a classroom, at an employer’s training center or a local university. You could take a huge online course with thousands of students from all over the world, or get a local tutor to instruct you one-on-one, face-to-face. You could take an evening course once a week for six months, or an immersive two-week crash course. You could seek out high-intensity instructors who drive their students hard, or teachers who prefer to gently guide their students without pressing them. You could get all your credentials through
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possible paths
if it is designed to support self-determination the entire educational system should encourage you to constantly re-assess what you like to do and what you might be good at, and give you a natural way to adjust your career plans as you go along according to what you learn about yourself and according to the changing job marketplace.
ideal
the notion that we should take away individuals’ abilities to make decisions and allow the system to decide is quintessential Taylorism—the kind of thinking that got us into trouble in the first place.
anti self determinism =Taylorism
A self-determined, competency-based credentialing system is also more closely aligned with the principles of individuality. It fulfills the jaggedness principle, since it allows students to figure out what they like, what they are good at, and what is the best way to pursue these interests. It fulfills the context principle by evaluating students’ competency in a context as close as possible to the professional environment where they will actually perform. And it fulfills the pathways principle by allowing each student to learn at their own pace, and follow a sequence that is right for them.
ideal
adopting these concepts would help solve the conformity problem: instead of trying to be like everyone else, only better, students will strive to be the very best version of themselves. Instead of playing the game of averages to get into a high-ranked university, you strive for professional excellence.
ideal
a self-determined, competency-based credentialing system would also put us on a path to solve the problem of endlessly rising educational costs. In an individualized system, you pay for exactly the credentials you want and need—and nothing more. Instead of one institution locking you into paying four years of tuition, different institutions will compete to offer you the best possible credential at the lowest possible price.
ideal
An individualized educational system based on competency and credentialing also creates a much better match between students and employers, because the value and availability of credentials adjusts in real time according to the realities of the ever-changing job market.
YES! ideal
Any student, at any moment, can see which credentials are valued by the companies they like, in geographic regions where they want to work, in industries where they want a career. They can compare costs, pathways, and difficulty of pursuing credentials and balance this with the potential salary and personal fit of various jobs.
ideal
businesses and organizations can be assured of job applicants who have the skills and knowledge necessary for the job, because they can specify any combination of credentials that are needed for a particular job, no matter how demanding or complex, and because they have input into the competencies required for any given set of credentials. Employers can directly influence the pool of available employees, since they could offer to pay candidates to get a rare or unfamiliar credential, or even a new set of credentials.
ideal stakeholder satisfaction
problem,
what do DOED and accreditors say?
if we really want to revolutionize the higher education system and move toward this new approach to education, then we need the help of the business world. Universities are unlikely to change unless employers demand something different. As long as employers continue to demand diplomas and degrees, there’s little incentive for universities to change their system. This revolution in individualized education will only come once employers recognize how they will benefit from it and start to hire employees based on credentials, rather than diplomas, and based on employees’ demonstrated competency
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what LEAP is about
This is the lesson of Kim Campbell: fit creates opportunity.
fit --> opportunity
if we want a society where each one of us has the same chance to live up to our full potential, then we must create professional, educational, and social institutions that are responsive to individuality.
vision
This is not how we usually think about equal opportunity. During the Age of Average we have defined opportunity as “equal access”—as ensuring that everyone has access to the same experiences.
equal opportunity
equal access suffers from one major shortcoming: it aims to maximize individual opportunity on average by ensuring that everyone has access to the same standardized system, whether or not that system actually fits.
equal access flaw
Equal access is an averagarian solution to an averagarian problem.
equal access is Taylorism
if there is no such thing as an average person, then there can never be equal opportunity on average. Only equal fit creates equal opportunity.
equal fit > equal access
