55 research outputs found

    Can Digital Badging Support an Inclusive New Normal in Higher Education?

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    This call for research considers how digital badging could help universities serve their students better and more flexibly, especially during crises (whether caused by public health issues, social unrest, or natural disasters). Touted as a means to recognize academic achievements and skills of both traditional and non-traditional students, digital badging can support personalized learning pathways by enabling individualized portfolios of micro-credentials. Also, badges can signify mastery at more granular levels than end-of-term course grades. In this review, we identify known digital badging opportunities and threats and consider a proposed micro-credentialing system based on college course modules rather than full courses. We then articulate directions for further research, guided by the theory of IT options and debt and the theory of complementary resources

    The international case for micro-credentials for life-wide and life-long learning : a systematic literature review

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    AIM/PURPOSE : Systematic literature reviews seek to locate all studies that contain material of relevance to a research question and to synthesize the relevant outcomes of those studies. The primary aim of this paper was to synthesize both research and practice reports on micro-credentials (MCRs). BACKGROUND : There has been an increase in reports and research on the plausibility of MCRs to support dynamic human skills development for an increasingly impatient and rapidly changing digital world. The integration of fast-paced emerging technologies and digitalization necessitate alternative learning paradigms. MCRs offer time, financial, and space flexibility and can be stacked into a larger qualification, thereby allowing for a broader range of transdisciplinary competencies within a qualification. However, MCRs often lack the academic rigor required for accreditation within existing disciplines. METHODOLOGY : The study followed the PRISMA framework (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta Analyses), which offers a rigorous method to enhance reporting quality. The study used both academic research and practice reports. CONTRIBUTION : The paper makes a theoretical contribution to the discourse about the need for innovation within existing educational paradigms for continued relevance in a changing world. It also contributes to the debate on the role of MCRs in bridging the gap between practice and academia despite the growing difference between their interests, and the role that MCRs play in the social-economic plans of countries. FINDINGS : The key findings are that investments in MCRs are mainly in the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) and Education sectors, and have taken place mainly in high-income countries and regions – contexts that particularly value practice-accredited MCRs. Low-income countries, by contrast, remain traditional and insist on MCRs that are formally accredited by a recognized academic institution. This contributes to a widening skills gap between low- and high-income countries or regions, which results in greater global disparities. There is also a growing divide between academia and practice concerning their interest in MCRs (a reflection of the rigor versus relevance debate), which partially explains why many global and larger organizations have gone on to create their own learning institutions. RECOMMENDATIONS FOR PRACTITIONERS : We recommend that educational mechanisms consider the critical importance of MCRs as part of innovative efforts for life-wide (different sectors) and life-long (same sector) learning, especially in low-income countries. MCRs provide dynamic mechanisms to fill skills gaps in an increasing ruthless international battle for talent. RECOMMENDATIONS FOR RESEARCHERS : We recommend focused research into skills and career pathways using MCRs while at the same time remaining responsive to transdisciplinary efforts and sensitive to global and local changes within any sector. IMPACT ON SOCIETY : Work and society have transformed over time, and more so in the new digital age, yet academia has been slow in adapting to the changes, forcing organizations to create their own learning institutions or to use MCRs to fill the skills gap. The purpose of education goes beyond preparing individuals for work, extending further to creating an environment where individuals and governments seek their own social and economic outcomes. MCRs provide a flexible means for co-creation between individuals, education, organizations, and government that could stem global rising unemployment, social exclusion, and redundancy. FUTURE RESEARCH : Future research should focus on the co-creation of MCRs between practitioners and academia.https://www.informingscience.org/Journals/IJIKM/Overviewhj2023Informatic

    Student, Interrupted: Can Digital Badging Improve Programmatic Agility and Help IS Students During Crises?

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    We propose that a stackable badged micro-credential system could increase academic programmatic agility, in turn helping university students cope with personal crises (illness, accidents, family emergencies), and societal-level crises (pandemics, natural disasters, geopolitical events). We demonstrate how our proposed system would certify students’ mastery of several modules comprising a required graduate-level Strategic IS Management course. This proposed system will provide helpful structure (through a modular design and reliance on well-accepted faculty governance, including the traditional college registrar role), and temporal flexibility (enabling students to receive credit for course modules taken in different terms/semesters, and taught by the same or different instructors) and portability (given that micro-credentials provide valid evidence of specific skills or knowledge a student has acquired, regardless of learning modality or instructor). This stackable badged micro-credential system would help students during crises, by making it easy for them to temporarily drop out of a course when circumstances impede effective learning and making it easy for them to resume studies when they are ready and able to do so. We discuss technical challenges that university administrators may face in implementing micro-credentialing in IS classes, offer suggestions for pilot-testing the proposed system, and suggest possible future extensions of this idea

    Rethinking workplace learning in the digital world: a case study of Open Badges

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    The purpose of this collective case study was to explore digital badging in educational institutions as support for K-12 practitioners struggling to integrate technology into pedagogical practices. The researcher conducted a mixed-method study that captured perceptions about digital badges and follow-up interviews with selected badge users to explore their viewpoints further. The goal was to generate a detailed case description, identify participants’ self-assessment of technological pedagogical content knowledge (TPACK), and define those attributes that are deemed important or not useful to Open Badge Course earners that participated in the study. Ten individuals from a Northern California region completed the survey and four participated in an interview process. Results from the survey found that participants highly valued the convenience, accessibility, and ability to self-pace afforded by the course. They valued being able to set their own learning goals and to begin and work at their own level of expertise. The game-like features and personal achievement were motivating factors to earn and complete badges. The course experience allowed time for cumulative study to learn and implement technology into teaching. The course experience supported their understanding of technological pedagogical content knowledge (TPACK). The interviews provided detailed information regarding perceptions and experience with the Open Badge Course. Six themes emerged from thematic analysis of the interview data: affordances of course content and course design, recommendations to sustain and improve the course, challenges of course content and course design, ways experience impacted/changed teaching, motivation for learning, and ways experience impacted/changed learning. Participant responses indicated that modifications were necessary for the course to be effective. The areas of challenge included: a lack of timely assessment of learning, constraints from rigor and management of badge levels, lack of relevant or meaningful badges related to the grade level taught, and difficulties with mechanical/operational procedures to access and complete required activities. Facing obstacles are not unique to digital badge project developers. The challenges identified in this collective case study provide valuable information for developers in redesigning future iterations of digital badge systems. Recommendations include how development of similar systems for informal professional learning within formal institutions of learning can be effective

    MICRO CREDENTIALING FOR TEACHERS: A CASE STUDY IN PERSONALIZED PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

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    Professional development for teachers must evolve to provide a personalized approach to better meet the needs of the individual. Micro-credentialing is one way to provide teachers with personalized professional development. This case study explores the implementation of a micro-credentialing course in one school district. The district selected a company that provides micro-credential courses nationwide. The theoretical framework for the study is Andragogy, the theory of adult learning (Knowles, 1984). The objective of the study is to determine to what extent micro-credentialing meets the needs of teachers, and to what extent it is effective professional development. Data for this qualitative study was collected through teacher surveys and interviews. A district administrator and a company representative were also interviewed. Analysis of the surveys and interviews revealed teachers found value in the course, they also shared suggestions for improvement

    The Usefulness of Digital Badges in Higher Education: Exploring the Students’ Perspectives

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    Many students entering higher education (HE) today have never known life without the internet. By the time students enter HE, many have been exposed to playing digital games and consider them a very useful learning tool. However, utilising gamification for student engagement and student learning in HE has not been investigated thoroughly, and this paper attempts to contribute to this emerging field of study as suggested by Gibson et al. (2015) and Reid et al. (2015). A survey investigating the usefulness of digital badges for student learning and engagement was distributed to two hundred and fifty-seven (275) undergraduate students at the College of Business, University College Dublin. The results suggest that the incorporation of digital badges into a module is beneficial as they can help students organise their study, maintain and track their progress, and motivate them to engage with module content throughout the semester. The survey results also provide some evidence that digital badges can make a positive contribution to student engagement within a module, particularly where they are directly linked with the module assessment requirements. Overall, digital badges have the potential to be a highly effective pedagogical tool that can also positively impact on the learning experience more generally

    Smart Universities

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    Institutions of learning at all levels are challenged by a fast and accelerating pace of change in the development of communications technology. Conferences around the world address the issue. Research journals in a wide range of scholarly fields are placing the challenge of understanding "Education's Digital Future" on their agenda. The World Learning Summit and LINQ Conference 2017 proceedings take this as a point of origin. Noting how the future also has a past: Emergent uses of communications technologies in learning are of course neither new nor unfamiliar. What may be less familiar is the notion of "disruption", found in many of the conferences and journal entries currently. Is the disruption of education and learning as transformative as in the case of the film industry, the music industry, journalism, and health? If so, clearly the challenge of understanding future learning and education goes to the core of institutions and organizations as much as pedagogy and practice in the classroom. One approach to the pursuit of a critical debate is the concept of Smart Universities – educational institutions that adopt to the realities of digital online media in an encompassing manner: How can we as smarter universities and societies build sustainable learning eco systems for coming generations, where technologies serve learning and not the other way around? Perhaps that is the key question of our time, reflecting concerns and challenges in a variety of scholarly fields and disciplines? These proceedings present the results from an engaging event that took place from 7th to 9th of June 2017 in Kristiansand, Norway
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