Principle: Competency-Based Education

Looking Under the Hood of Competency-Based Education

American Institutes for Research (AIR) recently released Looking Under the Hood of Competency-Based Education: The Relationship Between Competency-Based Education Practices and Students’ Learning Skills, Behaviors and Dispositions. This is one of the first valuable studies we have had looking at the impact of competency-based education. The Framework of Learning Skills, Behaviors, and Disposition AIR created… Read More ›

Looking Under the Hood of Competency-Based Education

This study by the American Institutes for Research rigorously examined the relationship between competency-based education (CBE) practices and changes in these learning capacities (such as the skills, behaviors, and dispositions that enhance student capacity to learn in school). CBE, an instructional approach that emphasizes what students learn and master rather than how much time they… Read More ›

Finding the Right Fit: 6 Things to Look For in Districts Ripe for Community Engagement

When the Nellie Mae Education Foundation launched its regional school-community engagement initiative in July 2014, we made an important decision: instead of selecting districts through a traditional request-for-proposals (RFP) process, we developed—in collaboration with the Great Schools Partnership, our intermediary partner—a comprehensive “engagement process” that entails a series of conversations, interviews, and in-person meetings with… Read More ›

Measures that Matter Most

This report marks the first time the Next Generation Learning Challenges (NGLC) has asked their networks of innovators to lend their voices to a critical set of questions: how should NGLC go about measuring the success of an educational innovation? And what measures matter most? Next Generation Learning Challenges represents some of the nation’s most innovative… Read More ›

Project-Based Learning at Harmony Public Schools

This brief provides an overview of Harmony Public School’s project-based learning vision, design, and approach, concluding with a few key considerations for districts as they explore implementation of project-based learning. Teachers need instructional practices that impart more sophisticated and higher-order thinking and analytical skills for students across the achievement spectrum. To meet this challenge, many… Read More ›

Digital Badging and Micro-Credentialing

This paper explores what badging really represents for PK-12 educators dedicated to student-centered learning with the help of voices directly involved in badging and micro-credentialing and educators thoughtfully watching it. It reflects on the potential of using badging with students and with educators, as a strategy to transform professional development. The perspectives included in this… Read More ›

‘Making’ as a (Student-Centered) Approach to Learning

The White House will celebrate the National Week of Making beginning today through the end of next week (June 17-23), inviting formal and informal learning spaces to host events showcasing the power “making” has had in their communities. Makerspaces celebrate do-it-yourself interactions, creative thinking, and idea-sharing. The maker movement was first introduced by Maker Media. Maker projects… Read More ›

8 Ways Blended Districts Can Implement a Competency-Based Structure

This blog post by writer and consultant Chris Sturgis discusses how districts implementing blended learning can go further to become truly competency-based. Chris Sturgis asserts that while blended learning embraces the use of personalization, on its own, it is not the same as competency education which requires a rethinking of the traditional system to advance… Read More ›

Students Take Charge

This article takes a look at two models of assessment in student-centered classrooms to find out what’s working. There are now hundreds of schools, dozens of districts, and at least 15 states actively striving for a student-centered learning system, but if kids are in charge, how do you know they’re learning? Since assessments can factor in… Read More ›

Seizing the Moment: Realizing the Promise of Student-Centered Learning

This policy brief presents a series of recommendations for building public will in support of student-centered learning, including policy priorities that can help to expand its practices more broadly at the local, state, and federal level. It incorporates profiles of schools and programs which illustrate the power of student-centered learning in action. A growing body… Read More ›

Defining and Visioning Blended Learning: The Learning Accelerator Goes Deeper

This article published by The Learning Accelerator (TLA), a national nonprofit organization that is, in their words, “seeking to transform K-12 education by accelerating the implementation of high-quality blended learning in school districts across the US through cultivating and funding the supporting ecosystem,” is an expansive, experience-informed vision for blended learning. Source Organization: Blended Learning Facts … Read More ›