All Hands on Deck: Ten Lessons from Early Adopters of Competency-Based Education

The perceived value of post-secondary education to economic competitiveness and individual success is driving innovation in higher education. Competency-based education (CBE) is the latest disruption that seeks to respond to the growing sense of national urgency to boost education attainment. The target audience generally includes those adult learners with some college but no degree already participating in the workforce. Competency-based education also seeks to create greater transparency in learning outcomes to show how well individuals can apply identified competencies in the work-world. Yet, competency-based education is hard to understand and communicate. For those educators who are thinking about initiating competency-based education programs on their campuses, you need to know what others have learned in the process of designing CBE programs and the kinds of questions you should ask yourself at the outset.