Benefits of Competency-Based Learning for College Students

Key Infor­ma­tion:

• Self-paced online pro­grams using com­pe­ten­cy-based learn­ing can sig­nif­i­cant­ly reduce the time and cost required to earn a degree.
• CBL offers a per­son­al­ized approach, allow­ing stu­dents to learn at their own pace and focus on areas of inter­est and need.
• Imple­ment­ing CBL in high­er edu­ca­tion requires sig­nif­i­cant adjust­ments in cur­ricu­lum design, assess­ment strate­gies, tech­nol­o­gy inte­gra­tion, and admin­is­tra­tive poli­cies. Despite these chal­lenges, many insti­tu­tions are mov­ing toward CBL to pro­vide more rel­e­vant and flex­i­ble learn­ing opportunities.

It’s no secret that col­lege can be very expen­sive. Reduc­ing the time you need to fin­ish your degree is a great way to min­i­mize your costs. One way to do that is to get your degree in a self-paced online program.

Often, self-paced learn­ing uti­lizes com­pe­ten­cy-based activ­i­ties to eval­u­ate your progress. Com­pe­ten­cy-based learn­ing (CBL) is straight­for­ward: you’re eval­u­at­ed based on pre­set out­comes and real-world per­for­mance. So, if you mas­ter the mate­r­i­al quick­ly and can demon­strate your learn­ing, you can move on to the next sub­ject more quick­ly, too.

CBL is not a tra­di­tion­al method of teach­ing and learn­ing. In fact, there are many dif­fer­ences between the two:

In oth­er words, self-paced CBL offers you the advan­tage of faster learn­ing, more rel­e­vant learn­ing, and a more per­son­al­ized learn­ing experience.

Relat­ed:

• Bal­anc­ing Fam­i­ly Life with Accel­er­at­ed Degree Programs
• Accel­er­at­ed Busi­ness Degrees for Entrepreneurs
• Tips for Suc­cess in Accel­er­at­ed Degree Pro­grams for Adult Learners
• How to Pre­pare for a Com­pe­ten­cy-Based Degree Program

The Core Principles of Competency-Based Learning

At its core, com­pe­ten­cy-based learn­ing is all about the indi­vid­ual learn­ing expe­ri­ence. Rather than par­tic­i­pat­ing in a set cur­ricu­lum, you progress through your cours­es based on your needs and inter­ests. In this regard, CBL is high­ly flex­i­ble and allows you much more free­dom to learn the spe­cif­ic knowl­edge and skills that are rel­e­vant to your future goals.

More­over, CBL also focus­es on trans­fer­able skills. Nurs­ing pro­grams are excel­lent exam­ples of this. Rather than spend­ing the entire pro­gram in a class­room lis­ten­ing to lec­tures about nurs­ing prac­tices, you spend a sig­nif­i­cant time in clin­i­cals work­ing side-by-side with prac­tic­ing nurs­es and real patients. So, you learn the basic com­pe­ten­cies in class and then have oppor­tu­ni­ties to trans­fer those skills in med­ical settings.

The process of trans­fer­ring skills is a key com­po­nent of mas­tery. This is anoth­er impor­tant part of CBL. Rather than being test­ed once to assess your com­pe­ten­cy, CBL gives you mul­ti­ple chances to demon­strate your mas­tery of a con­cept, tech­nique, or sub­ject. This, in turn, relates to the flex­i­ble pac­ing men­tioned ear­li­er — you can move quick­ly through con­cepts you mas­ter and ded­i­cate more time to con­cepts that require a lit­tle more of your attention.

Benefits of Competency-Based Learning in Higher Education

High­er edu­ca­tion inno­va­tions like CBL and oth­er flex­i­ble learn­ing pro­grams come with many ben­e­fits for stu­dents like you:

Implementing Competency-Based Learning in Higher Education

A sig­nif­i­cant chal­lenge in imple­ment­ing CBL in col­lege and uni­ver­si­ty set­tings is the time it takes to devel­op. CBL requires a back­ward design from desired com­pe­ten­cies to the mate­r­i­al pre­sent­ed in class. This neces­si­tates a sig­nif­i­cant time invest­ment from the faculty.

Relat­ed to that point is the time need­ed to adjust assess­ment strate­gies. Gone are the one-size-fits-all exam-based assess­ments pop­u­lar in tra­di­tion­al edu­ca­tion in favor of indi­vid­u­al­ized com­pe­ten­cy-based assess­ments that can more accu­rate­ly eval­u­ate learn­ing outcomes.

There are tech­no­log­i­cal con­sid­er­a­tions as well. Tech­nol­o­gy is a cru­cial com­po­nent of the indi­vid­u­al­ized learn­ing expe­ri­ence. Imple­ment­ing new sys­tems on cam­pus and for online stu­dents takes time and mon­ey, just like the oth­er adjust­ments col­leges must address to make CBL a success.

CBL requires adjust­ments to admin­is­tra­tive poli­cies as well. For exam­ple, high­er edu­ca­tion insti­tu­tions might have to change reg­u­la­to­ry poli­cies, finan­cial aid qual­i­fi­ca­tions, tuition pric­ing, and more. Mak­ing changes like this often involves mul­ti­ple stake­hold­ers and a lot of over­sight since changes can sig­nif­i­cant­ly impact bud­get­ing and oth­er resources on campus.

Hav­ing said that, CBL has been imple­ment­ed suc­cess­ful­ly at col­leges and uni­ver­si­ties through­out the U.S., espe­cial­ly those offer­ing online learn­ing options. A few well-known exam­ples include the following:

• South­ern New Hamp­shire University
• Uni­ver­si­ty of Phoenix
• Capel­la University
• North­ern Ari­zona University
• Walden Uni­ver­si­ty

The Future of Competency-Based Learning

The future of CBL in high­er edu­ca­tion appears to be bright. Edu­ca­tion­al trends indi­cate that more and more col­leges and uni­ver­si­ties are imple­ment­ing CBL pro­grams. In fact, the Amer­i­can Insti­tutes for Research reports that 47 per­cent of the high­er edu­ca­tion insti­tu­tions sur­veyed are in the process of adopt­ing CBL. 

With more and more self-direct­ed learn­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties avail­able at the col­lege lev­el in the com­ing years, it’s rea­son­able to assume that the num­ber of stu­dents attend­ing col­lege might increase. After all, more rel­e­vant learn­ing that’s direct­ly tied to one’s career goals is a strong moti­va­tion for get­ting an education.

Addi­tion­al­ly, the Coun­cil for Adult and Expe­ri­en­tial Learn­ing notes that a whop­ping 86 per­cent of col­lege fac­ul­ty report a need for increased skills-based learn­ing. Unfor­tu­nate­ly, the same study found that only 22 per­cent of insti­tu­tions had com­plet­ed the imple­men­ta­tion of CBL. This is like­ly due to the dif­fi­cul­ties of imple­ment­ing a whole­sale change in teach­ing and learn­ing, like those dis­cussed earlier.

Anoth­er effect of this push toward CBL is an eval­u­a­tion of seat time and cred­it hours. Specif­i­cal­ly, finan­cial aid oppor­tu­ni­ties go hand-in-hand with cred­it hours, which makes CBL pro­grams less effec­tive to meet each student’s needs. There very well could be a new type of cred­it-hour equiv­a­len­cy devel­oped in the com­ing years to make the finan­cial aid sit­u­a­tion for CBL learn­ers more effective.

On a glob­al scale, CBL can help address many holes in the work­force. You can grad­u­ate with spe­cif­ic skills need­ed for your cho­sen pro­fes­sion and do so with mas­tery of those skills, rather than a cur­so­ry knowl­edge of them. With that comes a more edu­cat­ed and skilled work­force that is bet­ter equipped to meet con­sumer needs and wants now and in the future.

Conclusion

As dis­cussed above, the ben­e­fits of CBL are many: it’s faster and cheap­er, more rel­e­vant, and pre­pares you bet­ter for your career. Though imple­ment­ing CBL in high­er edu­ca­tion comes with some sig­nif­i­cant chal­lenges, the ben­e­fits are hard to ignore for you, oth­er stu­dents, and the high­er edu­ca­tion sys­tem at large. There are also ample ben­e­fits of CBL pro­grams for employ­ers, who are able to hire more com­pe­tent, moti­vat­ed, and skilled workers.

Whether you’re a stu­dent, an edu­ca­tor, a col­lege admin­is­tra­tor, or some­thing in between, CBL and oth­er forms of self-paced and mas­tery-based learn­ing are worth a deep­er look. This could be the wave of the future; explor­ing CBL oppor­tu­ni­ties now can help you ride that wave!