Skills-based learning has developed beyond a conversation and has become the focus of many learning institutions from higher education to community colleges, career-specific educators, internal company training, and more. Why?

When we talk about education, we often describe it as a tool for economic mobility. We tell high school kids to go to college, get a degree, and that is the path to a good career. For adult learners, we advocate that they go back to school, finish that degree, get a master's or a doctorate - easy ways to “get ahead” and enhance their ability to move forward in their careers.

In a recent article titled “College Ed Must Adapt or Die”, Jason Wingard, the President of Temple University in Pennsylvania stated simply, “Consider this my burning platform memo for higher ed.” What was he referring to? There is a crisis happening in higher education right now, and if it were any other type of business, there would be widespread panic.

We're diverting from our Stakeholders in the Modern Credential Marketplace series in this blog post to talk for a moment about Dark Data. What is Dark Data? You probably generated Dark Data at some point today, not because you were travelling the Silk Road or looking for a new identity - but more for an activity like checking your bank balance, looking at your medical records, or digitally signing a document.

There is an entire ecosystem that revolves around skills, and that ecosystem is changing. It started with education, and the rise of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), which, while it did not have the impact many thought it would, spawned an era of self-paced alternative education that created a boom in online courses.

Over the past year, we’ve focussed our Lens on Learners: the types of learners, how they learn, and what they want from their education. With our Lens on Educators, we’ve explored what it will take for the education system to effectively bridge the gap between learners and employers.

Centralised methods of education have been the hub of learning historically for a long time. However, at what we now consider the K-12 level, education was often decentralised. Learning occurred at home, or with a small local community of leaders with different specialties, in one-room schoolhouses and more.

“Show me the incentive and I’ll show you the outcome.” - Charlie Munger

We focus our Lens on Educators a bit wider than usual today, as we digress into the realm of possibility. We take a blue-sky approach to consider what the future world of learning might look like if we borrowed a verification system the banking industry has been using since the days of the stage coach - and end up in a Web 3.0 hyper-connected Meta University. Here’s how it started...

As we focus our Lens on Educators in the latest arc of our Stakeholders in the Modern Credential Marketplace series, the real story is the interaction between educators and learners. Because it is the learners who will take the skills and knowledge transferred to them through education out into the world, where they will need to do something with them.

Continuing our Stakeholders in the Modern Credential Marketplace series, we turn our Lens on Educators, starting with a look at how educators can impact the employability outcomes of learners and programs around them now. The reason is simple. Change must start somewhere, and as when setting any goal, we need to aim for that which is a stretch for us, but still achievable.