Competency-based education is going upmarket. Three brand-name, Big Ten-affiliated institutions are now offering degrees in this emerging form of higher education.
Yet the new programs at the University of Michigan, Purdue University and the University of Wisconsin System are not aimed at the vast numbers of undergraduates who come to those campuses for the traditional college experience. They are narrow in scope, experimental and not all that sexy.
The Wisconsin System's "Flexible Option" is the most extensive and established of the programs. Its five competency-based, online credentials, which range from a certificate to bachelor's degrees, are designed mostly for adult students with some college credits but no degree. And they are offered by the system's two-year institutions, its extension program, and the Milwaukee campus -- not the Madison campus with the lake and the 80,000-seat Camp Randall Stadium.
Even so, several observers said the measured arrivals of Michigan, Purdue and the Wisconsin System will give a boost to competency-based education. They are big-name institutions that are trying a different form of instruction, which remains both promising and controversial.
Read more at Inside Higher Ed: https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2014/10/28/competency-based-education-arrives-three-major-public-institutions