To what degree? Alternative micro-credentialing in a digital age

Abstract

Graduates, employers and the community are accustomed to regarding a degree as a reliable signal that a graduate has attained valued cultural or vocationally oriented knowledge and skills. University degrees and transcripts confer social status, and they provide a common, near universal currency for negotiation in the professional and skilled labour market. However, an ecosystem of micro-credentials is emerging as an alternative or supplement to the degree, perhaps in tune with employers who have dispensed with degrees as prerequisites for employment on the grounds that degree transcripts are not particularly useful, and that university records are not good predictors of employment success. In this chapter we examine digital micro-credential ecosystems, together with their associated assessment methodologies and technologies. Digital micro-credentials may or may not become an enduring feature of the tertiary education landscape, and are certainly not based on educationally novel practices. But they raise fundamental questions for the higher education sector about the university’s ongoing role in warranting and crediting in an era dominated by digitisation.