Personal Essay: Micro-credentials for Mastery

The willingness to keep learning is, I think, the most important thing about trying to be good at anything. You never want to stop learning. — Emile Hirsch

Micro-credentials, or nano-degrees, have emerged as a dynamic tool for verifying mastery of discrete units of knowledge. Beyond serving as alternatives to traditional degrees, they can facilitate lifelong learning and encourage educators to innovate in delivering content equitably and affordably. However, assessing actual learning and skill mastery is a significant challenge, especially at scale (since an essential goal of alternative credentials is make education more accessible).

Submitting your Work

Email me a PDF document, between 2-4 pages.

Specifications

Attend a Roots Courses to experience a small module of knowledge and:

• summarize the key insights you gained from the experience (not just the topic information)
• what artifact(s) you produced and how it might be assessed
• how it might be integrated with Duke's current (or proposed) curriculum
• how it might expand Duke's curricular options

Consider the following questions in writing your essay:

• what strategies might effectively verify your learning?
• what does mastery mean?
• how are those ideas complicated within the context of team or real-world projects?
• what would motivate people to earn micro-credentials, before or after college?

Provide links to at least three resources you used to develop your scenarios, their impact, implications, and issues.