Competency-Based Learning for Data Scientists and Web Developers

Competency-Based, Asynchronous, and Personalized

Over the past four years I have managed multiple teams of developers, built technology to improve teaching and learning, learned Python, statistics, and machine learning, got a job as a data scientist at a tech startup, and finished a PhD in Instructional Psychology and Technology. These experiences have led me to search for the perfect competency-based learning platform for data scientists and web developers.

My data science training was not as efficient as it could have been, and with educational technology research and development experience, I feel like there must be a better way. Competency-based platforms seem like a better way to learn as you can start where you are (with what you know) and go to where you want to go (taking your own path). Unfortunately, I haven’t found a competency-based platform that does exactly what I want yet. To be clear, I’m actually looking for a competency-based platform that supports asynchronous learning, learner autonomy, and personalization. Specifically, these are the things I’m looking for in a competency-based learning platform:

1. Competency-based: It must have competencies that span the entirety of a knowledge domain (e.g., Basic JavaScript, Basic Python, Python for Data Scientists, etc.). Then, it must have sub-competencies or micro-competencies that break down each of these core competencies. This is essentially a concept map or a skill tree for a particular discipline or knowledge domain. It should show which skills are prerequisites to other skills, and it should be able to show my progress over the entire tree so I know what I should work on next to skill-up (based on where I started and where I want to go). In addition to this, tt must have reliable assessments that can determine what I have mastered and what I have not mastered. This refers to both the quality of assessment items and the quantity of assessment items.
2. Asynchronous: It must allow me to work at my own pace. I want to move as quickly or as slowly as I need to master all of the content.
3. Personalized: It must give me choice in the order in which I learn concepts.

Here are a few platforms that come close to what I am looking for, along with a few reasons why they fall short of my dream competency-based learning platform. In no particular order, (1) Degreed.com, (2) Khan Academy, (3) Udacity, Coursera, EdX, Pluralsight, and Lynda.com, (4) Learning Objects, (5) Aspire|Ability, and (6) Western Governors University.

Degreed.com

Degreed is on a mission to “jail-break the degree”. They have over 3 million users and have big corporate clients such as Atlassian, Bank of America, General Mills, ebay, GitHub, NASA, etc. Degreed has two different products that are worth mentioning in this post:

1. Customer-Facing Platform: Track all of the things you do to earn “points”
2. Skills Certifications: Master skill areas and prove your mastery with evidence to receive a skill score from 0 to 7 indicating your mastery level.

The basic public-facing platform (free) allows you to track all of the things you do to learn: read a book, read an article, finish a course, etc. Based on the Degreed-estimated amount of time it took you, it gives you points. This doesn’t fit my dream competency-based platform because it is tracking what you do, not what you know. Two people can take the same course and master different amounts of content. Furthermore, just because I did something doesn’t mean I mastered any of the content related to that thing.

The Skills Certifications are a little more interesting. You prepare a resume or set of evidences that shows you have mastered a particular content domain, like JavaScript. Then, you can apply for a Skill Certification in JavaScript. Degreed will take all applicants for a Skill Certification and give you a norm-referenced skill score based on the other applicants at the time you applied. They give the evidences to assessment experts as well as peers, and use these external evaluations to give you your score.

This is a really interesting way to assess mastery, but for my dream competency-based platform I crave micro- and sub-competency mastery tracking. Degreed will give you a global score at the domain level (e.g., JavaScript), but they don’t break it down into more granular pieces. How am I supposed to know what I need to do to skill-up if I only know I’m a 5/7 JavaScript learner?

Degreed is doing some really interesting stuff, but it doesn’t quite fit what I’m looking for.

Khan Academy

Khan Academy is a non-profit with the goal to provide a free, high-quality education to everyone. Khan Academy has thousands of practice videos and exercises across all grade levels and subject areas. However, their courses are a little sparse in advanced topics (college level and beyond). Khan Academy provides a lot of the things I am looking for: main subject areas broken down into smaller competencies, tracking progress over time, and providing assessments to assess my mastery. Additionally, Khan Academy used to have a starry night sky knowledge map. This is pretty close to what I am talking about when I say knowledge map or concept map. You can still access the link here: https://www.khanacademy.org/exercisedashboard but it doesn’t look like it is supported very well anymore (I get a Google Maps error when I run it 11/2/18). It used to show concepts, pre-requisites to concepts, and connections between micro-competencies.

Despite the positive things going for it, Khan Academy is not my dream competency-based platform for a number of reasons. First, Khan Academy is course-based. I want to jump around various content areas to personalize my learning and master what I am interested in. The course model doesn’t easily allow for that. Also, the Khan Academy starry night knowledge map is no longer supported and I want a domain map for my learning.

Another thing I don’t like about Khan Academy is they provide badges and points for exercise completion that are not directly associated with mastery. It may be motivating for K-12 learners to receive frivolous badges and points (although I’m not convinced this is even the case), but as an adult learner I want to be motivated by mastery.

Udacity, Coursera, EdX, Pluralsight, and Lynda.com

Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) exploded in the early 2010’s which resulted in hundreds of online courses. These courses used to all be free, but to find a viable sustainability model, many of these providers’ courses are now paid. I’ve taken 4 MOOCs all of the way through to earn a completion certificate, and I’ve started half-a-dozen additional MOOCs that I never finished. This completion percentage is pretty comparable across MOOCs (lots of learners start, but only a small percentage actually finish). Unfortunately, these platforms all provide learning content at the course level. I want to be able to personalize my education based on a knowledge tree at the competency and micro-competency level. Furthermore, many of these platforms do not offer micro-competency-based mastery scores. They issue a certificate at the end if you master a certain amount of the material, but no information is provided at a more granular level.

Pluralsight does have a skill IQ. This is a prior learning assessment that you take before starting a course that tells you what you have already mastered (no need to repeat this content) and where you need to start on a learning path based on what you already know. This is a great course-centered, mastery-based learning environment, but does not have the flexibility around scope and sequence that I am looking for in my ideal competency-based learning platform.

Some of these platforms have learning paths, which is a step in the right direction, but not a complete solution for me. Learning paths are predefined sequences of activities that get you from point A to point B. My issue with this is people rarely come from the same point A, rarely want to go to the same point B, and rarely want to take the same route from point A to point B. If we can augment learner autonomy by (1) assessing what they know, (2) showing them all of the possible ways to get from A to B, and then (3) helping them along their own path, I think learners will be more intrinsically motivated to succeed (see Self-Determination Theory for a good read on intrinsic motivation).

Learning Objects

Learning Objects is close to what I want. They are a competency-based learning platform that provides a breakdown of course content into competencies and even sub-competencies. They track learning over time and provide recommendations for how learners can improve. However, Learning Objects is a generic competency-based learning platform that functions at the course level. Really, I’m looking for a platform that has a knowledge domain map like, for example, Python for Data Science. Then, it would break down all the skills needed to master Python as a data scientist, have a knowledge map (what do you need to know first before you can master other content), and provide assessments so I can track progress as I go along. This is not Learning Objects, unfortunately.

Aspire|Ability

Jon Mott has been doing great things related to competency-based education for a while. He was previously at Learning Objects (recently acquired by Cengage) and is now starting a company called Aspire|Ability. The goal of his company is to bridge the gap between peoples’ current skills and the skills required for a desired job (I don’t have a lot of information about this endeavor, so please forgive me if details are incorrect). The only strike against this platform is it is still in the early stages of development (not even alpha yet). So while this could very well be a solution to my competency-based learning dream, only time will tell.

Western Governors University

Western Governors University (WGU) is a private, non-profit, online university founded in 1997. Their learning model is unique because they offer self-paced mastery-based courses. You pay for a 6-month period of time during which you can go through as many courses as you want. This means that more effective and efficient learners can progress as quickly as they want, while learners needing more time can take the time they need to succeed. This is a great model, especially for an online university.

I love what WGU is doing, but I crave granularity and personalization in my learning. I want to be able to track my progress through concepts in a course, but also track concepts outside of the course that are still related to the subject area. Furthermore, I want to be able to pick and choose which competencies and micro-competencies I want to learn, and in what order I want to learn them. WGU likely does some of these things, but being constrained to a course -model restricts the freedom of the competency-based learning environment.

Summary

I haven’t been able to find my dream competency-based platform yet. There are a lot of interesting companies, but they aren’t quite what I am looking for. However, I believe there is enough demand for a competency-based platform like this, so a few colleagues and I decided to build it. It may seem like an incredibly ambitious project (and it probably is!), but we’re starting small and validating as we go. We’ve already conducted a few rounds of validation, and we just launched our alpha product. We will be launching a public beta in the next few weeks.

Feel free to check out our progress at JavaScriptPractice.com. We’re not quite to where we need to be to count as my dream platform (e.g., we don’t have a nice domain map, we don’t have a structured prior learning assessment, etc.), but we’re getting there.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on these learning platforms or on our competency-based JavaScript platform in the comments. Or, if anyone knows of a platform I missed that comes close to my dream competency-based learning platform, let me know!