Micro-credentials are now available at SUNY Old Westbury and are available for non-degree students. Micro-credentials are a digital form of certification that indicates competency in a specific skill or set of skills, according to the National Education Association (NEA). To earn micro-credentials, educators identify competencies they want mastered and students complete the requirements to earn them.
“Because micro-credentialing is a relatively new model of professional learning, there is very little existing contract language or policy documentation codifying implementation,” the NEA notes. A micro-credential certifies that a student has attained a specified competency or skill set, generally by completing a group of two to four related courses with a grade of B or better. Once the requirements of a micro-credential are completed, a student is issued a digital icon that can be embedded in social media or an electronic résumé.
Stony Brook University and the University of Buffalo are among the universities that are already using micro-credentials. Director of the School of Professional Studies Edward Bever, who is directing the micro-credential program, said, “We’re just starting our first set and the School of Business has two in its graduate accounting program in taxation. So they can have people come in and take two or three classes with them and get a micro-credential for that and then the person might decide to go on and get the full masters degree here or they may just come and take the couple of classes.”
The School of Business is offering a business taxation micro-credential and an estate, gift & trust taxation micro-credential on the graduate level, and on the undergraduate level the Department of Psychology is offering the micro-credential in foundational counseling skills. Bever noted that micro-credentials can broaden the “network of students we serve…and pedagogically it’s good because it kind of gives people more immediate tangible rewards…. An undergraduate degree is a very long term project, it’s a four year minimum project and so to give people rewards along the way seems to me like a good thing to do.” He added, “The ability to issue a credential to people from outside the campus is a very unusual power …and there’s a lot of potential to make use of it.”
Bever first pitched his idea to the curriculum committee and the faculty senate decided to create a task force to look into it. He served as co-chair on that committee along with other faculty members and in 2017 they produced a report which went through the curriculum committee and the senate and was adopted early this year. It’s currently in a trial period. The committee will review the courses at the end of the year. Micro-credentials issued in the meantime will remain and are listed with the Credly organization which records them. Whether SUNY OW will continue with the program is still pending review.
Students who are interested in learning more or finding out more about the micro-credential program should visit www.oldwestbury.edu/academics/micro-credentials and for currently enrolled students or for general information, email micros@oldwestbury.edu.
