Let’s call this the Innovation Diffusion Curve Edition…

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“Our Relationship With Tests Is Unraveling. Why Is Everyone So Conflicted About It?” by Eric Hoover, in The Chronicle of Higher Education

“Sarveshwar, president of UC’s Student Association, had learned a lot about testing. She knew that high-school grades are the best predictor of success in college (as measured by first-year grades), and that test scores can add some predictive value beyond that.

“But she agreed with Jesse Rothstein, a professor of public policy and economics at Berkeley, who told the Board of Regents that though it’s important to admit well-prepared students, ‘if we want UC’s students to reflect California’s diversity, we have to recognize that predictive performance can’t be the lodestar of our process for selecting them.’

“Sarveshwar believed that UC must weigh the statistical benefits of testing requirements against their ‘social costs.’ That’s the term Saul Geiser, another researcher at Berkeley, used in a recent study of UC applicants. He found that the correlation between students’ socioeconomic background and SAT scores is about three times greater than the correlation between their socioeconomic background and high-school grade-point averages.”

Why does this matter to the future of learning?

As Jon Boeckenstedt, Vice Provost for Enrollment at Oregon State University and college admissions gadfly, has often pointed out, the SAT adds a mere 1-2% of predictive power to grades and GPA. When he weighs that marginal improvement in prediction against the massive costs—financial, emotional, cognitive, among many others—standardized tests simply are not worth it.

Add to that the “social costs” incurred by low SES students, and it’s hard to make an ethical case for their use.

That said, any change to decades of college admissions process will require more than just this year’s early adopters of “test free” policies. To “cross the chasm,” those who constitute the early market will require additional proof—likely several more years.

But once that proof satisfies them, we may see a significant shift away from standardized tests.

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“The Mastery vs. Seat-Time Debate Takes Center Stage Under Remote Learning,” by Mark Lieberman, in Education Week

“A broader shift in education toward competency-based learning may be a long way off, though. Even schools that implemented competency-based practices years ago still struggle to get teachers to support and adopt them. Teachers have been so beleaguered during COVID-19 that they may resist additional pushes for change. The pushback can also come from parents, who feel skeptical about a school model that's different from the one they experienced as a child, or that departs too much from their notions of how school should work.”

Why does this matter to the future of learning?

This feels like it less about “competency-based learning” and more about plain old “change.”

Innovators and early adopters engage with new approaches (like competency-based learning) in ways that are fundamentally different than the ways in which early market and late market thinkers do. Expecting everyone to get on board, at the same time, ignores this reality.

Creating change is almost never like flipping a switch.

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“What Does the Blockchain Mean for University Partnerships?” interview with Ray Schroeder, on the Enrollment Growth University podcast (transcript)

“Putting everything online has challenged smaller colleges especially, but even universities have struggled. It’s obvious now that sharing courses makes sense. An instructor at one institution can deliver a certain course while a professor at another institution delivers another course, and you allow dual enrollment across those institutions.

“To that model, Blockchain brings the ability to credential on one platform and universally for students. […] Even better, when you put a course into your virtual transcript on the blockchain, it’s not just the course that goes on there. That solves a longstanding problem with transcripts. Historically, the document just showed a course name and number. The reader didn’t know what the student learned.

“On the blockchain, though, you can include example projects, sample codes, class rank, class size, and information about what was in the textbook. This approach gives hiring managers much, much more information, and graduates can better represent themselves to a potential employer.”

Why does this matter to the future of learning?

Good news: For schools that struggle because they try to be too many things to too many people, credentialing on the blockchain offers a way to concentrate on your core competency and to partner with other schools to expand access to offerings. (Organizations like Global Online Academy and One Schoolhouse already offer such access without using blockchain.)

Bad news: We are probably several years from seeing this. First innovators and early adopters need to create some sparks. After what will likely be several years, then we can expect the early market to jump in.

The question is: which side of that chasm do you want to be on?

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