2025 Badge Summit

My 25+ year career in L&D—20 years of which were at a membership association—has allowed me to work from the crossroads of three major ecosystems: learning, credentialing, and human resources. As a senior strategist and learning architect, I have spent the past 3+ years bridging these three ecosystems for all types of institutions, including the DoD, associations, employers, and non-profits. My work is rooted in designing dynamic competency models and learner-centric credentialing solutions that facilitate skill portability across the talent pipeline (not just per credential). I see how associations and employers are the biggest players in the credentialing space because that’s where all learning is eventually applied and evaluated/assessed.
 
Having been a part of the badging community for the past couple of years, I understand the transformation taking place. The challenge is, a lot of what I’ve learned is focused on the ‘what’ and the ‘why.’ I need the ‘how.’ How do I help my clients who already have robust skill standards, bodies of knowledge, credentials, and digital badges make the transition, especially when it comes to technology considerations?
 
I’d love for this to be a working session to outline such a roadmap. (This work can eventually align with what Credential Engine and T3 already offer.) As an instructional designer by trade, I can support the development of such a product.

The workforce of the future will rely on talent that is quantifiable and verifiable for everyone, not just a select few. Discover how LERs drive equity by empowering individuals to own, showcase, and leverage their skills and experiences. This session explores TalentPass as a case study, highlighting its role in supporting underrepresented learners and workers. Engage in dynamic activities to identify equity barriers and design solutions that foster inclusion in education and the workforce.

Several limitations apply to digital credential wallets installed on digital personal devices limiting their usefulness. Access to credentials stored in them requires wallets are open and connected to the web. Credentials stored in them cannot be viewed by a third-party from the credential wallet. They must be sent to an end point via protocols specific to LER VCs.
We will discuss the design constraints associated with cloud-based storage for personal credential wallets. We’ll describe a range of potential uses for Wallet Attached Storage (WAS). And we’ll demonstrate an application built to provide WAS to the DCC Learner Credential Wallet.

So much of what is driving recognition is being driven by the "supply side" - i.e., the learning institutions, vendors, etc.  The solutions are focused on what they think the industry and learners want.   But do they know what they want, indeed does industry want rich data or do they just want to know someone can do they job?   How do they trust the badge?  The reality is we need standards to measure against, and we need external verification; otherwise, the industry will fall back on quals and where you got them and will be in the same place as we are now just with digital badges instead of certificates...