COMPETENCY BASED EDUCATION

AND

NAU’S PERSONALIZED LEARNING INITIATIVE

Frederick Hurst,

Senior Vice President for NAU Extended Campuses

Cori Gordon,

Lead Faculty for Liberal Arts in Personalized Learning

November 21, 2013

PERSONALIZED LEARNING INITIATIVE

Northern Arizona University’s Personalized Learning enables motivated students to earn a high quality degree more efficiently and at a lower cost by customizing coursework to fit individual learning styles and previously acquired knowledge.

PL OVERVIEW

•Self-paced, online, adaptive learning

•Mentor faculty

•Readiness assessment

•Curriculum is interdisciplinary and prescribed - there are no electives

•Every concept - multiple modalities

•Pre-, interim, post-assessments

NAU’S PERSONALIZED LEARNING

Three majors– Computer Information Technology– Small Business Administration– Liberal Arts

$2500 for 6-month subscription (all inclusive)

Students start any day of the year

General education requirements constructed in a modular fashion to produce six distinct degree paths; there are no electives

Highly structured student path from first contact to first lesson

AGGRESSIVE TIMETABLE

•First 3 programs developed and launched in less than a year

•Approved by HLC on May 21st

•Understanding to offer U.S. DoEd – Title IV in August

•Students enrolled; ~1200 prospects

•500 student goal in first year; 8,000 in five years

•Three new programs second year

PERSONALIZED LEARNING STUDENTS

Student Demographics

• Non-traditional and traditional students

• Varying levels of college experience

• Varying reasons for choosing PL

Student Experience

• Reaction to self-paced format

• Time on task in lessons

• Performance on assessments; completion of credits

Traditional Bachelor Degree

Student takes approximately 40 courses from Liberal Studies, Language, Minor, and Major – up to 120 credit units.

ENGL 254

ENGL 300w

SOC 210

HUM 450

CIS 221

CIS 270

HUMA 476

CCSU 490c

Syllabus

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MOVING FROM CREDIT TO COMPETENCY

40 Course Syllabi broken down by Learning Outcomes

ENGL 254

ENGL 300w

SOC1 210

HUM 450

CIS 221

CIS 270

HUMA 476

CCSU 490c

Syllabus

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Syllabi Deconstruction

Competencies identified

Courses are mapped to each Lesson by the learning outcomes

COLT/M

MOVING FROM CREDIT TO COMPETENCY

PERSONALIZED LEARNING DASHBOARD

TRANSCRIPT VIEW FROM DASHBOARD

COMPETENCY REPORT