SARATOGA SPRINGS — SUNY Empire State College has been awarded an Institute of Education Sciences (IES) grant through their “Transformative Research in the Education Sciences” program. SUNY Empire and selected partners will use the federal grant, totaling nearly $3 million over three years ($2,999,998.13), to develop a recognized incremental credentialing system for U.S. postsecondary education that will improve academic and labor-market outcomes for students.
The initiative, “Credential as You Go: Transforming the Credentialing System of the U.S.,” will serve as a blueprint for colleges, universities, and higher-education systems to strategically develop and implement incremental credentials, such as short-term certificates, badges, and micro-credentials, for their students. This work builds upon a previous planning grant funded through the Lumina Foundation.
Nan Travers, Ph.D., Director of SUNY Empire’s Center for Leadership in Credentialing Learning, will lead the effort. She will be joined by a collaborative management team, including Larry Good of the Corporation for a Skilled Workforce and Holly Zanville of the George Washington University Program on Skills, Credentials & Workforce Policy, as well as representatives from the State University of New York, the University of North Carolina System, and the Colorado Department of Higher Education.
The project team will implement 90 incremental credentials at the undergraduate, graduate, and continuing-education levels at institutions within the State University of New York, University of North Carolina system, North Carolina Community College system, Colorado Community College system, and Colorado Department of Higher Education.
The team will then collect data on student access to, persistence in, and completion of postsecondary credentials, as well as produce framework for institutions interested in implementing incremental credentials, policy change recommendations to facilitate incremental credentialing systems at postsecondary institutions, and a national marketing campaign to share strategies for postsecondary credentialing.
The federal IES grant will fund 100% of the project. The grant period runs from Sept. 1, 2021, to Aug. 31, 2024.
