Open Badges: Opportunities and Challenges Julie Adams, Staffordshire University Jisc RSC HE conference, 27 March 2014

Badges… Visual representations of: Skills Learning Competencies Qualities Achievements Interests Image from: / /

But does owning a badge prove you have the skills it represents? Some of my badges… All now available on e-bay! People like badges…

Digital badges: “ an online representation of a skill you’ve earned ” Open Badges take the idea further: – skills are verified through a credible organisation.

Open Badges Led by Mozilla Organisation Open, online standard for verifying skills, learning, interests and achievements Recognise formal or informal learning

Collect badges from multiple sources into a single backpack Share through social networks Images with Metadata hard-coded into them Mozilla Webmaker badges:

From:

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Ultimately, a badge is just one credential, one assertion of what we know. But, added together from different contexts across society, they tell a story about us that’s backed by a lot of people, and says, “this is what I can do.” Mozilla Blog, 12 February the-web/

Opportunities Stand out from peers Picture of whole person Show what someone can do Motivate

Opportunities Challenges Too many?Trivial?Consistency? Credible with employers? Stand out from peers Picture of whole person Show what someone can do Motivate

Some uses Recognise course units and /or course completion MOOCs Volunteering, sport, art, drama etc. Extra-curricular activities Technical, lab-based, group work, presenting, debating, research skills Skills developed across a programme Expertise in software packages Skills not recognised within assessment Workshops, conferences, courses, activities Staff CPD

Growth of Open Badges As of December 2013, there were: 235,100 badges issued 1,915 issuers 52,395 Backpacks Growth of over 1400% in 2013

Recent developments Endorsement of badges Badge Alliance: –independent of Mozilla –brings together organisations and individuals (leaders, designers, technologists, researchers) to work together to take the badge ecosystem forward.

What we are doing at Staffs InfoZone: Library and IT induction Add on to Digital Skills workshops for students Attendance at TeachMeets Working with Students’ Union Investigating support for Staffordshire Graduate Attributes

How? Plug-ins for existing systems e.g. WordPress, Moodle, Blackboard Badges in Moodle: Mozilla BadgeKit: Some others: Badges for all: Credly: Cloudworks:

How we do it… Create images in liaison with University Marketing Create and award badge via WordPress sent to participants They click link to go to Mozilla site Add the badge to backpack (or create a new one)

Sample backpack showing badges from a range of issuers ozfest/pictures/backpack.png

Getting Started Planning essential! Be clear on what you want to achieve Define clear criteria/definition of achievement in order to earn a badge Decide on look and feel for your badges to ensure consistent branding Try a small scale pilot to confirm processes

Some tools to help Jisc Open Badge Design toolkit oolkit-print_1.pdf oolkit-print_1.pdf Indiana University Design Principles documentation DigitalMe Badge Design Canvas

Some useful links Earn a badge: More about Open Badges: Open Badges blog: Badge the UK: JISC RSCs: Scotland: Northern: