Earlier this month, AACRAO hosted a CLR/LER Community of Practice engagement event - bringing together several higher education professionals to examine the growing interest in advancing Comprehensive Learner Records, Learning and Employment Records, and microcredentials as the future of academic record practices. While the transcript has long been the record of a student’s achievements (and will continue as the primary academic credential), there is a multitude of organizations asking higher education to think beyond the transcript to more comprehensively capture all learning activity and experiences and to assert them more digitally and dynamically.

Throughout this discussion, AACRAO leaders highlighted several organizations and initiatives engaged in efforts to drive CLR/LER adoption. This discussion brought to light the many external pressures that are driving this conversation and why higher education institutions need to consider how to capture and express student learning through these modern digital means.

Following are a sample of the organizations that were discussed and their respective efforts to advance the CLR/LER:

• The National Governors Association Skills-Driven State Community of Practice “...will support states in preparing their employers, education and workforce systems, data systems and policies to design and implement digital wallet and LER projects as an equitable economic mobility tool.”
• C-Ben has convened the Competency XChange, representative of a community with a shared vision for how competency-based solutions can scale in the United States and has published a 23-page agenda for Scaling Competencies as the Currency of Learning and Equitable Opportunity
• Educause is working to advance Badges and Credentialing and is expanding the related narrative that Credential Transparency Illuminates Pathways to a Better Future by “...[enabling] stakeholders in learning and job ecosystems to explore and compare credentials in order to make better decisions about the best options for learning, advancement, and meaningful careers.”
• The Brookings Institute has also entered this conversation, encouraging interoperability to help learners in the digital credential marketplace, stating “Governments and educational institutions should be moving to support interoperable versions of these digital credentials to give learners more control, which will ultimately lead to platforms and services that are more valuable for users.”
• Jobs for the Future published a report titled Building a skills based talent marketplace, positioned as a “...market scan focus[ing] on a technology solution that enables this transformed talent marketplace: digital wallets where learners and workers can store and share the artifacts of their achievements and share their skills as they pursue opportunities for advancement.”
• MIT has convened a Digital Credentials Consortium and recently published their Credentials to Employment: The Last Mile report, which “...attempts to map the space that exists between the promise of digital credentials that represent skills, competencies and abilities and their widespread adoption in employment-related use cases.”

These are just a few of the highlights from the discussion, which also showcased the increasing number of peer learning and professional development events focused on digital credentials and CLR/LER systems. Such events include The Badge Summit, hosted annually at CU Boulder, and 1EdTech’s Digital Credential Summit. AACRAO has also recently announced a new conference program to take place November 1-3, 2023. AACRAO has partnered with UPCEA to host a 2023 Conference to Examine the Emergent Field of Alternative Credentials in Higher Education. This partnership is in addition to other efforts AACRAO has pursued to advance the CLR/LER, such as founding a partnership with the Credential Futures Coalition, our engagement with the T3 Innovation Network, and our continuing work internationally with the Groningen Declaration Network.

It is clear to see that the drumbeat of digital credentialing that asserts various learner experiences is growing louder. AACRAO will continue to monitor the multitude of efforts in this space and record those within our CLR/LER landscape document as a tool for our members to advance these conversations among various campus stakeholders and to drive adoption within their institutions. AACRAO is also committed to supporting higher education in implementing CLR/LER/microcredentials and has added this as a service of our AACRAO Consulting team. We also intend to continue growing our CLR/LER Communities of Practice and Interest and to implement more peer learning and engagement opportunities as we move into the new year. If you have not already done so, we encourage you to join our CLR/LER Community and stay up to date on news and engagement opportunities.

本月早些时候，AACRAO 举办了 CLR/LER 实践社区参与活动——汇集了几位高等教育专业人士，研究人们对推进综合学习者记录、学习和就业记录以及微证书作为学术记录实践的未来日益增长的兴趣。虽然成绩单长期以来一直是学生成绩的记录（并将继续作为主要学术证书），但有许多组织要求高等教育超越成绩单，以更全面地捕捉所有学习活动和经验并对其进行断言更加数字化和动态化。

在整个讨论过程中，AACRAO 领导人强调了几个致力于推动 CLR/LER 采用的组织和倡议。这次讨论揭示了推动这场对话的许多外部压力，以及为什么高等教育机构需要考虑如何通过这些现代数字手段捕捉和表达学生的学习。

以下是所讨论的组织样本及其各自为推进 CLR/LER 所做的努力：

• 全国州长协会 技能驱动州实践社区“......将支持各州准备好他们的雇主、教育和劳动力系统、数据系统和政策，以设计和实施数字钱包和 LER 项目，作为一种公平的经济流动工具。”
• C-Ben 召集了 Competency XChange，代表对基于能力的解决方案如何在美国扩展具有共同愿景的社区，并发布了一份 23 页的议程， 将扩展能力作为学习和公平机会的货币
• Educause 正在努力推进 徽章和认证，并正在扩展相关叙述，即 证书透明度通过“......[使]学习和工作生态系统中的利益相关者能够探索和比较证书，以便做出更好的决定学习、进步和有意义的职业的最佳选择。”
• 布鲁金斯学会也参与了这场对话， 鼓励互操作性以帮助数字证书市场中的学习者，并指出“政府和教育机构应该转向支持这些数字证书的可互操作版本，以给予学习者更多的控制权，这最终将导致平台和对用户更有价值的服务。”
• Jobs for the Future 发布了一份题为“ 构建基于技能的人才市场”的报告，定位为“......市场扫描重点关注能够实现这一转型人才市场的技术解决方案：学习者和工人可以存储和共享的数字钱包他们成就的人工制品，并在他们寻求晋升机会时分享他们的技能。”
• 麻省理工学院召集了一个数字证书联盟，最近发布了他们 的就业证书：最后一英里报告，该报告“......试图描绘代表技能，能力和能力的数字证书承诺与它们在行业中的广泛采用之间存在的空间。与就业相关的用例。”

这些只是讨论中的一些亮点，还展示了越来越多的专注于数字证书和 CLR/LER 系统的同行学习和专业发展活动。此类活动包括 每年在 CU Boulder 举办的 The Badge Summit和 1EdTech 的 Digital Credential Summit。AACRAO 最近还宣布了一项将于 2023 年 11 月 1 日至 3 日举行的新会议计划。AACRAO 与 UPCEA 合作举办了 2023 年会议，以检验高等教育中新兴的替代证书领域。这种伙伴关系是 AACRAO 为推进 CLR/LER 所做的其他努力的补充，例如与 凭证期货联盟建立伙伴关系，我们与 **T3 创新网络，以及我们在国际上与格罗宁根宣言网络**的持续合作 。

可以清楚地看到，断言各种学习者体验的数字认证的鼓声越来越响亮。AACRAO 将继续监控这一领域的众多努力，并将这些努力记录在我们的 CLR/LER 景观文件中，作为我们的成员在各个校园利益相关者之间推进这些对话并推动其机构采用的工具。AACRAO 还致力于支持高等教育实施 CLR/LER/微证书，并将其添加为 我们的 AACRAO 咨询团队的一项服务。我们还打算继续发展我们的 CLR/LER 实践和兴趣社区，并在我们进入新的一年时实施更多的同行学习和参与机会。如果您还没有这样做，我们鼓励您加入我们的 CLR/LER 社区，了解最新消息和参与机会。