Relational Map coming soon. Learn more about the work we’re doing with AI and view our example prototypes here.
Learning and Employment Records (LERs) are digital records of learning and experience that are linked to and may be controlled by learners and earners. LERS are proposed to include a person’s jobs and skills acquired through education, credentialing, in the workplace, and through service and life experience. The records would be verifiable and secured according to web standards, and controlled by users, who can curate and use them to pursue educational and employment opportunities as they see fit.
The drive to create an interoperable, well-governed LER ecosystem is to increase equitable access to quality education and higher paying jobs, especially for individuals who gained their skills and competencies through routes other than a four-year college degree. Giving learners and earners control over their data can empower them to use it to access opportunities; for example, to determine eligibility for benefits, to market relevant skills to apply for jobs, to choose the skills they want to share absent of data that may trigger biases. For employers, LERs can offer predictors of performance based on data and help ensure that time spent on upskilling and reskilling of employees is responsive to workforce needs.
The LERs movement is founded in the recognition that the “skillification of education and employment (progress towards recognition of more granular skills and competencies obtained through formal and informal education and work experiences, as opposed to just degrees), is already well underway.” https://lermap.t3networkhub.org/#map-start
While education and hiring tools and technologies, especially those focused on leveraging skills, are advancing rapidly, hiring practices in the United States still rely heavily on pdf resumes, references and other proxies. These result in an incomplete picture of candidates, can result in poor matches between talent and jobs, and can lock people into a particular vendor or platform. Without intentional steps to establish a more equitable and interoperable LER ecosystem, it is likely that new technologies will only perpetuate inequitable access to meaningful education and jobs.
Launched in September 2023, the LER Ecosystem Map is comprised of three modules that depict the strategies and actions that different stakeholders can take to drive progress on LER development, issuing, use, and adoption:
The LER Ecosystem Map is a product of many collaborating organizations committed to creating and scaling a LER ecosystem:
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