Microcredentials: A Novelty or a New Pedagogical Model

Abstract

Microcredentials are short forms of active learning where learners focus on skills &
competencies rather than time. With a growing emphasis on learners as the foremost body
within education, knowledge acquisition using microcredentials supports students in
constructing knowledge themselves. Bloom’s revised taxonomy guides meaningful learning in
higher education, promoting effective, remarkable thinking. Pathway-oriented, flexible, and
relevant, microcredentials accommodate learning in bite-sized pieces, addressing a skills gap,
meeting labor demand. The flexibility of this type supports new models of pedagogy, allowing
institutions to reach more learners, expanding, and intensifying conventional higher learning
platforms. By embracing and integrating the concept of the microcredential, stakeholders to the
microcredentials eco-system including students, educational systems, government, and
employers will each derive many benefits. With specific examples, this work describes
an understanding of the wide-ranging value microcredentials provide to stakeholders as a new,
educational option. Using case examples from the tourism sector on Cape Breton Island, and
additional examples from around the world, we identify new ways of thinking that are outside
of the box, constructing innovative pathways to knowledge acquisition.