Fwd: Re: EOCred: Credentials and competences

[This was Stuart's reply to the message I sent to the wrong list]


Phil, thanks for pushing forward.

So, in essence, the question is how to handle referencing competencies 
from the credential and what's on the other end of rangeIncludes.

As for the property referencing a competency, I hope we do NOT use the 
existing educationalLevel / AlignmentObject for the reasons already 
discussed on this list. There is a broad consensus out there that 
defines competencies as assertions of knowledge, skills, and 
abilities--what someone should know, already knows and/or is able to do. 
While the pending schema.org/skills <http://schema.org/skills> property 
could have it's definition tweaked as you suggest, Phil, as noted above, 
skills are just one kind of competency. So perhaps the tweaking of the 
label 'skills' would make the use more inclusive of what the term means 
across the talent pipeline--from syllabus learning outcomes, through 
credentialing requirements to job postings and HR functions.

Competencies have been the focus of both ad hoc and de facto standards 
efforts--i.e., a lot of experts have looked at the description problem 
and there is a lot of accord across them.  The LRMI Task Group started 
out looking at developing a schema.org <http://schema.org> proposal for 
competencies and decided that the then emergent DefinedTerm proposal 
(see Category Code in pending and discussion to change name 
<https://github.com/schemaorg/schemaorg/issues/1775>) would basically 
work for this purpose. While the DefinedTerm proposal isn't ideal, it's 
a sound base that will likely have broad use. Perhaps, if useful, it 
could be subtyped later to provide the few properties that might 
optimize it for competencies.

On Wed, Mar 7, 2018 at 7:22 AM, Phil Barker <phil.barker@pjjk.co.uk 
<mailto:phil.barker@pjjk.co.uk>> wrote:

    Hello again.

    We have several use cases relating to the competences that an
    educational / occupational credential requires. Does adapting the
    skills <http://pending.schema.org/skills> ('skills required to
    fulfill this role.') from the JobPosting fulfil our need?


    The use case / requirements we have are

      * Individuals should be able to search for and find credentials
        that best address competencies they wish to attain.
      * Individuals should be able to search and find credentials that
        best match competencies that the individual posses and wishes to
        be recognized
      * Employers should able to search for and find credentials that
        address the competencies required of an employee.
      * [having identified a credential] It should be possible to
        identify the competencies required in order to obtain a credential.

    Also, knowing the competences required to earn a credential would
    help someone find relevant learning resources / opportunities, i.e.
    those which had similar competencies as learning outcomes.


    Currently, there is no means in schema.org <http://schema.org> to
    describe competencies. There is a lot of work going on in different
    forums around the description of forums, and some of us have ideas
    for how the proposed Defined Term type might be extended to describe
    competences.

    We have several choices to make.

    Firstly do we use the educationalAlignment / AlignmentObject for
    this, or do we create a new property for  'required Competence'.

    For reasons discussed when we were dealling with educationalLevel, I
    would prefer not to use the Alignment Object. We may want to discuss
    the similarity between the new property and skills
    <http://pending.schema.org/skills> ('skills required to fulfill this
    role.') from the JobPosting

    Secondly, do we try to propose properties for Competency and
    CompetencyFramework types here or do we leave this for others to do
    and settle for text descriptions or URL links?

    Given that Defined Term is not yet in schema, and given the work
    going on elsewhere, I am inclined to leave defining Competency and
    CompetencyFramework types to later, and to settle for text
    descriptions or links.


    My inclination would be to modify the existing schema.org/skills
    <http://schema.org/skills> property by tweaking the definition.
       skills: the skills and competences required.
    and add EducationalOccupationalCredential to its expected domain.

    We could also raise an issue about the desirability of a more formal
    means of representing competencies.

    What do you think?

    Phil

    -- 

    Phil Barker <http://people.pjjk.net/phil>. http://people.pjjk.net/phil
    PJJK Limited <https://www.pjjk.co.uk>: technology to enhance
    learning; information systems for education.
    CETIS LLP: a cooperative consultancy for innovation in education
    technology.

    PJJK Limited is registered in Scotland as a private limited company,
    number SC569282.
    CETIS is a co-operative limited liability partnership, registered in
    England number OC399090




-- 
Stuart A. Sutton, Metadata Consultant
Associate Professor Emeritus, University of Washington
    Information School
Email: stuartasutton@gmail.com <mailto:stuartasutton@gmail.com>
Skype: sasutton