This article is part of the collection: Real Life Learning: An Up Close Look at Competency-Based Education. In Thomas County, Georgia, students who have struggled in the mainstream have found a home ...

The “competency learning" movement is gaining serious momentum: See the list of schools and districts that are adopting competency learning. But, based on the research literature in the psychology of ...

What would the testing experience be like if schools allowed students to show what they know whenever they’re ready, in a variety of ways that suit them, and in ways that are instructionally useful?

This post is by Lexi Barrett, senior director of national education policy at JFF. The top job skills employers are seeking by 2020 mirror the competencies for deeper learning, such as problem solving ...

The rigors of an interconnected, global society have changed the way in which schools need to approach student success. In previous generations, the “organize and sort” method, typified by an A-F ...

The Hechinger Report covers one topic: education. Sign up for our newsletters to have stories delivered to your inbox. Consider becoming a member to support our nonprofit journalism. A ...

Capella University and Southern New Hampshire University were the first to successfully take the plunge with direct assessment, an aggressive form of competency-based education that is untethered from ...

At the Parker-Varney school in Manchester, grades are not part of the curriculum. “Mastery” is. Students work their way through individual concepts, like long division or the mathematical order of ...

Curriculum Prioritization, Most Essential Learning Competencies (MELCs), COVID-19, Curriculum Coherence, Teacher Agency Share and Cite: Malihan, J.C. (2026) Relearning What Matters: The MELCs as a ...