Dive Brief:
- A new report argues that federal student aid is ill-suited for competency-based education because the aid is designed to fund education within structured time periods.
- Competency-based education, or CBE, is based on demonstrated learning rather than hours or semesters, and it lacks designated start and end dates. “Satisfactory academic progress,” a requirement for federal aid access, is also difficult to establish with CBE.
- “Thoughtful experimentation” with federal student aid and CBE is needed, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation-sponsored report concludes.
Dive Insight:
The report was written by Stephen R. Porter, an education professor at North Carolina State University. Porter notes that Congress provided an alternative for CBE students to receive federal aid in the Higher Education Act in 2005. But the CBE competencies still have to be translated back to credit hours for students to access federal aid. Porter says that a variety of institutions should be allowed to conduct well-controlled experiments on different approaches to measuring and paying for learning, rather than time, for CBE student aid. Results of those experiments could help Congress in the reauthorization of the Higher Education Act.
