Dive Brief:
- Advocates of credentialed learning, with badges and “nanodegrees” awarded to students who demonstrate specific skills, are having a tough time gaining acceptance of their views from those who control the resume filtering process at large companies.
- Hiring managers spend an average of six seconds sizing up a resume, and it’s not clear if human resources “robot” resume sorters are noticing the alternative credentials of prospective employees, the Chronicle of Higher Education reports.
- Alternative credentials may work best for job candidates in a small pool of candidates — in part because faking a claimed skill on a resume is a lot easier, and easier to doubt, than a badge from an institution.
Dive Insight:
Skill badges are making their biggest inroads in IT, and it makes sense that employers seeking job candidates with technical skills would be more interested in credentials than those looking to hire people with sales or communications skills. Udacity’s nanodegree programs gaining support from Google and AT&T will also help advance the cause. When skill badges are more widely excepted by employers, programs that offer the credentials can offer more assurance to students that their tuition is money well spent.