The Rebundling of Learning

Over a year ago, Nate McClennen and Tom Vander Ark wrote an article for the online newsletter Getting Smart titled “The Great Education Unbundling and How Learning Will be Rebundled.”

In the article, McClennen and Vander Ark write,

“More schools, more courses, more online learning experiences – for 25 years there has been steady expansion of the number of in and out of school learning options. The pandemic accelerated the great unbundling of learning – at least for those with access, agency, and advocates.”

“Facing increasing choice, increasing demand by parents, and increasing quality options, schools that reframe learning to credential, credit, and count programs and experiences outside of the traditional program will thrive. While unbundling will expand, how learning is rebundled will emerge as the next innovation – accessible, personalized, accountable and massive.”

According to the two authors, the three big trends laying the groundwork for unbundling are “school choice, alternative higher education, and the emergence of big tech.”

Specific to K-12 unbundling,

“…critical services like transportation and food are often unbundled – supported by outside service providers. Local education agencies (LEA, school districts and charter management organizations) often out-source professional learning and some encourage teachers to guide and certify their learning with microcredentials. But for most students the learning experience is tightly bundled and controlled by state and district course requirements, prescribed standards, required accountability tests, and adopted curricula. Budgets are another big disincentive for unbundling – LEA typically don’t want to pay other providers for something they do or could do.”

“However, while layers of requirements, policies and traditions exist, LEA have wide latitude in granting credit for valuable experiences and demonstrated knowledge and skills. And, while school choice has expanded slowly, we’ve also seen a gradual expansion of course choice and, more recently, experience choice.”

McClennen and Vander Ark point to a myriad of examples of unbundling courses, or part of the “what” of learning. Among these course choices are online secondary school, part-time school, dual-enrollment, internships and apprenticeships, and partial credit options.

“Unbundling also has emerged via the school choice movement, with many states authorizing the ‘backpacking’ of education funds for students. The format varies and can include direct funds to parents (such as Idaho’s Strong Families, Strong Students legislation which distributes up to $1500 per student for educational choice). Other formats are found in vouchers, education savings accounts, and tax credits.”

The other part of the “what” of learning are learning experiences. McClennen and Vander Ark admit that few of these experiences come with any type of school-recognized credit, nevertheless experiences like Khan Academy, Stanford’s Curious Cardinals, Prepr, Synthesis, and Concord Consortium all offer deep learning opportunities focused on out-of-school.

If we are to rebundle learning, the two authors ask excellent questions for our consideration. Among these questions are:

“How to capture and communicate new capabilities?”

“What learning counts?”

“Who controls choices?”

“How do you make learning portable?”

“Who rebundles learning into coherent pathways?”

McClennen and Vander Ark end by suggesting seven policy changes that would enable a coherent rebundling of learning moving forward:

“State policy should eliminate seat time requirements in lieu of master demonstration.”

“States should reimburse LEA for progress rather than seat time (or a combination of attendance and performance).”

“States should provide weighted funding to provide extra time and support for learners that bring more risk factors to school.”

“States could authorize new LEA to provide part time priority learning experiences with performance reimbursement and credit reciprocity.”

“LEA should unbundle courses into competencies and provide several options for partial or full master demonstrations including work based learning experiences.”

“Learners and LEA should have access to personalized and localized guidance systems that expose possible futures and surface relevant learning experiences.”

“Open technology resources should track competencies including full and partial credits in a sharable learner record.”

All of this makes sense to me, but I’m not an elected state legislator or governor.

I don’t know of one state that is working on stuff like this right now. Most are preoccupied with legislating critical race theory, vaccine policies, and school libraries.

It seems like we are stuck in the mud, spinning our tires.

Til tomorrow. SVB