Why I'll be using digital Open Badges

Back "in the day" I achieved the rank of Life Scout with Troop 668. I had a great time and I learned a lot of skills. To memorialize my skills, I received merit badges as a sign of competency. All the merit badges I earned were proudly displayed on my sash —Canoeing, Camping, Cooking, Swimming, Astronomy, (Ham) Radio, etc. — these were just a few of the skills I learned and all were a part of the best times of my youth.

Badges still come in many physical shapes today... from Scouting (with its circular cloth badges), to Education (with its rectangular paper degrees), to the Military (with its numerous medals of recognition), and many other examples.

But today there are also new digital and "open" badges. They serve the same purpose: to memorialize skills learned and milestones reached. And as they are earned, they can be privately collected and (if desired) publicly displayed.

I have decided to begin awarding digital open badges to the people who interact with the services I provide. I want it to be a recognition of the efforts and the results that people have invested their time in. It will be important to acknowledge the learning, the skills, and the actions that people have achieved with me... and with the broader field.

For more information about the emerging field of digital open badges, please refer to these links (you'll need to copy and paste them into another browser window):

  • http://openbadges.org/about/
  • http://openbadges.org/press/

Are any readers using open badges yet? What do you think generally about the idea? Thanks for reading my first long-form post!

Marianne Arvidson

Enterprise Sales Leader | Quota Crusher | SaaS Startups

9y

John - Thanks for the introduction to Open Badges thru your post. I had never heard of them before. I like the concept! Seems like a great way to give recognition to people for their accomplishments!

Michael Bradbury

Am writing. ✍️ Working on a book proposal about Arctic climate change

9y

Check out Science Scouts. They've been using open badges for a few years with great success. http://badgesforscience.org. I've attempted to go down this path myself but never got very far. But I'm definitely interested in exploring this concept again.

Norlyn Dimmitt, FSA

Empowering Beloved Community (spiritually, economically, politically)

9y

OK, I did look into open badges a bit ... sounds like a great idea (has collaboration, i.e., collective wisdom, built into it). I see that the MacArthur Foundation is a supporter -- that should give the idea better traction.

Norlyn Dimmitt, FSA

Empowering Beloved Community (spiritually, economically, politically)

9y

I'll have to look into that, though with my particular variety of ADD (hyperfocus), it may be after I get www.VOP-IL.org launched. Would love to talk soon about conscripting you to the board of advisors! [Envisioning 50 state projects to empower deliberative democracy, independent of, but complementing Steven Kull's www.VOP.org and the Citizen Cabinet initiative]

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