In today’s Pope Center piece, Jenna Robinson writes about the growing movement in the UNC system to use the College Learning Assessment to measure how much (or how little) students gain in the human-capital aspects the CLA assesses.
These are steps in the right direction. Before long, however, it will be possible for individual students to take the CLA, which is a pretty good indicator of reasoning and communication ability. (If I remember correctly, StraighterLine is going to offer it for a mere $149.) Before long, I suspect that good students will start assembling portfolios about themselves consisting of solid evidence of accomplishments such as a strong CLA score and independently certified scores from exams they’ve taken following online courses, and employers will treat those portfolios as better indicators of talent than the old BA.