Cub Scout Badges as Digital Badges

I'm looking at implementing Digital Badges for Scouting Canada badges. The interesting part is many of the features for distributing and hosting the digital badges related infrastructure and features are available with Mozilla Open Badges and Scoutstracker. Using these existing platforms and approaches is a good idea, so I reached out to Dakemi Communications the maker of scoutstracker. The contact was successful and, to make a long story short, I need to write a few user stories regarding the use of digital badges within scouting.

Note: It is important to recognize that Mozilla open badges provide features where digital badges can be verified as reputable. The issuer and earner of the badge can be verified toward the issuing of the badge and the assessment of the skills and knowledge implied by the badge can be confirmed. In other words, the skills and knowledge identified by the badge have been recognized in the recipient. And digital badges can't just be copied from one person to another.

Actors:

• Scout - this can be a person who has earned badges in any of Cub Scouts (8 - 10), Scouts (11 - 14), and/or Venturer Scouts (14 - 17). These badges collectively show the beginnings of mastery in many areas, and are well assessed for completion. 
• Leader - this is a person (or group of persons) who has evaluated and awarded a badge.
• Observer - this is a person interested in looking at a Scouts badge accomplishments. This could be a potential employer, a college or university, a volunteer organization, a friend or associate, a parent, or anyone interested in looking at a scouts badge accomplishments. 

User Stories:

• As a Scout I want to display my scouting accomplishments (badges) in my social media like facebook, tumblr, linkedin, Etc...
• As a Scout I would like to display all the badges I have earned since beavers, and be able to organize the badges into themes across all my scouting years.
• As a Scout I want to organize my scout badges as clusters to show the themes of my scout accomplishments alongside with my other similar (non-scouting) accomplishments.
• As a Scout I want to review the digital badges of someone I admire or someone further along the scouting path than myself. I want to identify the accomplishments of another, so I can follow a similar learning journey.
• As a Leader I want to see the scouts have recognition for their accomplishments (both online and off).
• As a Leader I want to assign badge completion and also award through information technology and the internet.
• As a Leader I want to support the scout in promoting their accomplishments while not wearing their scout uniform.
• As a Leader I want to display my Scouting accomplishments in Facebook and LinkedIn.
• As an Observer (employer) I want to review a persons accomplishments to assess their character and work ethic.
• As an Observer (parent) I want to encourage my child to have a healthy and strong online persona.
• As an Observer (University recruiter / admissions) I want to get a view into a persons background and accomplishments outside of their academic accomplishments.
• As an Observer (associate / new friend) I want to view a persons background.
• As an Observer (friend) I want to have fun with other friends in sharing our personal accomplishments.

Managed Endorsements

I'm approaching my 10th anniversary on LinkedIn and I have found it a magnificent record of my professional life. The fact that it is published to the web is a positive side benefit. Surprisingly (or maybe not), I use it as my system of record for my professional life. When I enter into situation that may require a resume, the first thing I do is I make sure my LinkedIn profile is up to date. And I make updates to my resume reconciled against my LinkedIn profile. It is the easiest and best organized place to keep my professional profile information.

So when a past associate from Mozilla pointed to the year old blog post about "empty endorsements" I started reflecting about how I disagree with this. Don't get me wrong, I have the utmost respect of the work done by Erin and Alex. And the world is a whole lot better place because they are in it. As we move further into our digital, connected, and social media lives... the idea of online or digital endorsement becomes increasingly important. And staying connected with people is our connected knowledge (*we store our knowledge in our friends*); and really over a life well lived we don't know when things will come full circle. So staying connected to people in multiple ways, and acknowledging (or endorsing) a persons skills or knowledge you are familiar is the right thing to do. I do know I recently endorsed Erin for her leadership skills. I didn't do this lightly, I was mindful when I did it. I spoke with Erin a number of times during my time with Mozilla and I observed how she led a group, she is a good leader. So when I was prompted by LinkedIn (an option she has chosen to use) on a skill she has included with her profile, I thought about it and made the endorsement. From my experience, I will always consider Erin a good leader. If Erin (or anyone) truly believes LinkedIn endorsements are empty, I will politely suggest they turn off the ability to be endorsed.

From my perspective my LinkedIn endorsements are not empty, either given or received. They could be if I wasn't mindful when I gave an endorsement, or didn't consider which endorsements I displayed. (I regularly prune / update my online profiles). I believe in social media and paying it forward. I believe our personal reputations are an accumulation of all our contributions, recommendations, endorsements, badges, interactions, etc... across all the locations we participate and contribute online (and more importantly, offline).

Three badge system design domains

The ultimate autodidact.

I've been on this badge system design journey for a while. I've been engaged with the Open Badges movement for over a year, with daily thoughts and efforts in moving this initiative forward. My commitment Open Access Accreditation (Open Badges) started five years ago during a discussion about Open Educational Resources. Recently my efforts have been in building the School of Badges on the P2Pu, with particular focus on Badge System Design. I am basing all of this design work on the things I learned while working with the open badges team and the success of a similar workshop with Scope the end of last year. When I started to build the P2Pu course it became apparent that we needed a badge system design "tool" or approach to base the course around. I came up with the idea of creating a rubric as a guide to building badge systems. The idea met with a good amount of success and a small group iterated around its development over a couple of months. The previous link shows our results. One aspect of the rubric that I have struggled with is how it was being influenced by traditional methods of curriculum development and accreditation, or that the rubric was trying to work for many different badging contexts. It seemed we were trying to build a single rubric for all badge system design domains. Too me it felt strained...

This morning during discussion within the P2Pu Badge System Design course I came to the realization that there are three domains for badge system design. These three domains are;

1. Badge System Design for traditional curriculum
   This is really a mapping of existing curriculum to badges with the addition of co-curricular activities. There is a lot of room for innovation here, in the end all badges are associated with traditional education and related activities. The traditional could also include badges within scouting organizations or other legacy based institutions that have been issuing merit badges for a period of time before digital and open badges.
2. Badge System Design for informal learning
   This is learning outside of the traditional curriculum. In particular, self-directed learners, autodidacts, heutagogues, and small groups engaged in informal learning. This is where people have the opportunity to develop their own badge systems.
3. Badge System Design for events and community
   This is everything else where you would want to issue badges; participation in conferences, recognition for involvement with communities, accomplishments of merit, fun activities where tasks or activities have been achieved or participated in, this list could be anything that could be dreamed up where a badge could be issued.

The hacker scouts have brought together the tradition of scouting, with the freedom of the hacker community, the resources of adafruit, the venue and innovation of the maker movement, with open badges. This image is the hacker scouts badge system design.

Quick issuing and organization of Badges

Working through some of the comments within the Quick Issuing course within the P2Pu School of Badges. One discussion item prompted me to answer a bunch of questions that I believe are really important. These are the questions and related answers;

Are all my badges tiered?
No not all my badges or tiered. I do believe some of my arrangements are a star or a network. I do think badge organization should follow the organization of the knowledge domain. I do think it would be more of a network of related subjects, skills, events... that as they are earned would form clusters or groupings. I organized as a tiered approach for I was wanting to relate the categorization like the color scheme of the martial arts belt system.

I do believe the work Mozilla has been doing around badge system design is excellent and I believe they are wanting to stay away from the tiered or hierarchical approach. But I do think many humans organize in hierarchies...

Mozilla Webmaker is also becoming the exemplary badge system design. Kudo's for creating a great example!

Do I create a table for all my badges, or just tiered badges?
No, I don't create a table for all my badge systems. I do believe it is important to provide some way to organize, display and describe the badge system. A table is one way... and due to my using wikiversity for the mobile app dev course, the table seemed like the best way to go.

Do I have a giant table for all badges in one course?
I don't see creating one giant table to describe all the badges. There does need to be some way of describing the badge system as a whole. I believe it would help people understand the learning pathways within the badge system if there was a "curriculum" or "learning journey" map. I do see that Mozilla Webmaker is doing great work here as an example. See Erin Knights post; http://erinknight.com/post/29830945702/webmaker-badges
I also see the badge system and approach created by the Khan academy is also an interesting example of displaying a whole badge system.

Badge endorsement is important

During the sixth task of the Badge System Design course the participant is asked to compare and contrast three adjacent cells from within the rubric. I have chosen the three rightmost adjacent cells from the Endorsement criteria row.

the three rightmost cells from the endorsement criteria of the badge system design rubric.

Endorsement: The badge system is recognized by other organizations, communities, individuals and/or systems. It fits or is aligned with previous badge and credentialing systems of similar subject areas.

I will break my compare and contrast into three sections;

1. how I understand each cell
• within the introductory cell endorsement is not applicable as this performance level is about having a simple badge or badge system being issued. Having endorsements for the badge or system is not required. If a badge or badge system begins to receive endorsements it would move into the working performance level.
• the working cell needs a couple of endorsements, and these can come from anywhere. It is that people, groups, communities or institutions have put in the effort to endorse a badge that adds the value and puts the badge or badge system into the working performance level.
• the notable cell needs endorsements from multiple sources, it is preferable these endorsements come from different subject areas and different contexts. The people, groups, communities or organizations need to resolve back to proven entities of reputation. How the reputation is provided will vary, it needs to exist.
2. how each cell compares to the other
   It makes sense the introductory cell does not require endorsement. The idea is to quickly create a badge or badge system and endorsement would add effort and require a third party to provide the endorsement, this would slow down release of the badge. A working system needs endorsement from a few parties, the effort of a few parties providing endorsement is adequate to move an introductory system into being a working system.The notable system is like the working system in that it has endorsements from multiple sources. These endorsements will come from across industries and subject areas.
3. and where do the cells contrast and what is the value in their differences
   The three different cells contrast in that the introductory cell requires no endorsement, the working cell has endorsements, and the notable cell has endorsements from multiple sources from within different industries and / or subject areas.

Improvement:
I believe these three performance cells for the endorsement criteria work well together and they build toward more comprehensive endorsement. I would suggest adding that some of the sources of endorsement for the notable performance level come from organizations, communities or individuals of proven reputation. How reputation is proven becomes another issue for discussion.

The minimum for a badge system

If I was to list through all the criteria of an introductory badge from the Badge System Design Rubric I would end up with the following list of attributes. And honestly I believe this is the minimum a badge or badge system requires to be considered a starter or basic badge system.

• Badge is awarded for accomplishing a simple task, attending an event, or participating in a community.
• Badge has simple design, with little brand or curriculum affiliation. Mono-color badge with simple graphical themes. No integration with other internal or external badge systems. Services the basic graphical needs of a png or svg file.
• A single badge system, where the badge is well designed from a graphical perspective. It is easily identified in how it can be earned on its own, and within other learning, achievement or recognition journeys.
• The criteria to earn the badge is well articulated and easily understood. Criteria attribute within the badge meta-data resolves to internet location (URL).
• Badges are issued from a 3rd party public and open badge issuing platform. Little integration with the course, community of practice, or participants sites are present. All associated URL's resolve back to working and open URL's where no login is required.
• Each badge fits well within its own badge system and related curriculum. Standards applied are local to the organization, community, group or an individuals badge system.
• Assertions resolve back to valid URL's.
• The evidence of an earned badge represents the learning, achievement or recognition criteria of the badge.
• All skills and knowledge for building the badge system reside within one to three people.

Strength: I believe the main strength of the introductory performance level for badge system design is in its simplicity. The basic levels of performance to introduce a new badge system are well articulated and easily understood.

Opportunity: The description what is a learning, achievement or recognition journey is vague. Providing some concrete examples of these three badge worthy journeys needs more explanation.

Does a badge stand on it's own?

This post sets out to describe what I believe are the strengths and weaknesses of one row from within the Badge System Design Rubric found within the P2Pu challenge of the same name. The row I have chosen to evaluate is dedicated to a badge systems criteria.

What is badge criteria: Each badge stands on its own, or is it a part of a larger learning, achievement or recognition journey. The objective is well represented in the badge or collective badge system criteria. The criteria provides flexibility so a badge can be reused in different learning, achievement or recognition contexts. The badge criteria accommodates for its potential expiration.

I believe an individual badge or badge system should be able to stand on its own. This is so it can be used across contexts. This strengthens the design of the badge and sets the badge or badge system for greater reuse. The criteria of the badge system needs to be well articulated and easily understood so people quickly know what they are working toward. I believe the badge criteria should be written in such a way that it is timeless or recognizes its expiration. If a badge does expire it should still accommodate for its assertion (validation).

Introductory badge criteria: The criteria to earn the badge is well articulated and easily understood. Criteria attribute within badge meta-data resolves to URL.

These are simple criteria to meet, and as an introductory badge gets someone to completing the design quickly. What is the outcome for earning the badge, well written and easy to understand, with a working URL. What else do you need to get started?

Working badge criteria: The criteria to earn the badge is comprehensive in that it describes different learning, achievement or recognition approaches, associated tasks and outcomes. The criteria has one or more examples or completions for reference.

The working criteria looks to be complete and has accommodated for different approaches to achievement, assessment or learning. The working criteria doesn't restrain the approaches used to create evidence toward earning the badge. Examples of how the badge was earned are easily found and understood.

Notable badge criteria: The criteria allows the badge to stand on its own, fit within the system it has been developed, and can be used within other badge systems. Criteria seems timeless in that it is constructed and worded in such a way that it does not expire. 

I like that the badge can also be used in other learning contexts and within other badge systems. One of the benefits of badges is to also reduce the duplication of accreditation for the same subjects. The design and wording of the badge should be timeless, I believe this would cause the badge to be more transferable and work well in other badge systems. This does not mean that a badge cannot expire, it just means criteria should be designed and written without an expiry type vocabulary.

Exemplary badge criteria: The criteria fits well within multiple learning, achievement or recognition contexts and applies well across communities, events, curriculum and cultures. The learning context may change and the criteria still applies. The criteria is developed and written in such a way that it is timeless; earning the badge more than once through time makes sense. The badge criteria does not expire.

If a badge or badge system could be used across contexts (in particular, across cultural contexts) and meet or exceed the previous three performance levels it should be considered exemplary.  The badge criteria should not expire. Unless, it makes sense for a badge to expire; or have a renewal cycle where skills, knowledge, learnings, and/or attendance needs to occur through time.

Strength: I believe the main strength of this criteria is in describing a badge or badge system that stands on its own. I believe it is important that any badge can be used across contexts and become a part of another badge system.

Opportunity: I believe there is an opportunity to improve the description (with working examples) of how a badge or badge system can be used across contexts. I also believe that there are times where a badge should not be used across contexts and it would dilute the badge to design it so it could be used across contexts.

Badge System Design as a P2Pu course

Over the next eight weeks I will be facilitating the Badge System Design challenge hosted on P2Pu as a course. This eight task challenge encourages you;

1. to explore existing badge systems 
2. do a deep study into a rubric that guides badge systems design 
3. review and provide feedback to your peers also studying badge system design
4. design and create your own badge system 

During the eight weeks (starting June 1st) I will be facilitating this P2Pu Challenge as a course where I will engage each participant to complete the challenge. Upon completion of the course you will be awarded the 301 - Badge System Design badge. I look forward to deepening all our understanding of badge system design.

The course badge awarded upon completion.

Designing a badge to span contexts

Designing badges so they can span contexts is good for badges. The idea being that a badge designed for one context could fit well within another context. This context spanning should work for learning specific skills, informal learnings, accomplishments or attendance within a conference, helping out in the community, or being recognized for something of importance. There are many ways badges can be awarded and designed to be used across contexts. This is well understood through a couple of scenarios;

1. Soldering badges
There is a growing number of organizations and events that support the hacker ethos. Hacking has also been a hobby of many for generations. The idea of figuring something out and making it better, or combining it with something else, or starting from scratch and creating your own goodness is what hacking is about. Some of these organizations include; hacker scouts, maker faires, hardware hobbiests, and adafruit. They all focus on hacking, making and inventing. Mostly hacking occurs within technical environments, but things are changing where you can pretty much hack anything to better serve your needs. All four of these organizations see the ability of soldering as a skill required to be a successful hacker. And each of them offer ways to develop and recognize the skills of soldering. Hacker scouts provide lab type environment to develop soldering skills, maker faire will have workshops or table setup where a person can prove their soldering skills, home hobbiests could create a short video displaying their soldering skills, and the adafruit organization has learning reasources and toolkist to learn soldering. All these organization and approaches could issue the same badge in this capacity.

The same badge design, criteria, validation, and endorsements could be used across these different contexts to award the same soldering badge.


2. Lighting badges
   
   
   Many different disciplines include lighting as a part of their learning curriculum. These disciplines include;
   • Landscape architecture where lighting is important for safety and showcasing the landscape at night.
   • Theater lighting where lighting is important to the stage for the particular theater performance.
   • Band lighting where the performance band needs lighting across many different sized and shaped venues.
   • Residential lighting where lighting is designed specifically for the residence.
   • Industrial lighting where lighting is designed for the specific industrial of large public space.
   
   The importance here is that different contexts have the need for different (yet similar) badges. Each needs a lighting badge and each criteria would be different due to the environments they are wanting to light. Each badge should be designed for each specific environment, while each badge could be reused into another curriculum. As an example, an independent learner may want to learn all they can about the lighting of space, regardless of context or environment. They could earn badges from all five disciplines and create their own lighting specialty curriculum.
   
   Different badges of the same descriptions, developed for different contexts could be used within a new unique and specialized learning program.

What does this mean to badge design? What design approaches should be considered so a badge could be used across contexts?

There are five main attributes within the badge metadata that describe the badge and how it relates to other things and where its criteria is described. It is within these attributes that the badge can be designed to span different contexts and environments.

• image - the badge image should remain issuer agnostic. There should be no branding information within the image of the badge and the badge should use universally recognized imagery that aligns with the meaning of the badge. The above soldering badge could serve as an example.
• criteria - the wording within the badge criteria should describe the learning, achievement, or recognition using a neutral language. Within the badge criteria refrain making reference to the issuer, context or environment. Consider the badge having the abilities being issued by another organization or within a different context.
• tags - use tags to decribe the badge across contexts. 
• alignment - if the badge aligns with a standard other similar badge with a well articulated and similar criteria add AlignmentObjects. Keep in mind that official standards are sometimes difficult to find in areas of innovation. If other similar badges exist, add them here, and also link to thier official describtions or critiria URL.
• endorsement - when endorsement comes available within the OBI. Seek endorsements for your badge. 

Add to the rationale for a School of Badges

So we have created three of eight courses toward a School of Badges. If you can add anything further or have questions. It would be most appreciated...

Rationale
What are the rationale behind creating the school of badges?

1. Comprehensiveness - provide people a complete set of courses to explore all the aspects of open and digital badges (from getting started through technical implementation). The set of courses should be run and hosted from within a shared platform that facilitates peer based learning.
2. Learning Pathways - offer a set of courses that provide steps along a learning journey allowing the learner to build an understanding of badges best suited to their needs. The learning pathway should be flexible in that they can develop their own scenarios when deepening thier understanding of open and digital badges.
3. Collaboration (peer based learning) - utilize a platform that encourages peer based learning and allows people to engage at a frequency and depth best suited for their personal needs. Discussion and collaboration should be a foundational feature of the learning environment.
4. Promotion - align the school of badges with P2Pu for mutual benefit. Add content, learners and traffic to P2Pu while following the P2Pu approach in building a school. The build-out of the courses within the School of Badges is a volunteer effort; and P2Pu benefits from these added courses (content) and provides a platform for their promotion. The school also aligns with P2Pu increasing use of open badges to recognize accomplishments.
5. Other - what else can you think of?

Badge System Design for Communities

During the P2Pu community call it was suggested I tie the badge system design rubric more closely to communities (within which the badge has currency). Consider how the badge system represents skills, practices, participation, and habits of an existing community? How much does the community identify with the badge?

I believe this is a good suggestion and an excellent couple of questions. I took it on to deeply review the rubric and make adjustment to increase alignment with community based learning. Fortunately the adjustments required were small as the rubric had already considered community. The adjustments I did make made the rubric a better guide for individuals, communities, groups and institutions.

The vocabulary that ties the rubric to community;
I see it as very important that the rubric works well at guiding different individuals, groups, communities and organizations. I harvested some of the vocabulary associated with community and am grateful for this additional focus and increasing the rubrics ability to guide badge system design for communities.

• attending an event, or participating in a community
• encourage outstanding participation in community or event
• people who have earned the full collection of badges are considered masters by their peers
• earning one or many badges from within the system is considered an accomplishment by peers and community members
• multiple learning, achievement or recognition contexts and applies well across communities, events, curriculum and cultures
• it describes different learning, achievement or recognition approaches, associated tasks and outcomes
• for accrediting a subject, community or event domain
• endorsements from cross-industry / cross-subject organizations, communities and/or individuals
• team requires strong community building, pedagogical, and/or curriculum development skills

The badge within the community;
I believe the two questions can be answered together; how does the community identify with the badge? and does the badge represent the skills, practices, participation and habits of the community?

These are questions best answered by the community itself. And the rubric is well aligned to help groups and communities ask and answer these questions. The rubrics purpose is the guide and prompt thinking about the badge system being designed. It is not used (though it can be) to evaluate existing badge systems.

Badge System Compare and Contrast

One of my current tasks is in developing the Badge System Design challenge for the P2Pu School of Badges. This course is based around a rubric developed for badge system design. In task three of the challenge it is requested the learner reviews, compares and contrasts a number of existing badge systems, this post answers this following request from the challenge.

1. Write a blog post or task discussion item describing what you found when exploring the different badge systems listed above. Compare and contrast the different badge systems. If you write a blog post be sure to provide the link to the post in the task discussion thread.


• foursquare - provides a very engaging flat badge system. A great example of earning badges for simple accomplishments. In general, foursquare badges are about visiting locations. Some badges are fun accomplishments, like visiting a location of global significance. The simple graphical appeal of the badges bring a cohesiveness to the badges. The foursquare badges are not focused on accomplishing learning goals, this is not to say people would learn if they visited a museum or hardware store a number of times.
• khan academy - provides a very comprehensive and integrated badge system. The badges are issued stealthfully when the learner completes an activity or lesson. Different scores are given for different badges, and badges are awarded for completing a number of related tasks. Khan Academy has effectively used objects in the universe (meteors, moon, earth, etc.) as the badge design theme. Badges are also grouped into programs and badges are issued for completing courses. The learning journeys associated with badge systems is not easily apparent.
• mozilla webmaker - provides a great set of badges well aligned with their digital literacy initiative. Badges are earned stealthfully and by completing accomplishments. Their badge system is well articulated and earning pathways are easily identified. The badge design is attractive and encourages engagement and the desire to learn.
• wikipedia - has been issuing badges (or barnstars), and should be considered one of the first online organizations to offer digital badges. Barnstars are awarded based on contribution and peer review / nomination. Most of the barnstars are stand alone and are not a part of a learning journey. Barnstars represent single accomplishments.
• carnegie mellon robotics - provides comprehensive learning journey toward computer science use within robotics. The program includes badges awarded along the way with completed tasks. The strength with this project is the good use of learning pathways, which are easily understood.
  
  
• compare and contrast - I believe the creation and use of learning pathways will become recognized as an important design principle when creating badge systems. These pathways can be created using traditional curriculum pathways, used during events and conferences, and by self-directed learners who are creating their own pathways. For the self-directed learner the idea of pathways aligns with personal curriculum mapping. I digress.
  
  Of the five badge systems above, two provide well visualized and easily understood learning pathways (mozilla webmaker & carnegie mellon robotics), one provides for ongoing learning (khan academy), and the other two are flat and provide recognition of accomplishment (foursquare & wikipedia).I believe all are successful with implementing the purpose of their badge system. I do believe the khan academy could do more with visualizing pathways for their learners for it is not immediately apparent what would be accomplished by pursuing which badges. The differences between the badge systems that support pathways and those focused on individual accomplishment show how both can be valuable in their own way, fun for the earner, have good visual appeal, and fit within the many different aspects of badge earning.

Badge System Design: Task 7

This is how I have approached completing task 7 of the P2Pu Badge System Design Course. I am using the Open and Networked PhD candidate challenge as the learning journey worthy of a small collection on badges. Task 7 of the P2Pu challenge requires completion of the following five activities;

1. Reflect upon a learning journey worthy of a few badges and envision a badge system to provide recognition for key learnings.
   
   The learning journey is creating and bringing together all the materials required to become an Open and Networked PhD candidate. The badge system will have seven micro badges, one for each task in the challenge. Once the learner has completed all tasks they will be awarded the OnPhD Candidacy badge.
   
   
2. Choose a performance level from the rubric and design the system to meet this level. Be sure to provide supporting discussion of how each performance criteria is being met.
   
   The badge system is meant to be a working badge system as described in the badge system design rubric.The criteria in the rubric are met as follows;
   
   • Purpose: the completion of the OnPhD candidacy challenge is a significant accomplishment with effort required to completed each of the seven tasks within the challenge. A person who earns all micro-badges and the OnPhD Candidacy Badge should consider themselves an OnPhD Candidate, equivalent to a traditional PhD Candidacy.
   • Graphical design: in this badge system uses a simplistic mono-color with a theme of images and good use of a banner. It doesn't provide any branding within the micro-badges and the banner names map directly to task names.
   • Organization: is a flat single level hierarchy consisting of seven micro-badges and one badge. The learning journey is easily understood and well organized. The badge system is only just been implemented but has been well received by the community.
   • Criteria: is succinctly described and allows for flexibility in different learning approaches. Each completed task adds to the overall objective. The earning of each micro-badge naturally leads to the next. Overall the badge system is easily understood.
   • Technical Integration: Badge(s) are easily available through the use of credly for awarding. This 3rd party badge issuing system allows for both criteria and evidence to be hosted at other locations. Badges can be moved to the Mozilla open backpack.
   • System Integration: The OnPhD Candidate badge system integrates well with existing and similar PhD candidacy requirements. The OnPhD Candidacy also integrates with well with heutagogical and autodidactical  approaches.
   • Assertion: the badge hosting organization (credly) is well established and will provide a hosting environment for the foreseeable future. 
   • Endorsement: The affiliations (endorsement) of the OnPhD with both Wikiversity and P2Pu bring added reputation. Once a number of candidates have successfully completed the OnPhD Candidacy challenge further endorsements will be sought.
   • Validity: is yet to be determined as no one has successfully completed all the tasks within the badge system. Validity will be determined once a small sample of candidates have completed the challenge.
   • Development Team: had one main developer with another providing subject matter expertise (SME). The curriculum development had input from three other SME which vetted the curriculum design.
   
   
3. Using pen and paper, drawing tool or some other way of image creation and draw the badge system. Diagram and describe the important graphical elements of each badge. Discuss the themes, and common elements of the badges. Publish the diagram and related discussion.
   
   
   
   
   
4. Provide a table describing and mapping criteria to each badge.
   
   The mapping of criteria to badges is well described in the "OnPhD Candidacy Badge System" blog post; http://criticaltechnology.blogspot.ca/2013/04/the-onphd-candidacy-badge-system.html
   
   
5. Publish all this work in a way available to the internet.
   
   A number of blog posts accompany this post in providing background and related information to completing this task.
   • http://criticaltechnology.blogspot.ca/2013/04/the-onphd-candidacy-badge-system.html
   • http://criticaltechnology.blogspot.ca/2013/04/leveling-of-onphd-badges.html
   • http://criticaltechnology.blogspot.ca/2013/04/badge-system-design-working.html

Badge System Design: Working

The Working badge system design is meant to be a complete badge system. It implements everything of the introductory badge system with the addition of a thorough set of dimensions and integration with other learning and credentialing systems. A working badge system is a complete badge system.

a simple working badge system design

The rubric has a number of criteria provided in the left column of the following table. The right column of the table provides the attributes what could be considered a working badge system. I have also added an italicized comment describing what I believe is success when designing a working level badge system. Keep in mind there are also Exemplary, Notable and Introductory performance levels within the rubric.

Criteria	Working
Purpose: What is the purpose of the badge being awarded. is it for a simple task, does it come with recognition (peer or otherwise), or does it represent an equivalent certification.	badge is awarded for completing a significant accomplishment, demonstrating a skill or participating in a community. Success: badge system collectively represents a significant accomplishment requiring effort and display of newly acquired skills and/or knowledge. Could also be awarded with a facilitation or community role where contribution is recognized by peers or community organizers.
Graphical Design: How the individual badges look and are related to one another. Is brand well represented.	Badge design is attractive and comprehensively establishes a brand and curriculum awareness. Earners are attracted to completing the criteria and earning the badge or collection of badges. Success: People are attracted to completing tasks, attending events or participating within a community so they can earn the badge. The badges within the badge system have a common look and graphical appeal attriactive to the earner community. People are wanting to display the badges on their personal profiles.
Organization: How the badge system looks as a whole and is understood as a system. Are levels (if applicable) clearly defined. Is the learning journey and awarding of badges easily understood. Does the badge system hold value within the community it serves?	The badge stands alone or is part of a very small (two to twelve) badge system. badge system is a single level badge hierarchy / network or has a simple parent-child relationship for earning the collection of badges. How the collection of badges relate to one another is easily understood. People are attracted to earning these badges. Success: Badge system is simple and mostly implemented as a flat system or with one level of hierarchy or degree of separation. The journey represented by the badge system is quickly understood.
Criteria: Does each badge stand on its own, or is it a part of a larger learning journey, is this well represented in the badges criteria. Does criteria provide flexibility so a badge can be reused in different learning contexts. Does the badge criteria accommodate for its potential expiration.	Criteria to earn the badge is comprehensive in that it describes different learning approaches associated tasks and outcomes. The criteria has one or more examples or completions for reference. Success: The collective of all the criteria meet the learning or participation objectives of the whole badge system. Each badges criteria can be met in multiples ways. There are available examples (evidence) of what successfully earning the badge looks like.
Technical Integration: How badge system integrates with the hosted learning system.	Badges are issued from either a 3rd party issuing platform or the course, community of practice, or individual is hosting their own OBI platform. Badge meta-data, including criteria and evidence, is hosted to allow flexibility in referring URLs. The ability to verify / assert badge validity has been implemented. Success: Badges are easily issued with the ability to refer to a variety of internet locations and data types for criteria and evidence. Linking to badges for display and organization comes with little effort. Issued badges can be easily moved to the Mozilla open backpack. Badges can be verified after issue.
System Integration: How the badge system integrates with related and similar curriculum and badges systems. Are applicable standards being applied.	Badge system shows consideration to other related communities of practice, curriculum and standards. These related badge systems are easily recognized and referenced. Success: Badges integrate well within their own badge system and also recognize other similar badge systems, curriculum, events, communities, etc. Badge system could begin to share among themselves or badges could be applied to non-badge tasks with little rework. An integration task could be done with little conceptual effort.
Assertion: Does the badge system resolve back to an existing and reputable organization and hosting environment.	Badge assertion refer back to an environment that will continue in perpetuity or until badge expires. Personal accomplishments can be recognized through time. Success: Badges will be hosted until all issued badges have expired. The issuing organization should give attention to its reputation within the community it serves.
Endorsement: Is the badge system recognized by other organizations, communities, individuals and/or systems. Does it fit with previous badging and credentialing systems.	Endorsed by one to five organizations, communities or individuals of unconfirmed reputation. Success: The badge system should have endorsement beyond the institution, community or small group that is issuing the badge(s). This further endorsement should come from a recognized group or organization. Loose affiliations will work as long as recognized by both parties.
Validity: how is the badge determined to be valid. What is considered valid.	Sample of earners of the badge repeatably demonstrate learning required to earn the badge as described in badge criteria. Success: Earners of the badge(s) can demonstrate skills, knowledge and familiarity aquired while participating in the earning of the badge(s). This will work equally well for learning based badges, community based badges, and conference attendance type badges
Development Team: broadness of experience held within the badge system development team.	All skills and knowledge for building the badge system reside within two to seven people. Some team members will possess multiple skills and knowledge. Team requires strong pedagogical and curriculum development skills to evaluate comprehensiveness of badge system, criteria and assessment methods. Success: Focus on having the badge system "curriculum" well designed and reflected in all the criteria attributes of the badges. The team should be able to design and deploy badges and related criteria to meet the desired learning, participation or event outcomes. Team should be more than one so you can discuss and be critical of design.

Badge System Design: Introductory

I'm building a rubric to assist people understand badge system design. There are many things to consider when building badge systems and having guidance, ways to assess the system design progress, or prompt your thinking toward badge system design is good. This rubric is also a foundational resource in the P2Pu course on Badge System Design. This post sets out to describe the thinking behind the introductory performance level within the rubric.

Well designed badge

The Introductory badge system design is meant as just the basics of a badge system. The badge system implements just what is needed to provide a basic / introductory badge or small system of badges. The level of knowledge to create an introductory badge system is a minimum.

The rubric has a number of criteria provided in the left column of the following table. The right column of the table provides the attributes what could be considered an introductory badge system. I have also added an italicized comment describing what i believe is success when designing an introductory level badge system. Keep in mind there are also Exemplary, Notable and Working performance levels within the rubric.

Criteria	Introductory
Purpose: What is the purpose of the badge being awarded. is it for a simple task, does it come with recognition (peer or otherwise), or does it represent an equivalent certification.	badge is awarded for accomplishing a simple task or set of tasks each awarded for a badge within the simple badge system. Success: keep it simple, awarding badge(s) for a task or small set of tasks. Could also be awarded for participation in a conference or maker faire.
Graphical Design: How the individual badges look and are related to one another. Is brand well represented.	Badge has simple design, with little brand or curriculum affiliation. Monocolor badge with simple graphical themes. No integration with other internal or external badge systems. Services the basic graphical needs of a png or svg file. Success: Not too much design effort exerted. Has a simple visual appeal with basic brand and curriculum affiliation.
Organization: How the badge system looks as a whole and is understood as a system. Are levels (if applicable) clearly defined. Is the learning journey and awarding of badges easily understood. Does the badge system hold value within the community it serves?	A single badge system, where the badges are well designed from a graphical perspective and how they can be earned on their own and within another learning journey. Success: Badges are easily understood and the learning journey is clearly articulated in both text and as an image. The badge holds value within the community it is awarded. Value is built through the quality of evidence associated with each awarded badge, the reputation of the community in which the badge is awarded, and the frequency of badges being awarded.
Criteria: Does each badge stand on its own, or is it a part of a larger learning journey, is this well represented in the badges criteria. Does criteria provide flexibility so a badge can be reused in different learning contexts. Does the badge criteria accommodate for its potential expiration.	Criteria to earn the badge is well articulated and easily understood. Criteria attribute within badge meta-data resolves to URL. Success: Each badge has a simple to understand criteria with a well described set of tasks or accomplishments to earn the badge.
Technical Integration: How badge system integrates with the hosted learning system.	Badges are issued from one of the 3rd party public and open badge issuing platforms. Little, to no, integration with the course, community of practice, earner or issuer site(s) are present. Associated URL's resolve back to working and open URL's (no login required). Success: A working badge system has been implemented within one of the 3rd party issuing systems. All criteria and evidence attributes resolve back to working URL's.
System Integration: How the badge system integrates with related and similar curriculum and badges systems. Are applicable standards being applied.	Badge fits well within its own badge system and related curriculum. Standards applied are local to the organization, community of practice, group or an individuals badge system. Success: Badges are well integrated within its badge system and related curriculum, tasks or accomplishments. If standards exist within the issuing organization, community of practice, group or individuals practices; these standards are honoured.
Assertion: Does the badge system resolve back to an existing and reputable organization and hosting environment.	Learner assertions resolve back to valid URL's. Success: assertions resolve back to working URL's, no 404 errors. Hosting environment will remain until all issued badges have expired.
Endorsement: Is the badge system recognized by other organizations, communities, individuals and/or systems. Does it fit with previous badging and credentialing systems.	NA Success: An introductory badge system design does not implement any form of endorsement. Not that endorsement isn't important, its just  that endorsement would move a badge system into a higher performance level.
Validity: how is the badge determined to be valid. What is considered valid.	The evidence of an earned badge represents the learning criteria of the badge. Success: All issued badges have evidence attributes that fulfills the badge criteria.
Development Team: broadness of experience held within the badge system development team.	All skills and knowledge for building the badge system reside within one to three people. Some team members will possess multiple skills and knowledge. Non-team members are available as subject matter experts. Success: There is one or more people who collectively have all the skills and knowledge to create an introductory badge system.

The OnPhD Candidacy Badge System

If you want to earn the OnPhD Candidacy Badge you need to be awarded the following seven micro-badges. Each of these micro-badges are awarded for completing a task within the OnPhD candidacy challenge. All of these badges, with the exception of the Candidate badge, are hosted at the credly site and can be issued by anyone who has already earned the badge. Provided below is a copy of the badge image and the title, description and link to the related tasks from the P2Pu site.

	1. Describe your learning history - This is a cumulative description of all the works (formal and informal) you have completed to be considered toward your candidacy for an ONPhD. https://p2pu.org/en/groups/onphd-candidacy/content/describe-your-academic-history/
	2. Identify your domain of study - View and Discuss The described domain of study should be both broad and focused. This is to allow others to get a sense of both the knowledge domain and your focus. https://p2pu.org/en/groups/onphd-candidacy/content/identify-your-domain-of-study/
	3. Detail your contribution - What of considerable significance are you going to contribute to your chosen subject domain of knowledge? https://p2pu.org/en/groups/onphd-candidacy/content/detail-your-contribution/
	4. Methodology - Completion of a PhD requires a significant reseach project or major contribution to your chosen knowledge domain. https://p2pu.org/en/groups/onphd-candidacy/content/research-methods/
	5. Skills and Knowledge Development - Completion of a PhD level of knowing also requires the development of other related skills and knowledge. https://p2pu.org/en/groups/onphd-candidacy/content/skills-and-knowledge-development/
	6. Engage the community - How are you going to engage the learning community and your learning network. https://p2pu.org/en/groups/onphd-candidacy/content/engage-the-community/
	7. Seek supervision and endorsements - Identify the people in your learning network who are going to assist on your learning journey and help you get to finished. https://p2pu.org/en/groups/onphd-candidacy/content/seek-endorsements/

Context works within the badge system design rubric

I continue to solicit feedback for the badge system design rubric I have created for the P2Pu course under the same name. Last week I had a great (and too short) talk with the P2Pu team during their regular community call. One important idea that came from the discussion was how the rubric applies to different learning (and badging) situations? I.e. does it apply to individuals, communities and institutions equally? Short answer; Yes. After a review, and few changes the rubric could apply equally well to different groups or learning contexts.

• Individual - people or small groups, friendships, self-directed learners, autodidacts, heutagogues.
  Design Impact: Design the system for themselves with reference to existing badges systems or themes within subject domain. Individual or small group has to be responsible for all aspects of badge system.
• Community - community organizations, festivals, conferences, communities of practice, distributed groups.
  Design Impact: Consideration of how badge systems differ for a community of practice or conference. Badges awarded for informal tasks, participation or alternative approaches to learning. System may be considered more celebratory in nature or branding for event or community.
• Institution - traditional educational institutions, large businesses, international organizations.
  Design Impact: Alignment and or extension of existing and traditional (or product based) curriculum. Organizational brand needs to be considered in design. Look for opportunities for badging co-curricular activities or informal learning related to institution / organization,

I believe adding these three contexts as different views into the rubric will make it stronger and more comprehensive.

Flipped assessment implemented

The 301 - Badge System Design course being built for the P2Pu School of Badges will also include flipped assessment. The basic idea of flipped assessment is to have people early on in a shared learning journey assess those who are a few lessons ahead. The thinking behind this is the people most invested in giving and receiving collaborative assessment and peer review are those currently active in a learning journey.


Within the P2Pu Badge System Design course the flipped assessment occurs twice. Once during task 3 where early learners review a badge system design created by someone almost finished the P2Pu course. And again as a peer assessment of another learners compare and contrast task.

The collaboration is supported by both early and later learners having to reach out to each other to complete the challenge. The fun part is how the early learners have to find an open badges quick issuing site to award badges to the later learners for completing the tasks they are reviwing. and without these in-course awards the learner will not achieve overall completion of the P2Pu challenge.

A badge system design rubric

With the amazing assistance and feedback from others I have created a badge system design rubric. The purpose of this rubric is to guide people toward creating a good badge system. The rubric is not meant to evaluate existing badge systems, but to prompt thinking about what is a good badge system design. The goal is for people to create effective and well thought-out badge systems.

A pdf file of the badge system design rubric is available with this link.

The rubric has four levels of performance and nine criteria. The levels of performance are as follows;

1. Introductory - this is meant as just the basics of a badge system. the badge system implements just what is needed to provide a basic / introductory badge system. The level of knowledge to create an introductory badge system is a minimum.
2. Working - this is meant to be a working badge system. It implements everything of the introductory with the addition of a more thorough set of dimensions and integration with other learning and credentialing systems. A working badge system is a complete badge system.
3. Notable - this is meant to be a badge system of note, it should be referred to as a good working system with additional features that should be considered when developing badge systems. It implements everything of the working system with the addition of being recognized (and utilized) by other learning and credentialing systems within the same subject domain.
4. Exemplary - the exemplary badge system is a badge system that most others aspire to be. The exemplary badge system becomes the defacto standard for accrediting a subject domain.

for greater understanding of each level of performance for the badge systems, read each level as a column. Given the depth of detail for the criteria I will be dedicating a blog post to each criteria explaining my thinking, references and rationale. Remember, the badge system design rubric is to guide the development of a badge system not evaluate existing badge systems.

Leveling of OnPhD badges

I have developed the OnPhD candidacy challenge on P2Pu. The purpose of this challenge is to guide people through the tasks of declaring their candidacy as an Open and Networked PhD.  A part of my work towards an OnPhD is to research alternative methods of assessment and accreditation for the self-directed life-long learner... I have the belief that digital and open badges will provide very well for the accreditation part. Therefore, I keep a concious eye toward the open badges movement and have been helping out in building the school of badges on P2Pu. I've taken on the creation of a couple of courses within this school, I am also doing some review of Leah MacVie's outstanding work within the school. One of the courses she has developed is 102 Quick Issuing, and I am working through the course to debug and give feedback. One of the tasks within the 102 Quick Issuing challenge is to describe a badge system you would be issuing badges. The badge system I am developing is to support the OnPhD. This badge system would recognize the accomplishments as a person meets or exceeds the milestones found within a traditional PhD while also allowing a person to be self-directed in defining their own OnPhD.

I have a deep appreciation of the colour themes within martial arts belt system to denote levels of accomplishment. I will use these within the development of the badge system for my OnPhD. Essentially, I will use the respective colours as part of the badge as I progress toward mastery in my chosen subject domain. Completing the OnPhD Candidacy challenge awards the earner a yellow candidate badge, and other tasks or accomplishments within this level would also be awarded a badge with a yellow colour. As the progression toward mastery progresses, so would the colour of the badge, closely matching the belt colours within the martial arts. Given the self-directed (or heutagogical) nature of the OnPhD much of the badge system design should be responsibility of the OnPhD candidate, allowing them to set their own learning directions(s). This would deepen learning and is strongly supported by current research around heutagogy.