Introducing our Demonstration Projects

Greetings: We are pleased to share the latest update from the Learner Information Framework (LIF) team.  We gathered in Seattle last month to reflect on progress to date and dig into the work ahead as our demonstration project partners launch their initiatives. We wanted to share some key learnings from this meeting and an update on our progress:

Demonstration Projects Panel

A highlight of the team’s time together was a panel discussion with representatives from LIF’s three demonstration projects — 

• Brent Capriotti with Western Governors University. WGU is using LIF to evolve its digital credentialing capabilities, including adopting freshly relevant data standards and advancing its achievement wallet. The wallet is a student-centered repository of learning and employment skills and experiences, both issued or self-asserted. WGU is focusing on a strategic “HigherEd-to-Employment” use case and will implement, exercise, and evaluate the value of LIF-translated data in job talent search scenarios.
• Natalia Lara with Opportunity@Work. O@W is partnering with Jobcase to use LIF to structure data from unstructured conversations between a Gen AI-powered career coach and job seekers, enabling their research team to capture insights about a job seeker’s self-reported career experience, aspirations, and barriers. 
• Greg Siemens with Southern New Hampshire University. SNHU is using LIF to connect multiple types of learner data from various source organizations, along with SNHU data, into a holistic learner profile.

Stay tuned! Future emails will go into more detail on each project.

Commonalities Across Demonstration Projects

While each project has a different approach and focus, the project leaders collectively surfaced three key commonalities:

• Learning About Learners—Each organization is looking to better understand its learners’ journeys. It was recognized that a major reason learners may drop out or discontinue their education is that, all too often, post-secondary institutions do not clearly understand their needs and circumstances. 
• Focus on Underrepresented Learners—Each project focuses heavily on underrepresented populations who often possess a wealth of experiences and prior education that are not always recognized. 
• Long Term Collaboration—Organizations see great potential for LIF to improve collaboration across providers, organizations, and institutions over time, which could improve services to learners.

Role of LIF

Although demo project leaders and teams are working to tackle different solutions in support of their learners, they acknowledged a shared challenge: it’s hard to get learner data into a usable, insightful, holistic format that would enable timely, personalized support for learners.

LIF demonstration sites are exploring how LIF’s tools and data structure can help them better understand their learners over time, and more effectively support them along their varied paths toward success.

We look forward to seeing how our demonstration partners leverage LIF to enrich understanding and improve learner support. Stay connected to hear more!