The world is changing. Individuals will now need to own and control their educational credentials, important documents that include transcripts, certificates, and other essential papers related to universities, and schools are now in need to be organized by individuals.
This idea was very well received from the American Council of Education which mentioned it in a study funded by The United States Department of education that sees with good eyes the use of blockchain in education.
“Blockchain, in particular, holds promise to create more efficient, durable connections between education and work,” wrote Ted Mitchell, the president of ACE, in the foreword to the study published on June 8, adding: “In the wake of the COVID-19 crisis, learners will be more mobile, moving in and out of formal education as their job, health, and family situations change.”
Still, some obstacles are messing our path, most of them technical. What if you lose the private key that allows you to prove control over the credentials” In the worst case, it can be re-requested, but then you are still bound to the issuer.
Cross-border interoperability and cross-chain cooperation in conveying digital credentials between different national DLT systems have also turned into a problem. The OECD Blockchain Policy Expert Group is working on policy recommendations in this area.
Still, technology is not the most important congestion and he made it clear: “It is the socio-technical integration of rules-based, autonomously operating DLT systems in complex social environments.” Alex Grech, a managing partner of Strategyworks, showed empathy for the statement adding that the more intimidating obstacles might be far from a non-technological nature.
We have a lot to learn yet, there are tons of documented history we can use as a source to upgrade our knowledge about it. “Small states like Malta and the Bahamas have been using Blockcerts to notarise education credentials since 2017,” said Grech. According to the ACE report, three major themes exist where DLT can be applied to create an advanced social equity environment: “personal data agency, a long term learning, and the incredible feature of connecting different ecosystems to co-exist.
The notable need for connected ecosystems led to experts to reference the aforementioned feature called blockcerts, which is, in fact, an open standard for verifying blockchain-based certificates. Somehow, the main problem is that departments related to human resources, recruitment, and hiring management will need to put trust in this system.
Can Blockchain Change the Labor Market?
On the one hand, blockchain may affect not only the traditional education sector but also the labor market. On the other hand, it is also not hard to figure how credentials of all kind and nature could impact on the labor market and colleges in general. The mission is to go beyond the boundaries of a simple diploma; we need to go further than achieving a certificate. Individuals who did not finish their degree do not have anything to show for it, a person keeps learning his or her entire life; traditional education is just a little step that represents that.
By: Jenson Nuñez
