19 Achieving your future
We are all in a lifelong learning loop. As we iterate around the while loop of life, we continually gain more experience, develop new skills and knowledge. As you loop your own personal loop, you will also collect evidence of your personal and professional achievements. Some of these achievements can be certified or “badged” in various ways. This evidence can be collected as part of your professional identity and reputation, that’s the jar called ME
shown in figure 19.1.
Evidence is a key part of the “Context, Action, Result and Evidence” (C.A.R.E.
) stories described in section 8.6.8. So what evidence can you collect and how you can certify or badge these achievements, sometimes known as micro-credentials (Horton 2020; Ward et al. 2023) or digital credentials (Camilleri, Muramatsu, and Schmidt 2022)? 📛
Your future is bright, your future needs achieving, so let’s start achieving your future.
19.1 What you will learn
After reading this chapter you will be able to:
- Describe some the evidence and micro-credentials you can collect and badge to show your achievements:
- during University
- after University and throughout your professional career
- Identify any gaps in your personal and professional achievements
- Plan activities and set goals for future achievements that will help you to continue grow professionally and personally
19.2 Academic badges
One kind of badge you get when you finish University is your degree certificate like the one shown in figure 19.2. A degree certificate is an important offline physical (paper) badge that marks a milestone in your career. If you like gaming, its a huge achievement unlocked
that will take you to the next level. Your certificate also tells people that you were a member of a particular University community and that you mastered your chosen discipline to some level, Bachelors, Masters or PhD.
Degree certificates are an important badge, but they don’t give very many details of your professional and personal story while at University. You could give more details by providing:
- your overall degree classification: first, second, third etc
- your individual module grades, for example in an academic transcript or by listing them on your CV, see section 8.6.3
- your projects, see section 8.6.5
- your portfolio of work, if you have one
This data give a bit more detail that a degree certificate does not but it is limited to purely academic achievements. You are much more than your grades, because there’s a lot about your character that is difficult or impossible to measure, see figure 19.3.
Employers will often want to see more detailed evidence of your character and your softer skills than those provided by degree certificates and grades. While academic achievements paint some broad brushstrokes of your professional identity shown in figure 19.4, they don’t help employers see the finer details or much of the evidence.
19.3 Open Digital badges
Digital badges provide a solution to this problem, just like your degree certificate is a verified badge of your achievements, a digital badge does the same but in a digital way. Rather than being physical, a digital badge is virtual and transferable. It’s just a *.png
graphic file which has been digitally signed and contains metadata. This means it can be displayed on your CV, on social media such as LinkedIn or “stacked” into a digital portfolio collection as shown in figure 19.5.
The Mozilla Foundation have defined an open standard for digital badges (Enabler 2019) so that badges can be issued, hosted and certified by different organisations. (Belshaw 2019)
A digital badge has certified data locked inside (shown in figure 19.6) which details the achievement it has been awarded for including:
-
recipient
that’s you! -
issuer
the organisation awarding the badge, e.g. Poppleton University -
badge name
e.g. PASS leader badge (see figure 19.7) -
badge image
e.g. a digital logo -
evidence URL
a link to evidence
All this information is coded so that only the recipient and issuer can manipulate it, for example by associating an email address with it.
Anyone such as your University or employer can issue badges, so for example, the University of Manchester issues badges for leaders of its Peer Assisted Study Scheme (PASS) www.peersupport.manchester.ac.uk. An example of a PASS leader badge is shown in figure 19.7.
Badges can be used for a wide range of different kinds of achievements shown in figure 19.8.
- Membership being a member of an organisation or group
- Participation participating in communities
- Capability demonstrating capability with some skill
- Mastery mastering a set of skills
19.4 Commercial digital badges
There are other digital badges for evidencing your achievements besides the open ones described above. Like open badges, they also provide certifiable evidence of professional and personal achievements, see figure 19.9:
- Certificates from service providers and organisations like Amazon Web Services, Microsoft and Google, see figure 19.9 and e.g. redhat.com/en/services/certifications etc
- Certificates from Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) like edX and Coursera:
19.4.1 Microsoft Fundamentals Digital Badges
The Department of Computer Science are working with the Flexible Learning Programme to pilot the introduction of Microsoft Fundamentals Certifications for University of Manchester students. (George and Pettifer 2022) This means you can get Microsoft certified on Azure, AI, Data, Security, CRM, ERP & 365 this summer.
These certifications will enhance your CV and LinkedIn profile (see chapter 8) with signed digital badges, like the ones shown in figures 19.9 and 19.10. Gaining these certifications typically involves about ~20 hours of online study and normally costs $99 each, but we are offering them free to University of Manchester students as part of a pilot project. Get hired, stay ahead, be productive, and receive the recognition you deserve with Microsoft Certified: Fundamentals. These highly marketable, industry-respected certifications offer foundational training and exams that provide a practical, high-level overview of Microsoft technology and validate your existing knowledge. The University is currently offering eight different certifications for you to choose from:
- Microsoft Azure Cloud Fundamentals: AZ-900
- Microsoft Azure AI Fundamentals: AI-900
- Microsoft Azure Data Fundamentals: DP-900
- Microsoft Security, Compliance and Identity Fundamentals: SC-900
- Microsoft Power Platform Fundamentals: PL-900
- Microsoft 365 Fundamentals: MS-900
- Microsoft Dynamics 365 Fundamentals Customer Relationship Management (CRM): MB-910
- Microsoft Dynamics 365 Fundamentals Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP): MB-920
In addition to the free learning materials you can access via learn.microsoft.com, (Nadella 2024) the University have bought access to an extra learning package to support you. This includes video training, quizzes and practice tests you can take up to 100 times. If you choose any of these certifications, we will give you access to these extra resources, see details below.
Interested? To gain these certifications you need to be able to:
- Commit to ~20 hours of online study time per certification between now and July 2024
- Attend one in person 50 minute exam per certification in Manchester in July 2024
- Let me know which certifications29 you are interested in taking over the summer by filling in this form by 5pm on Friday 3rd May:
Any other questions or comments, let me know via the comment section of the form above. If you’re not a student at the University of Manchester, its worth considering taking these training courses, or something simlar such as those described in section 19.4. They’ll all help your CV stand out.
19.4.2 Microsoft FAQ
We’ve had lots of interest in the Microsoft Fundamentals
-
Can I retake the exams? Yes, scroll down to
Microsoft Fundamentals
in the retake policy - Can I see the material? Yes, its all online, see the links above, you don’t need to be enrolled to see the basic course material
- What has the University bought? The basic materials are freely avaialble online, the University has bought some extra software and services from ProdigyLearning to help you practice the exams including quizzes via prodigylearning.com/certifications/microsoft/microsoft-certified-fundementals
- Can I take the exam at another time? Yes, if none of the dates we offer in July work for you, we expect to offer more in-person examination dates during term-time for students who can’t be in Manchester in July. So you can study in the summer, and take the exam at a later date
- Can I take the exam online? Unfortunately not (yet). We’re not convinced that the online exam procedures are good enough for us to be confident about their validity
- Can I take multiple exams? Yes, but bear in mind that each one requires about 20 hours of study, so if you sign up to all eight, you’ll have a busy summer! You’ll also have to make time to sit eight seperate in-person examinations.
- What am I committing to? At this point we’re looking for expressions of interest, rather than firm commitment that you’ll definintely sit the exam(s) in July. So you can change your mind, it’s called flexible learning for a reason (George and Pettifer 2022) , but please only register if you’re reasonably serious about having a go.
- Can you offer Amazon / Google exams as well? Not yet, but we may do in the future, see section 19.4
- Can I continue studying for these exams after the summer? Yes, provided you are still a student at the University
-
How difficult are the exams? That depends on who you are and what your background is, they are designed for
Beginner
level (students) but Microsoft aren’t very clear about what that means in practice. If you’re not sure, take a look at the free course materials online to work out if the courses are right for you - When are the exams exactly? We’re finalising dates for exams in July, we’ll offer multiple slots. If you can’t make any of them, you’ll be able to take the exams at a later date, most likely from September onwards during term-time.
We have focussed on technical achievements here, but there are non-technical achievements too, see for example chapter 10.
19.5 Breakpoints
Let’s pause here. Insert a breakpoint in your code
and slowly step through it so we can examine the current values of your variables and parameters.
- Besides the badges and certifications already discussed, what others exist?
- For the skills and knowledge you already have, what evidence do you have for it?
- Where are the gaps in own skills or knowledge?
- What evidence can you collect that you are developing these skills and knowledge?
- What parts of this evidence are you able to badge and certify?
19.6 Summarising your achievements
Too long, didn’t read (TL;DR)? Here’s a summary:
Your future is bright, your future needs achieving. Achieving your future will help you build and test your future. Building and testing your future will help you to start coding your future.
Digital badges let you take your achievements from the many places you learn, and combine them into a portable portfolio that tells a digital story about your learning. The data inside a badge is shown in figure 19.11 and gives an employer a more detailed and evidenced view of your professional development than traditional physical badges like degree certificates.
In the next part, chapter 20: Ruling your Future which outlines Ten Simple Rules for Coding your Future, a recap of some key points we’ve covered so far.