What’s an Open Badge?
Open Badges are verifiable, portable digital badges with embedded metadata about skills and achievements. They comply with the Open Badges Specification and are shareable across the web.
Each Open Badge is associated with an image and information about the badge, its recipient, the issuer, and any supporting evidence. All this information may be packaged within a badge image file that can be displayed via online CV's and social networks. Thousands of organisations across the world issue badges in accordance with the Open Badges Specification, from non-profits to major employers to educational institutions at all levels.
What do Open Badges mean?
Badges may represent many different types of achievements and claims:
- Hard skills such as proficiency in a programming language
- Soft skills like collaboration
- Participation
- Official certification
- Authorisation
- Community involvement
- New skills and literacies not recognized by traditional education providers
Because the system is based on an open standard, recipients can combine multiple badges from different Issuers to tell the complete story of their verifiable achievements—both online and off. Open Badges can be displayed wherever recipients want them on the web, including on social media profiles and through services that store and display badges. Badges can be shared for employment, education, or lifelong learning.
Anyone can Issue a badge, receive one, verify that a badge is real, or inspect the metadata and any associated evidence. Badge issuers can certify that their badges are technically compliant with the specification and therefore, can be readily moved among Backpacks and display sites. Badges can be used to set goals, motivate behavior, connect learning environments, and communicate achievements across many contexts.
Benefits of an Open badge
Qualification recognition
Providing a digital certificate and a badge for your qualifications enables your learners to be more widely recognised for your qualification. A digital badge can be shared and used in multiple ways in our modern digital world.
1. Reinforce your brand and awareness of your qualifications
2. Provide a digital currency for your learners, e.g. in their resumes
3. Differentiate the value that your programs provide
4. Improve the security and auditability for your certification process
Motivating small steps
Create different badges for small steps in your training programs, so that learners can be recognised and motivated for achieving specific outcomes, building to your overall completion award.
1. Encourage and reward progression
2. Gamify your learning programs
3. Monitor progression more easily
4. Create clear pathways to success
Modern Certification
Upgrade from printing and mailing paper certificates to digital certificates supported by a portable badge credential. Save time and money while improving the service and value you provide your users.
1. Supplement or replace your paper certificates
2. Improve security and audibility
3. Empower your users to easily share achievements, e.g. on LinkedIn
4. Reinforce your brand through wider digital use
Skill Portability
Discovering your learner's skills and competencies becomes much easier and more valuable to the learner if you have provided them with a digital credential that they can share widely.
1. Make resumes stand out from the crowd with digital badges
2. Share skills via badges on LinkedIn and other social media platforms
3. Unlock skills data within digital badges
4. Future-proof to international standards
Evidence Professional Development
A modern digital credential or digital badge becomes recognisable, discoverable and verifiable evidence of professional mastery and/or completion of a training program.
1. Enhance your organisation's brand and reputation
2. Provide your users with a portable skills currency
3. For membership organisations, support communities of practice
4. Support tiered delivery via accredited centres
Event attendance
Easily create communities of users for your events and conferences where your attendees can all identify shared experiences via their badge, display on LinkedIn and generally indicate that they are proud members of your community.
1. Quickly issue badges to attendees from an import file
2. Promote brand awareness and recognition for your events
3. Recognise continuing professional development
4. Provide verifiable evidence of event attendance
Integrate with Systems
Implement digital badges and certificates without the disruption of replacing your existing processes and systems. Use our advanced APIs and plug-ins to seamlessly integrate with your existing workflows.
1. Simple badge-issuing API
2. Event-driven issuing rules engine
3. Off-the-shelf plugins available for popular apps
4. Comprehensive documentation and support service