Getting Smart Podcast | It’s Time to Update Your Graduate Profile – Here’s How

The Partnership for 21st Century Skills was formed by business and education leaders in 2002 to build support for learning outcomes relevant to the new economy particularly critical thinking, creativity, communication and collaboration.

After a decade leading P21, Ken Kay launched EdLeader21 (now part of Battelle for Kids) to provide implementation support to district leaders in the form of a professional learning community. More than 200 districts and schools are members

In March, EdLeader21 launched the Profile of a Graduate campaign (#profileofagraduate). The new website includes a gallery of adopted profiles and an implementation guide for creating your own. In our latest podcast, Ken sat down with me to explain more about this campaign and how schools can join.

Podcast Highlights

“We want at least 1,000 communities to sign up and develop a graduate profile in the next two years,” said Kay.

Some districts engage the whole community. Virginia Beach City Public Schools, which started this process a decade ago, gathered 1000 community members to ratify their updated profile. Other districts gather an advisory group that represents the community, said Kay, and many districts include parents and students in the process.

The process creates direction, not another initiative, said Kay. It will create common definitions for skills like creativity. The process often concludes with defining competencies and performance tasks that allow students to demonstrate those competencies.

For more see:

• What to Look For: A Shared Vision of Powerful Learning
• The Vision of Performance-Based Education at District 51 (and podcast with D51)
• Rethinking High School Graduation Requirements: Project & Microcredentials

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