Online learning providers such as Coursera have developed partnerships around performance-based admissions programs, which lessen the barriers for students from all backgrounds to participate. It’s a potential model for other programs that could help ease the entry of more tech professionals into the workforce.
Coursera works with educational institutions such as Ball State University, University of Colorado Boulder (CU Boulder), Illinois Institute of Technology (Illinois Tech), and Northeastern University to offer students an alternative pathway to enroll in online degree programs.
Tech professionals who have day jobs and lack time for the admissions process can enroll in programs by just trying out a couple of courses. With tech professionals having many other options now to get training beyond four-year degrees—and roles such as web developers, system administrators and database engineers not requiring a four-year degree at all—performance-based admission programs could provide a quicker path to pursuing a college education.
If you’re an experienced tech professional and need some new skills in data science and engineering without going through another full degree, performance-based admissions programs provide that option to seek the additional training.
Performance-based admission programs allow educators to rethink the role of college applications altogether, according to Quentin McAndrew, global academic strategist at Coursera. McAndrew is a former assistant vice provost and executive director of academic and learning innovation at CU Boulder, where she was part of a team that pioneered a performance-based admissions program.
The goal for CU Boulder faculty was to establish equity among tech learners and remove the bias from applications, according to McAndrew. The performance-based admissions program benefits learners who work by day and have limited time for the admissions process. Students can skip the process of digging up a college transcript and tracking down professors from years ago to get recommendations. It also saves students up to a year studying for a GRE.
“They don't have to rely on past performance that may not reflect who they are now,” McAndrew said, adding that these programs provide options for adult learners who return for undergraduate degrees or to pursue certificate programs on Coursera in Google IT and Microsoft Data Analytics.
The College of Engineering graduate programs at Northeastern University lets students take two classes in Northeastern’s Data Analytics Engineering program to qualify for full enrollment. Students can acquire skills such as R, SQL, and Python without going through the full admissions process.
Although students access the programs on the Coursera platform, they attend online courses with university faculty following the same curricula as on campus, McAndrew explained.
Without the application process, students can just sign up for a course and pay their tuition. If they earn a B or better, they can work toward their degree. They can also try out courses as noncredit content to see if they are ready for a particular course.
“As soon as they register and pay, they get access to the course within hours,” said Randall Fullington, assistant vice provost and executive director of academic and learning innovation at CU Boulder.
Students who lack a tech degree but have a passion for tech can benefit from the performance-based admissions program. “Now they can come back and actually realize their ambitions and their full potential,” McAndrew said.
Coursera and partners such as Boulder are still working to inform students that the performance-based admissions program exists. Currently, 25 percent of degree programs on Coursera offer performance-based admissions, according to McAndrew.
Making Tech Learning More Equitable
The goal of performance-based admissions is to make learning more inclusive, allowing universities to offer programs while avoiding bias.
Performance-based admissions is about “how do you be inclusive, rather than making it difficult for professional learners, lifelong learners to aspire toward higher education,” said Mallik Sundharam, vice president for enrollment management and student affairs at Illinois Tech.
Tech professionals who work during the day also have personal commitments and may lack the time to work on college essays and seek letters of recommendation from supervisors. “Do we want them to go do all of this if they are a manager or VP of a company?” Sundharam asked. “We want to make this as inclusive as we can and not to create hurdles for them to take their first step toward the graduate degree, and that's how performance-based admission was born.”
“It makes the application itself completely equitable because it is based on your experience, your ability and your willingness to work through the coursework,” McAndrew said. “It takes that application decision out of the hands of the university and puts the learner in charge of their learning.”
McAndrew said she has heard from students that they were unlikely to go back to school for a degree without the option of performance-based admissions.
How CU Boulder Uses Performance-Based Admissions
CU Boulder created the performance-based admissions program partly because of an overwhelmed registrar, according to Randall Fullington, the university’s assistant vice provost and executive director of academic and learning innovation.
It offers master’s degree programs in electrical engineering, computer science, and robotics within the College of Engineering & Applied Science. The university will also be launching an AI graduate certificate in the fall that will be part of the computer science degree. Many students that work full time are looking to add skills in areas such as data science, according to Fullington. He says 70 percent of students in the university’s data science graduate degree are employed full time.
“It's great to be able to see people adopting this model,” Fullington said. “Our mission really has been about reach. It has been about bringing our education to learners around the globe, and this has been a way that's allowed us to do it.”
Courses at CU Boulder are stackable, according to Fullington. Students can stack about 9 to 12 credits and accumulate them to earn a full degree.
“It allows students to choose the level of credential they think is important for their career,” Fullington said.
Illinois Tech Offers Performance-Based Programs for “Career Growers”
Illinois Tech developed its own standards for the performance-based admissions program while conferring with Coursera and CU Boulder, Sundharam said. Coursework includes training in AI and data science. A sample course is “Introduction to Data Structures.”
Participants in the Illinois Tech program consist of career changers who are pivoting from one industry to another, as well as career growers who are progressing in their current area of work. “The content that we have in the [Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs)] are the same content that they will have in their degree program,” Sundharam said.
The “career growers” can qualify for the Illinois Tech program with AWS and Salesforce certifications rather than credits, Sundharam said. Course loads get reduced if students have those certifications.
Open-learning MOOCs allow people moving from another career into tech to test their knowledge through their performance without fully registering. “That gives them the convenience of continuing on once they try it,” Sundharem said. “That's what we hear is the most advantageous for our lifelong learners.”
