Competency-Based Education in the News

Florida is helping to lead a national conversation about how the traditional education system is no longer matched to demands of the modern workforce. Just last week, the Florida Legislature passed a policy that will support Competency-Based Education pilot programs in select Florida schools for the implementation of a new education model better designed to meet the individual needs of students.

In the new clips below, read more about how Competency-Based Education allows students to advance to higher levels of learning when they demonstrate mastery of concepts and skills—regardless of time, place or pace.

Florida Politics, March 12, 2016

“Levesque also singled out proposals from Sen. Jeff Brandes and Rep. Ray Rodrigues to boost competency-based education, which the FFF director said “breaks the mold of a one-size-fits-all education model by building a foundation where instruction can be personalized for every student.

“This is what helps meet the real goal – students demonstrating mastery of material,” he continued. “This is the future of education.”

Orlando Sentinel, March 10, 2016

“…Lake educators — who have been part of a grant-funded, personalized-learning program for two years — say … that the effort is about tailoring lessons to meet student needs.

Several senators said they hoped it would help schools push ahead advanced students who need more of a challenge and provide more help to those who were struggling.

“They all learn differently,” said Sen. Kelli Stargel, R-Lakeland.

Sunshine State News, March 10, 2016

The bill, HB 1365, sponsored by Sen. Jeff Brandes, R-St. Petersburg, would create a competency-based education program for several of Florida’s school districts.

“Every child has unique talents and abilities. But rather than tailoring education to meet both the strengths and weaknesses of individual students, we force them to conform to a system in which they all are expected to master the same subjects in the same way and in the same amount of time,” said executive director for the Foundation for Florida’s Future Patricia Levesque.

WFSU – NPR, March 10, 2016

Some Florida students could soon be able to work more at their own pace. A priority of the Foundation for Florida’s Future is on its way to Governor Rick Scott, and it creates a pilot program for competency based education.

The idea is this: When a student has demonstrated mastery of a subject, they can move on to the next one. But as Democratic Senator Bill Montford notes, it’s not just for kids in high-level programs.

“Let me also add we have a lot of students who can take advantage of this who have had difficulties for whatever reasons. Maybe they’ve been ill and out for a year—they can come in catch up and get to where they need to be. It’s also a good program for our remedial-needed students as well.”

Tampa Bay Times, March 10, 2016

The program seeks to let students advance through school if they can prove they’ve mastered what they should be learning.

St. Petersburg Republican Sen. Jeff Brandes, one of the bill’s sponsors, heralds it as “the future of education.”

“I’m excited that Florida is taking the first step down that road of competency-based learning,” he said.

Florida POLITICO, March 10, 2016

The chamber voted 31-6 to approve HB 1365, substituted for SB 1714, which would let select districts and schools apply to design and launch academic programs where students advance academically based on whether they’ve mastered content rather than on their age or grade. Lake, Palm Beach, Pinellas, and Seminole county school districts are included, as well as the University of Florida’s P.K. Yonge Developmental Research School.

Sen. Jeff Brandes, a St. Petersburg Republican who sponsors the bill, argued during the debate that competency-based learning is the future of education.

redefinED, March 10, 2016

Sen. Jeff Brandes, R-St. Petersburg, who sponsored the bill in the Senate, said Wednesday that the idea isn’t exactly new. Florida Virtual School students, for example, move through material at their own pace, and the school only gets funded once they finish a course. Brandes said the state needs to prepare for a future in which all students advance from one unit to the next, or one grade to the next, once they’ve mastered the material.

“I think the best way for us to understand that is to do pilot programs to study it,” he said. “I think the future of education is a student moving through a rubric at their own pace, not sitting in a seat as we’ve done for the last 100 years.”