What is Pathways?

Pathways is a new Accredible feature available to issuers on Connect and Growth plans. It enables issuers to:

  • Create clear learning pathways with improved communication around the requirements for completion:
    • Include both mandatory and optional requirements in a pathway.
    • Set optional pathway completion criteria, for example “finish 2 out the 5 options”, or “finish 3 modules before completing a higher-level module”.
    • Set different option pool requirements, for example “finish any of A, B, or C and any of D, E, or F”.
    • Set optional completion credentials for learners to progress towards.
  • Automatically calculate and display user progress so learners can better understand what they have completed and where they should go next.
  • Set-up milestone credentials for learners to earn as they progress towards an optional, overall completion credential.
  • Track learner pathway completion rates (Connect).
  • Track individual ‘node’ completion rates throughout a pathway (Growth).

Pathways list view on issuer dashboard
Pathways list view on Issuer Dashboard

What can issuers do with Pathways?

Pathways gives issuers the ability to create and track learner journeys by linking together all of the complicated certification program requirements in a helpful and flexible way. The increased flexibility means that issuers can create pathways with varying levels of complexity and optional requirements, representing everything from micro-credentials to higher education degrees. 

Pathways builder example
Pathway Builder example

Pathways enables issuers to deliver increased value to their learners. They boost engagement (and issuers save time) by auto-issuance of credentials when learners reach significant milestones in the pathway, incentivizing the learner to continue to progress through the Pathway. They provide visual learning maps that give learners an easy-to-follow guide so they better understand what their options are and where they should or could progress next. Provide learners a clear path through their options that will earn them your high-level credential, or show them what they can build towards with more learning. They can keep track of the success of their created learning pathways by monitoring learner proficiency, enrollments, and course completions in real-time to support data-driven decisions. 

Pathways insights example
Pathways Insights example

What are the benefits of Pathways?

Pathways offers a number of benefits both to issuers and their learners. Issuers gain a dedicated, intuitive builder making it easy to plan and create learning pathways, and increased visibility into how individuals are engaging with their pathway. Learners have a central, easy to access location where they can view their progress (Expected Q2), see which pathways they are enrolled into, and better understand how to complete a pathway. 

Capture and Communicate Requirements of a Program

Issuers use Pathways to effectively capture and communicate the requirements learners need to fulfill in order to finish a certification program in its entirety. For example, issuers can set all requirements within a pathway to mandatory (required), include a mixture of mandatory or optional steps (finish 2 of 5 options), or set all requirements to optional. This allows issuers to create pathways that are as simple as Level I, II, and III or create more in depth pathways up to complex university degrees. 

Example view of issuer page with available learning pathways (Expected: April 13th)
Example view of issuer page with available learning pathways

Auto-Issue Milestone and Completion Credentials

Automation is key to saving time and reducing resources. The automation offered by Pathways enables issuers to set auto-issuance criteria for both milestone and completion credentials. This saves issuers from having to manually calculate progress and completion status or criteria. For example, issuers will no longer have to manually assess if their learners have completed the right number of modules e.g. finish 2 out of 5 options. Or if their learners have completed the requirements within different option pools e.g. any of ‘A, B, C’ and any of ‘D, E, F’. This is most effective for longer, complicated pathways, but automates a complicated and tedious task for issuers across all program sizes or complexity. The use of milestone and completion credentials also serves to engage and motivate learners along their learning journey by providing incentives to continue and a final touchpoint to work towards.

Visual Communication of Program Structure

The ability to create a visual representation of the structure of a program is useful for both issuers and their learners. Issuers don’t need to prepare any documentation in addition to creating the learning pathway and can reference this from their own website so prospective learners can understand the program requirements. The reference helps learners by outlining the pathway in a way that’s easier to understand and informs learners prior to enrollment of the expectations of the program.

Example of learner view for program structure
Example of learner view for program structure

Example of third-party view for program structure
Example of third-party view for program structure

Guide and Increase Completion Rates

The clarity Pathways delivers around program structure serves to improve guidance to learners around their progress and which credential they should earn next to complete the pathway. The improved communication around where learners are currently and where they should go next reinforces completion of the entire pathway and helps to motivate learners. Those enrolled on a pathway can access their pathway view at any time from their Credential View and Suggested Credentials page. 

Example of Progress Overview for Learner on their Credential View
Example of Progress Overview for Learner on their Credential View

In Summary

Pathways is a powerful new feature for issuers. Pathways lets issuers link together their courses and options to clearly communicate how learners can progress through their certification program and motivate them to advance. Issuers eliminate the tedious or complicated process of manually tracking learner progress and completion criteria. They save resources by automating milestone and completion credential issuance and maintain full control over what makes up a pathway and what criteria learners need to satisfy. The simplicity and versatility of the Pathways builder allows issuers to create Pathways of varying complexity covering small programs to high-value degrees. Learners gain an easy-to-follow visual guide for the learning pathway which outlines step-by-step the requirements of the pathway to achieve their goal. Pathways supports issuer program growth, enables more complicated credential programs, and gives issuers the tools to make smarter, data-driven decisions for their learners. 

For more information about Pathways, contact the sales team today. Or to see digital credentials and Pathways in action, book a platform demo