Using Technology to Facilitate the Accreditation of Prior and Experiential Learning in Developing Personalised Work‐based Learning Programmes. A Case Study Involving the University of Derby, UK

Abstract

This article recognises the well-established processes available to educators for the validation of competence, however acquired, and suggests that these mechanisms could be deployed more frequently in future. This proposition is based on employers’ adoption of work-based learning strategies that focus on learning outcomes rather than prescribed learning inputs. The article suggests that, in future, [electronic accreditation of prior and experiential learning] E-APEL tools, by incorporating a record of the claims process within the user’s e-portfolio, could help mobile knowledge workers seeking to update or enhance their high-level skills to present clearly documented records of their informal learning alongside a record of formal learning aligned with the [European qualifications framework] EQF. It concludes that technology can help to structure the [accreditation of prior and experiential learning] APEL process and, by facilitating initial judgements as to how particular challenges at the workplace relate to levels of challenge in higher education, can enable those workplace learning experiences that help to establish the baseline for future work-based learning to be more clearly identified.