Learner Competency Levels Framework
🔎 Project Overview
Western Governors University (WGU) is known for its competency-based education model. For nearly two decades, the model remained unchanged — until WGU launched its first major revision: the creation of a Competency Levels Framework.
This project introduced a shared system for describing levels of complexity and rigor across disciplines. It was developed in collaboration with the WGU Assessment Council and the Open Skills Network (OSN), aligning institutional competencies with national skills standards.
🛠️ My Role
Partnered with the Assessment Council to lead framework design.
Researched and synthesized multiple taxonomies (Bloom, Fink, and others).
Developed the WGU Competency Levels model to apply across Health Care, Business, IT, and Education.
Aligned the framework with OSN’s Open Skills Management Tool (OSMT), ensuring interoperability and national visibility.
📘 Deep-Dive Narrative
As WGU scaled, faculty and subject matter experts (SMEs) lacked a common language for describing complexity across competencies. Health Care might use Bloom’s Taxonomy, IT might use Fink’s, and Business another. The result was uneven curriculum design and inconsistent assessment.
To solve this, I facilitated cross-disciplinary design sessions where faculty, SMEs, and assessment developers collaborated to define progressive levels of mastery. Drawing from existing learning taxonomies, we synthesized a WGU Competency Levels Framework that:
Defined progression of rigor across all programs.
Enabled clearer alignment between learning outcomes, curriculum, and assessments.
Positioned competencies within the broader ecosystem of open, portable skills frameworks through OSN.
This was the first institution-wide update to WGU’s competency model since its founding — and one that shaped the foundation for future program development.
Optional Resource Link:
Open Skills Network – OSMT →
👥 Leadership in Action
This project required cross-disciplinary consensus-building. Faculty from Health Care, Business, IT, and Education often had different philosophies and taxonomies. My role was to listen, synthesize, and guide these voices into a single, unified framework.
A faculty colleague reflected:
“Molly has a rare ability to bring diverse experts into alignment. She made sure every discipline’s voice was heard, while moving us toward a framework we could all share and apply.”
✨ Key Outcomes
Created a scalable model for representing rigor and complexity.
Unified faculty across disciplines under a shared competency framework.
Strengthened alignment between competencies, curriculum, and assessments.
Expanded WGU’s national leadership by integrating with OSN’s open skills ecosystem.
