Exploring Free Microcredentials: Advice for Teachers

My First Free Digital Learning Competency

Finding Opportunities

As part of my project for my current doctoral course, I must earn seven to ten microcredentials this Summer. I expected that finding free microcredentials in my areas of interest would be easy; it’s not. Perhaps my expectations were skewed because, as a classroom teacher, it seemed that I was constantly receiving email advertisements for these types of opportunities.

However, what I’ve found in the last couple of days is that there is a lot of “bait-and-switch” with finding free courses. For example, some courses are free, but you must pay to receive the certificate or badge at the end. Other courses provide you with a free certificate or badge but only after you pay for course content.

I also noticed organizations using “free microcredentials” as a vehicle for collecting user data. In other words, when you sign up, it asks, “Which of our programs interest you?” I won’t sign up for these “fishing” courses, so I won’t know the quality of their free offerings.

Of course, I am not opposed to paying for quality content, and, while not a class expectation, an investigation of any quality difference in free versus paid microcredentialing is a worthy pursuit. However, the vast majority of teachers, in my experience, do not pay for professional development, so finding completely free competency-based learning modules is important in “selling” the idea to the masses, so to speak.

Digital Promise

With that said, I found that Digital Promise made it easy for me to look through their choices to find opportunities well-suited to my interests. The course offerings are both paid and unpaid, and there is no way to sort them by “free.” However, the thumbnail summaries of the courses show the course prices, so it’s easy enough to skim through. From here, I found my first digital competency to complete for this course.

Microcredential – Transformational Leadership

Free Credentials, Allow 14 Days for Certificate

Name: Becoming Transformational Leaders
Issuing Organization:
- King Mongkut’s University of Technology Thonburi
Description of Learning Outcomes and Competencies:
- The current transformational leadership model demonstrates four behaviors: idealized influence, inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation, and individualized consideration. Transformational leaders foster higher intrinsic motivation and loyalty among colleagues and create a commitment to a new vision of the future.
Alignment with my professional goals:
- As a leader, I want to inspire and motivate others toward a common vision. Transformational leaders excel at expressing a compelling vision, nurturing a sense of purpose, and uniting their team to surpass organizational goals. This capacity to inspire and influence is crucial for progressing into leadership positions, and I know that I can benefit from continuous learning in this area.
Timeline for Completion (estimated):
- This microcredential requires two short written submissions as well as two short video submissions. The resources section is full of additional research to explore if interested, but the only requirement from it is to complete a transformational leadership self-assessment (very short).
- I estimate that the microcredential would take 2 hours to complete without reading all of the research. For someone who wants to delve deeply into the additional resources, I imagine that it would at least take a week to read and digest all of the different research articles and resources linked to the course.
- I submitted my work on 6/5/2024, and the system said to allow them two weeks to approve or deny my credentials. I received my digital badge on 6/14/2024.

I invite you to continue with me as I find and complete additional microcredentials.

Lorie Bell