Partnerships Schools Blueprints - Skills and Knowledge.

Empowering Learning Through Digital Credentials: A New Era of Badging at ACS International Schools

Its Monday again and time for another Partnerships Schools Blueprint.

This project has been a passion project of mine for many years and I have finally made it a reality in 2024, rolling out pilots across our schools to fine tune. After working on the www.Idea.org.uk platform in 2015, the power of digital credentials was never in question, but how do you quantify essential future workplace skills?

I think we have cracked it once and for all, with many schools across the globe taking on similar approaches off the back of our presentations and sharing of content.

In an increasingly dynamic and skills-focused world, students need more than just academic qualifications to thrive. At ACS International Schools, we’ve taken a significant step forward by creating a digital badging system, in partnership with Navigatr , to recognise and measure the skills our students develop through experiential learning. Navigatr’s founders, Tim Riches and Mark Riches , along with their technical lead Omid Mufeed , have been instrumental in bringing this vision to life.

The Power of Digital Badging

Digital credentials offer a modern, flexible way to recognise achievements. Unlike traditional methods of assessment that often focus on time spent or generalised progress, digital badges provide a detailed, skill-based record of learning. At ACS, we wanted a way to quantify and celebrate students’ acquisition of essential future workplace skills—skills that employers and higher education institutions increasingly value.

These badges represent more than just isolated achievements; they track mastery over time. Every time a student practices and applies a skill, the system records it, providing a comprehensive, evolving portrait of their growth. This approach ensures that students are not only recognised for learning new skills but also for refining and mastering them as they progress.

Experiential Learning and Skills Mastery

Our collaboration with Navigatr has resulted in a unique module that awards badges based on experiential learning, allowing students to earn credentials throughout their school journey. Whether they are involved in sustainability projects, arts programmes, or service-learning initiatives, students gain badges for real-world applications of their skills.

For example, a student may earn a badge in Adaptability by successfully adjusting to new challenges during a group project, or demonstrate Leadership by guiding their peers in a community service activity. Importantly, the system doesn’t just record the event—it tracks how often these skills are applied, highlighting true mastery.

Our badging system is built on a well-researched taxonomy of skills, aligned with the competencies sought by future employers. This ensures that our students are developing the abilities that will matter most in the workforce and in their broader lives. Below is a core list of the skills our badges recognise:

Essential Skills List:

• Adaptable: Ability to adjust to new conditions or tasks
• Agile: Frequently reassessing and adapting to predefined plans
• Ambitious: Strong desire and determination to succeed
• Appreciation: Recognition and enjoyment of good qualities in situations or people
• Assertiveness: Confident without being aggressive or arrogant
• Caring: Compassionate, kind, and trustworthy approach to others
• Committed: Dedication and loyalty to a cause or goal
• Communication: Articulate, diplomatic, and effective at listening and sharing
• Confidence: Certainty in one’s own abilities
• Conscientious: Willing to do what is right with integrity and honesty
• Courage: Facing challenges with determination, not overcome by fear
• Creative: Ability to generate original, innovative ideas
• Dedicated: Wholehearted commitment to tasks or goals
• Dynamic: Active, forward-thinking, and positive in attitude
• Empathy: Understanding and sharing the feelings of others
• Enterprising: Showing initiative and resourcefulness
• Ethical: Upholding moral principles in decision-making
• Global: Understanding and engaging with the world community
• Honest: Genuine, fair, and transparent in behaviour
• Independent: Self-reliant and free from external control
• Innovative: Always seeking new ways to solve problems
• Inquirer: Persistently curious, always asking insightful questions
• Insightful: Showing deep understanding of situations
• Intuitive: Instinctively understanding problems and potential solutions
• Leadership: Guiding and offering clear direction to others
• Optimistic: Positive outlook, believing in the best outcomes
• Passionate: Enthusiastic and excited about what you do
• Patient: Tolerant of delays and problems, remaining calm and composed
• Perceptive: Sensitive insight into situations or people
• Professional: Displaying a courteous, business-like manner
• Reflective: Thoughtfully considering one’s abilities and skills
• Resilience: Bouncing back from setbacks, staying persistent
• Resourceful: Clever in overcoming challenges
• Respectful: Showing deference and respect for others
• Responsible: Accountable for one's actions and role
• Self-Aware: Understanding one’s own strengths and areas for improvement
• Self-Belief: Confidence in one’s abilities, appearance, and behaviour
• Sensitivity: Appreciation of and tolerance for people different from oneself
• Teamwork: Reliable and collaborative in group efforts
• Trustworthy: Reliable and honest in all actions
• Understanding: Sympathetically aware of others' feelings, tolerant and forgiving

Each of these skills is associated with a specific badge, awarded as students accumulate skill points through various activities. The platform we’ve developed is both intuitive and powerful, allowing educators to easily award badges by uploading class lists, while students can view their achievements through a centralised dashboard.

A Community of Accountability

Our goal is not just to recognise achievement but to build a community of learners who are accountable for their growth. With this platform, we can track the actual skills students are learning—not just the hours they’ve spent or the number of tasks completed. This gives us a data-driven view of the impact our partnerships and programmes are having on student development.

We are able to measure progress in real-time and use this data to hold ourselves accountable, ensuring that our work with partners is delivering meaningful, measurable outcomes. Over the next 5 years, we plan to expand this badging system across all ACS campuses and partner schools, using it to document and celebrate students’ experiential learning journeys.

Aligning with Future Employer Needs

The skills we focus on are not chosen arbitrarily—they are derived from research and ongoing dialogue with future employers and educational experts. By developing a system that tracks skill mastery rather than simply participation, we are ensuring that our combined partnerships students are not only prepared for the workplace but also equipped with the lifelong learning skills necessary to adapt and thrive in an ever-changing world.

Shaping the Future Together

Our partnership allows us to deliver a system that is both cutting-edge and user-friendly. Students can earn and share their badges across platforms, including social media, providing them with a digital portfolio that showcases their competencies. With just a single sign-in, they can access a wealth of information about their learning journey, and educators can easily monitor and reward their progress.

Watch Our Explainer Video

To see how this system works in practice, watch our 6-minute explainer video here. We are excited about the future of learning at ACS and look forward to continuing to empower our students with the skills they need to succeed.