The Faculty Versus Academic Reform

James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal ^ | April 9, 2025 | Wenyuan Wu

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Since the 1997 founding of Western Governors University (WGU), a private, nonprofit institution developed to pioneer so-called competency-based education (CBE), a growing number of colleges throughout the U.S. have explored the model to varying degrees. Sometimes referred to as “proficiency-based learning,” “mastery-based learning,” or “student-centered education,” CBE is an alternative model of academic instruction that empowers students with variegated choices in learning pace, individualized academic support, and progress based on mastery of course materials.

According to the latest national survey regarding CBE, conducted in 2020 by the American Institutes for Research, 47 percent of institutional respondents reported being in the process of adopting CBE, and 13 percent reported current operation of at least one full CBE program. These 65 CBE-implementing schools had a total of 551 CBE programs, of which 415 (75 percent) were offered at the undergraduate level and 136 (25 percent) were graduate programs. Compared with traditional learning programs, which track seat-time, deadlines, grades/test scores, and rigid academic schedules, CBE is attractive as schools seek to improve learning outcomes, respond to evolving workforce needs, and expand access.

As WGU’s materials describe it, CBE “means that students progress through courses as soon as they can prove they’ve mastered the material, rather than advancing only when the semester or term ends.” This innovative approach is particularly popular among institutions catering to nontraditional learners, such as community colleges—so much so that, in 2021, California’s state lawmakers enacted legislation (AB 102 and AB 1958) to promote CBE.

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Sounds like remedial education for
“studentsc who are not cut out for college or academia. They think anyone can become a doctor or engineer, you just have to spoon feed the material the right way.

It’s another program pushing “equity”.and race preferences. An institutioniized waste of money and destroyer of real education.

And deep down in the article we find out that’s the case.

“For Charla Long, president of the Competency-Based Education Network (C-BEN) and a consultant for the pilot, traditional models of learning have “created an inequitable system because it’s so time bound.” By meeting learners where they are, CBE advocates say, the system promotes equity. Yet one person’s equity is another’s inequity.”