The UMUC online MBA program features the integration of competencies into instruction, assignments and feedback, as a key part of its innovative curriculum design and education practices. By emphasizing ten specific competencies, faculty encourage students to connect classroom experiences with real-world skills and promote increased collaboration, personal growth, and greater depth of learning.

UMUC and the MBA program in particular adopted a competencies-based level of instruction and development, including emphasis on the Constructivist approach where the focus is on learning and the recognition that all students are teachers as they bring diverse expertise, experiences, and world views to the task of learning. The learner is an active processor of information. Resulting from our work, we can report on some challenges we have faced, solutions we have developed, and practical examples of competences in action.

Competency development is strong in the UMUC seminar, “Organizations and the External Environment” (Global Business). This course is global in scope, emphasizing major theoretical approaches and issues such as sustainability, ethics, trade and investment, and the impact of politics, economics, and technology on a global stage. This course requires a shift in conceptual development requiring global thinking and an international perspective. The ten core competencies are integrated into weekly assignments, readings, and discussions. We have found that competency-based learning can lead to greater faculty/student collaboration and personal/professional development.

The integration of competencies encourages students to think critically about the relationship between the assignments and their own competency development. Select competencies are highlighted each week; students must illustrate within each week’s assignment how their skills are expanding and how they demonstrated the given competencies in the context of their professional, academic, or other experiences. In the constructivist approach, instructors and faculty assistants act as collaborator-facilitators, supporting students to determine their own goals, learning, and education. The student is an active participant who constructs knowledge, is self directed and self assessing. Students have the opportunity to exercise many of the competencies while working on a semester-long team case study. Faculty members focus on competency development when providing feedback to student team members regarding ways to improve overall individual and team performance and the quality of team assignments.

We begin with the premise that students come with the ability, theoretical exposure, and practical base to succeed in an adult learning setting. Faculty members can stimulate the self reflection and learning needed to help students develop approaches and ideas that are tailored to their careers and environment targets. We support knowledge construction that exceeds memorization and expands beyond focus on content alone. Competency development is stressed when faculty members provide requested guidance for team conflict resolution and discussions on a global business project assignment. Competency integration moves students from tacit to explicit knowledge and skills. It is the essential component of faculty / student integration and student learning. This paper will discuss various challenges and successes with implementing a competency-based education practice.