Digital Badging is a contemporary method of displaying and sharing goal attainment, specifically the acquisition of skills, knowledge and other achievements . In an higher education setting this is used to motivate learning and has been shown to be of value to students in tracking their achievements, as well as employers in seeing the skills of potential employees. Nursing students perform a myriad of highly specialized skills during their nursing education. Digital badging allows nursing students to display their skills attainment in an electronic format that can be shared with transfer institutions, scholarship committees and employers.

This project engaged in the following actions:

1) Research and develop best practices in healthcare with regard to implementing a digital badging system

2) Develop a road map for structuring badge attainment based off the newest Maricopa Nursing curriculum

3) Examine the new process with a focus group of students and instructors

4) Prepare for multi-campus program implementation

Maricopa Nursing currently tracks student skills attainment via paper tracking system that identifies skill attainment by instructors initial and date. This system is antiquated and has many inherent disadvantages.

A literature review was performed-informing the pilot development & implementation.

During academic year 2016 this pilot was implemented at Phoenix College Nursing. A digital badge scaffold plan was developed based off the updated 2015 Maricopa Nursing curriculum. This pilot emphasized clear perimeters defining the level of skill performance required to earn a badge. Which in the previous system was undefined and neither student nor nursing educators had a clear, consistent method for verbalizing the requirements for skill attainment.

Outcomes: 71 Phoenix College Block 2 Nursing Students earned the following digital badges

1) Tracheostomy Suction Skills Badge

2) IV Initiation Skills Badge

3) IV Infusion Skills Badge

Utilizing Canvas Learning System as a medium for the badge tracking students were able to:

Clearly identify the requirements for each skill

Work at their own pace in skill attainment

Celebrate and share their skill attainment with others via social media/Canvas ePortfolio

A survey was performed to gather student experiential data from both the intervention group at Phoenix College Nursing as well as the control group at Mesa Community College Nursing.

Student feedback includes high value in a digital method of tracking. Further evaluation would be needed to determine stake-holders (hospitals/clinics) use of electronic skills.

Next Steps: The positive outcomes from this project support implementation of next phase development. This includes expanding the digital badging initiative throughout all four block at Phoenix College Nursing during AY2017-2018. This full program implementation will serve as a pilot model for the district and allow Maricopa Nursing consortium to evaluate and plan for full-scale, district-wide implementation.

Three residential nursing faculty members engaged in the research, development, implementation and evaluation of The Digital Badging Project.

Dawn Klecka, MSN, MBA, RN, AHN Project Coordinator

Nora Vetto, BSN, MSN, RN Project Partner

Diana Breed MSN, RN Project Partner

Special thanks to Helice Agria, Phoenix College Director of CTL for assistance in grant research and digital badge creation assistance

Special thanks to Seth Goodman, Phoenix College Grant Developer for research assistance