Competency
5 January 2022

Competency Misuse & Abuse

Competency misuse and abuse is everywhere. I even found it walking up Yonge Street in Toronto one July afternoon! I spotted this sign on the door of a retail store selling household goods. I thought, what a perfect example of how a problem can become competency misuse & abuse. Competency statements often start as problem statements or gaps in practice. It’s because we often keep […]

Competency
28 December 2021

The Value of Competency Profiles

The competency approach in health care is the preferred method to meet the mandate for public protection. A competency profile defines a profession’s scope of practice and it is used to afford access to the profession and address concerns about practice. Concerns About Practice When a complaint is lodged and investigated, the contextual details are gathered so that the performance can be evaluated by a […]

Competency
28 December 2021

A Case for Excellence

The goal of a competency-based approach is to identify the minimum standards of performance, or the threshold between competent and not competent. This is a key determinator for student progression and graduation. However, in my experience, less than 5% of a class are at risk of falling into this category. Despite this being a low frequency – high risk concern, educators can spend a significant […]

Theories of Learning
27 December 2021

Competency-Based Education

The construct of competence in health care links educational providers, certifying bodies, and employers in the common goal of developing an effective health care workforce. Competency-based education (CBE) has been the educational intervention of choice of many professional and technical health programs. CBE is seen as increasing activities within the classroom that reflect the actual workplace and challenges the idea that institutional reputation determines the […]

Theories of Learning
27 December 2021

Situated Competence

In the late 1980’s situated cognition began to appear along with research in artificial intelligence and machine learning. Situated cognition involves three central theses: (1) learning occurs not only in the brain but also in the body, (2) learning incorporates the socio-cultural context, and (3) the boundaries of learning extend beyond the individual (Robbins & Aydede, 2009). This holistic approach acknowledges that human cognition involves […]