A better Completion Agenda: expanding the range of acceptable outcomes in higher education

Abstract

The Completion Agenda is part of a larger transformative shift in education, which is moving from a focus on providing instruction to a focus on producing results. This gradual but profound paradigm shift has been underway for multiple decades, and its impact on higher education cannot be understated; as one well-known description of this phenomenon noted, shifting the focus from teaching to learning "changes everything" about how higher education is conducted(1). Grounded in the increasingly close relationship between educational attainment and economic success(2), this results-oriented approach is driving many of the major efforts for change in U.S. higher education, including the Completion Agenda, performance-based funding, the revived interest in competency-based education, and standardized assessments such as the Collegiate Learning Assessment.