Competence, according to Dictionary.com, is “the quality of being competent; adequacy; possession of required skill, knowledge, qualification, or capacity.”[1]<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n Much of higher education is competency-based, whether or not that word is used explicitly.\u00a0 Higher education is\u00a0not only about learning information, but also about\u00a0learning skills so that you can\u00a0apply, manipulate, transfer, and generally\u00a0work with that information.\u00a0 Learning about statistics should enable you to think critically about statistical information presented in a news story as you evaluate its validity.\u00a0 Learning about literature should enable you to apply insights into human motivation in order to deal with a co-worker empathetically.\u00a0 Learning about nutrition should enable you to interpret food labels and determine whether prepared vegetables are more nutritious in\u00a0canned, frozen, or freeze-dried form.\u00a0 Consider something you learned in a college course, and then consider how you applied that learning in a different context. You’ll immediately understand the concept of competence, or\u00a0skills that help you apply and transfer knowledge.<\/p>\n The ESC Undergraduate Area of Study Guidelines which identify knowledge and skills expected in degrees\u00a0actually list competencies, as do the ESC Learning Goals.\u00a0 Employers are also\u00a0focusing increasingly on competencies because they help workers maintain relevance and productivity in the workplace.\u00a0 In addition to\u00a0want ads listing specific\u00a0content knowledge,\u00a0they\u00a0increasingly list competencies such as\u00a0the abilities to learn, work on teams, communicate, and persist\u2014all of which are key to\u00a0succeeding in today’s fast-changing\u00a0landscape in which\u00a0content knowledge can change rapidly.\u00a0 The\u00a0page on General Workforce Skills<\/a>\u00a0has a fuller discussion of\u00a0general workforce competencies expected in the near-future workplace.<\/p>\n As part of educational planning, then, it’s important to\u00a0consider the\u00a0competencies that will enable you to succeed and complete the degree, competencies which are also transferable to work and life.\u00a0 That’s why it’s called “educational” planning and not just “degree planning.” As you pursue your degree, you\u00a0should be developing more awareness of the underlying competencies that education can foster, in order to planfully engage in your learning.<\/p>\n The third part of this text deals with competencies for school which, as you can see in the table below, are also competencies for work and life.<\/p>\n![\"decorative](\"https:\/\/s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com\/courses-images\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3676\/2018\/10\/17013616\/skills-3371153_1920-1-300x146.jpg\")
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