The document discusses the OK Study Centre's experiences developing and implementing open badges for skills acquired through volunteering and non-formal education. It outlines how the centre has created badge infrastructure for its training courses and meta-badges for completing training paths. They have also created 2 volunteering skill badges so far with plans for more. Examples of volunteering skill badges described include those for chairperson, peer champion and event organizer. Benefits noted are making skills visible for individuals and giving voluntary organizations a competitive edge in recruitment. Tips provided for voluntary organizations include starting small by identifying important skills and success stories to promote badges.

1. Making competences acquired in
voluntary organisations visible:
experiences of designing badges for
training and learning by doing in the
voluntary sector
Marion Fields
Coordinator, OK Study Centre
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2. OK Study Centre
• A nationwide non-formal adult education
provider funded mainly by the Finnish
Government.
• We organise, study, develop, supervise
and fund training in NGOs.
– We have 69 member organisations and ca.
150, 000 occasional students anually
• In recent years we have undertaken many
R&D activities to develop new ways to
validate learning in the voluntary sector.
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3. Our badge story so far…
• We have been involved in several
projects to develop open badge
concepts.
– We participated in a large project with
Discendum, during which we built a
website and organised training for our
members.
– We are in a Nordic project called open
badges for Adult Educators, which focuses
on bringing badges to the adult education
community
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4. What have we ended up with?
• We now have:
– A badge infrastructure for our training
courses +meta-level badges for
completing a ’training path’
– 2 badges to recognise learning
outcomes from volunteering; more
badges to come
– A badge for adult educators
– A website + supervision for members
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5. Examples of badges created
for volunteering purposes
• We have created badges together with
member NGOs with common criteria.
• Badges created for skill batches:
Chairperson, ’peer champion’,
event organiser.
• Application with evidence,
organisations issue them
independently.
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6. AdEO: Educator’s badge!
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Serves as an introduction for educators and trainers.
You need 5 small pieces of evidence + a reflection.
https://openbadge.wordpress.com/

7. Our way of thinking about
Open Badges
• Competencies gained by participation in
non-formal education or volunteering
activity are real and useful and they can be
validated and made visible.
• Badges are a really good way of recognising
skills acquired outside the classroom.
– For informal learning by volunteering, one can
devise the criteria more loosely than for
courses, which is welcomed by voluntary
organisations
• There are many forums for validation: e.g.
inside the voluntary sector
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8. Benefits we have noticed
There are benefits for both individuals
and organisations:
• Individuals can find a new way of making
their skills visible, which is motivating and
empowering.
• Can give voluntary organisations publicity and
a competitive edge: badges are already used
in volunteer recruitment.
• Courses in our field are planned and carried
out by professionals, but aren’t always well
known. Badges help in making learning
outcomes visible.
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9. Experiences
• We are pleased that we have got
started!
– Many badges have a fairly high
acceptance rate.
• Our members say that they have
started to appreciate learning by
doing more
• Introduction takes
time
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Thanks! This works!
It’s a fine digital
product, I hope people
will start to issue more
of these!
-Sanna

10. Tips for voluntary
organisations
• Start small. What kinds of achievements are
easy to ’wrap’ into a badge?
• You might want to start by individual skills
and achievements instead of batches.
• Ask you volunteers: what skills are most
important to them?
• Identify success stories and use them in
marketing badges.
• Team up with other organsiations and
endorse each other’s badges!
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11. Thank you!
Marion Fields
marion.fields@ok-opintokeskus.fi
Twitter: @marion_fields
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