Conference Agenda

The competency-based educational approach is a project that generates significant interest in global educational policy, as it is promoted by highly influential international organizations such as the OECD (Rychen, 2016) and UNESCO (2015), along with other supranational organizations like the EU (Council of the European Union, 2018) and OEI (2010). Since the 1990s, numerous countries worldwide have undertaken reforms in their national curriculum to introduce the competency-based approach at all educational levels (Anderson-Levitt & Gardinier, 2021).

This educational approach interprets the learning process as the acquisition of a set of competencies necessary for students to overcome life situations (Levine & Patrick, 2019). Competence is defined as a combination and mobilization of knowledge, skills, and attitudes that enable individuals to confront problematic contexts (Le Deist & Winterton, 2005; Westera, 2001).

However, the approach is not without its criticisms. Firstly, there is a lack of universal acceptance of the competency definition, with ambiguous interpretations contributing to the absence of a single model (Le et al., 2014; Westera, 2001). Furthermore, competencies and learning outcomes are often considered equivalent, leading to evaluative processes determining if students’ performance aligns with expected standards (Le et al., 2014); in other words, assessment is performative. Additionally, criticism arises regarding the influence of international organizations compelling countries to hastily implement policy reforms introducing competencies into their education systems, following global trends and causing these changes to become impositions (Krejsler, 2019; Díaz-Barriga, 2019).

Despite the abundance of empirical material on the competency-based educational approach, it faces numerous criticisms due to the perceived tendency to impose a global educational agenda linking formative processes with economic needs (Preston, 2017; Tröhler, 2013). Therefore, Díaz-Barriga (2019) advocates for continuing conceptual studies on this approach to unravel its educational implications and contribute to knowledge in this field.

This conceptual study aligns with the current that critiques the competency-based educational approach. We argue that the competency-based educational approach is an instrument of the capitalist system designed to connect educational processes with economic needs. The study aims to provide a comprehensive view of the competency-based educational approach. To achieve this, we will follow the trilateral analysis proposed by Barnett (2022) to understand the educational implications of any pedagogical project: the political, the epistemological, and the anthropological.

International acceptance of the competency-based educational approach should not hinder the ongoing task of questioning its project, exploring the relationship between this approach and centers of power, and considering alternative approaches.

The question of how to live an ethical, meaningful, and purposeful life is one of the most fundamental issues in education. In Kemmis’ words, education is about ‘living well in a world worth living in’, and for Biesta, education is the ‘how’ of existence. This existential turn is certainly a welcome alternative to narrow conceptions of education as preparation for future employment. A deep challenge arises however, when attempting to determine how to live well or what it means to exist. This is not because these are difficult topics but because they seem to beg the question. An answer to the question of what is education is presumably the result of some educational enquiry and is therefore asking how we are to educate ourselves about education. As one attempt to explore this challenge, this paper takes a radical alternative. Instead of understanding education as about existence, it explores what it might look like for existence to be about education.

I begin with a thought experiment that brings the existential question into sharp focus – imagine having one minute left to live. Clearly undesirable, I expect most would experience a crushing sense of anxiety. However, for the sake of argument, suppose you wanted to determine what you should do with the rest of the time you had left. Two immediate responses spring to mind. The first would be to do nothing, perhaps paralysed by indecision or an awareness of the meaninglessness of any decision. A second response might be to somehow quickly attempt to do that which you think, or feel is the most important thing that you must do before your time is up. And yet there are further ways to increase the existential angst. There is the question of determining which of those two responses is the best. And then the question of by what purpose or criteria such a decision is to be made. At this point, I would wager that anyone’s response would be that these are impossible tasks given only a minute left to live. Yet what is the difference between one minute and one year, or 100 years? What makes answering the question of what to do any more possible simply by extending the time available?

I have framed the situation in terms of time because of the immediate resonance of its force upon our experience. However, this thought experiment draws attention to another equally taken for granted concept, perhaps even more fundamental than the nature of time. It is the presupposition of making any educational progress at all. Whether presented as one minute or 100 years, both cases betray an underlying assumption of something that can be done, with time simply being a limiting factor. In fact, we would not feel the pressure of time in constraining what we can do unless we already believed we can do something. Regardless of time, what reason do we have for thinking we can make any progress at all on questions such as what to do?