Global education systems that are academic and examination oriented are facing three primary challenges: (a) Disconnect between school content and the world of work; (b) Disconnect in realizing the national goals of education; and (c) Disconnect with the demands of the twenty-first century, which has been dubbed as a knowledge and skill age that needs a new set of competencies. Many countries have identified the need to transform education systems towards mitigating the three challenges through entrenching competency-based curriculum (CBC). This chapter explores the skills and competencies required for efficacious delivery of CBC on online platform in higher education.
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The salient aspects of higher education such as teaching, enrolment, hiring, and scholars have changed over time. Currently, there is more diversity in the levels and categories of programs and degrees on offer in various levels and in diverse institutions such as private nonprofit, private for profit, public, four- five-year programs, two-year, and less-than two-year program institutions (Ginder et al., 2014a). There has been an increase in the number of full-time instructors to almost equal that of number of the part-timer instructors (Kena et al., 2014), and the usual admission of only-government students has changed to include self-sponsored learners that were hitherto not considered. A number of factors ranging from global dynamics, curricula change, economic, political, social, cultural, technological, and labor market aspects have prompted these changes (Palloff & Pratt, 2013; Siemens & Matheos, 2010).
The aspect of changing education systems and information technology has heavily restructured the mode of teaching learning in higher institutions. Lecture room limits have surpassed the confines of time, place, and physical presence (Barber, Donnelly, Rizvi, & Summers, 2013). It is now the age of anyplace and anytime learning in the context of the new dispensation and new education system roll outs (Paulson, 2002). Novel instructional methods, learning strategies, and evaluation techniques have come up to accommodate these changes (Areba, 2022). Additionally, novel innovative arrangements of learning have flourished. Many numbers of programs have been pursued to logical completion through studying in virtual higher institutions and e-learning open universities (Allen & Seaman, 2014; Siemens & Matheos, 2010).
These variations signify hitches that might be encountered by faculty in higher institutions of learning who must match the paradigm shift to keep pace with the emerging trends, the new education systems, novel innovative methods to scientific studies and certification, and novel approaches of instructions (Siemens & Matheos, 2010). This encompasses being cognizant of basic principles of new education systems, who the scholars are, what they require to study, how to instruct them, the delivery techniques they ought to possess to efficiently play their fast-changing roles (Palloff & Pratt, 2013; Scobey, 2012). Part of the changing dynamics in higher education is utilization of digital technologies to enhance teaching and learning.
Digital learning is an optimistic style in learning that has the potential of efficiently transmitting knowledge and skills to students in higher education and other lower levels. It relies on the use of modern techniques of communication like mobile devices, virtual digital libraries, computers, audio-visual aids, computer aided networks, graphics search engines, and multimedia software (Meletiou, Boyatzis, Stavroulaki & Sgouropoulou, 2012). Hence, digital/virtual learning infers using every type of technology to convey knowledge and skills with efficient communication among trainers and learners to gain intended benefits seamlessly and within limited time and space (Tamrakar & Mehta, 2011).