Competency Education and Evaluation: Issues and Dilemmas

Abstract

Competency education in the applied behavioral sciences can be en hanced by synethesizing the values of humanistic psychology with the measurement, evaluation, and accountability that characterize be havioral psychology. Since a competency-education program specifies learning outcomes in advance in measurable terms, includes experiences to aid the learner in achieving competence, and specifies evaluative criteria by which competence will be measured, it limits learner depend ence and competition and increases learner independence. Such a pro gram is characterized by (1) the integration of subjective as well as objective judgments, (2) many different methods of measurement and evaluation—including self-evaluation by learners and personal feed back, and (3) firmness as well as a high degree of openness and trust.

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