Achievements of a wide variety of types, from participation through formal degrees, may be issued as a badge. Some organizations prefer to refer to them by their primary purpose, such as a micro-credential, degree, or certificate. Badges issued in a digital form, or “digital badges,” often align to open standards (see “Open Badge”). See Stefaniak and Carey (2019) and Bean et al. (2023).

According to 1EdTech, “The CLR is a standard way to describe and share learning-related plans, achievements, skills, and milestones over a person’s lifetime. An individual will have multiple CLRs, one from each learning organization” (1EdTech, n.d.).The concept of a "CLR" was first used by the Lumina Foundation to describe learning records that showcase student learning across academic and co-curricular learning, as well as other opportunities. 1EdTech formalized this concept into the CLR Standard. As defined by 1EdTech (2021), CLR was "designed to create, transmit, and render an individual's set of achievements, as issued by multiple learning providers, in a machine-readable format that can be curated into verifiable digital records of achievement." See also Lemoie (2022) and Lemoie et al. (2023).Version 2.0 of the CLR standard enables issuing multiple achievements in a single credential (see 1EdTech, 2023). A CLR may contain achievements in the form of Open Badges (see “Open Badge”) and may define relationships between the individual achievements. For example, a CLR may express courses (from a transcript) in the format of OB 3.0 single-assertion credentials of the achievement type Course. Each of these OB 3.0 course credentials can be signed so that they can be separately verified and therefore used separately from the rest of the transcript (see “Verification”). The whole CLR may also be signed to secure the included course credentials as a set.

A credential makes assertions of fact about a credential subject, including identifying information, association with other entities, or in the case of LERs issued as VCs (see definition), learning or work experience. As defined by W3C (2024), "A set of one or more claims made by an issuer. The claims in a credential can be about different subjects."

“Like a dictionary, the CTDL is comprised of nouns (classes) and verbs (properties) that allows it to make simple statements, which, in aggregate, enable rich description of credential-related resources including credentialing organizations and specific subclasses of credentials such as degrees, certificates, certifications, and digital badges. Credentials are related (linked) to other entities in the credentialing ecosystem such as assessments, learning opportunities, requirements, costs, and conceptual frameworks (e.g., competencies, classifications of occupations, and instructional programs).” (Credential Engine, 2018).

Some wallets may support self-authoring of credentials in addition to the ability to accept credentials issued by other issuers. Other names are occasionally used, including backpack, passport, host, or portfolio. Wallets may be made available either as native apps or web services. Wallets provide capabilities for holders to receive, manage, and share credentials. They typically:Provide secure storage within the wallet or in secure wallet-attached storageSupport one or more protocols for sharing and/or receiving credentials such as VC-API, OID4VCI/OID4VP, or CHAPIManage keys on behalf of credential holders and cryptographically sign presentations of credentialsRender credentials for human readability

"Descriptive metadata about evidence related to the achievement assertion" (1EdTech, 2024). Evidence typically consists of links to external resources and/or narrative or descriptive content. Evidence may at times describe a linked entity, for example a creative work authored by the credential subject. A narrative is textual content that may include reflections or descriptions.

The ability of two or more systems or components to exchange descriptive data about things and to interpret the descriptive data that has been exchanged in a way that is consistent with the intent of the creator of the data. Interoperability layers for LERs issued as VCs include (Adapted from Lemoie, 2022):The credential content should be expressed using an open data standard that helps machines and people determine how to interpret the information inside. OB 3.0 and CLR 2.0 are the most common LER-focused credential types.Delivery describes how the LERs move from one entity to another. Protocols for delivery include Credential Handler API (CHAPI), and OID4VCI/OID4VP. Verification (see definition).

"The organization or entity that has made an assertion about a Credential Subject. The issuer of a [digital credential] assertion is the authoritative source for that specific assertion" (1EdTech, 2024).

LERs issued as VCs are issued digital credentials compatible with the W3C Verifiable Credentials Data Model and an open data standard for an LER-specific credential type to describe specific learning achievements or qualifications. Open data standards for LER-specific credential types define the syntax for claims that can be made in the LER. They include Open Badges 3.0, Comprehensive Learner Record 2.0, and the European Learning Model. LERs issued as VCs are verifiable through a proof signed by the issuer. The VC Data Model serves as a postmarked envelope for a message written in the language of the LER-specific credential type. The payload may contain skills and rich content about the described achievements, including:Alignment to skills identified by URLs, which may be part of frameworksRubrics, assessment results, criteria, and/or evidence of authentic assessmentAdditional descriptive metadata using the Credentials Transparency Description Language (CTDL)

Each LER makes claims about a learner or worker (subject) by a particular authority, its issuer. These claims typically document an achievement such as the attainment of a skill or other experience relevant to the qualification of the subject for work. Through the use of standardized technologies for issuing, sharing, and consuming LERs, they can be learner centered and controlled, data rich, and verifiable.

Micro-credentials refer to credentials that are small, but still "higher-stakes", more rigorous, or more designed for the purpose of credentialing than some other forms of LERs such as participation badges, open recognition, or self-issued LERs.Definitions emphasize the granular nature as opposed to degrees, the "stackability" of claims, and emphasis on recognition of individual skills or competencies (see Post University, 2022). Credential Engine (2024a) articulates a micro-credential as"a credential that addresses a subset of field-specific knowledge, skills, or competencies; often developmental with relationships to other micro-credentials and field credentials".

1EdTech's Open Badges specification describes a method for packaging information about a single achievement, such as an earned microcredential, skill, competency, or degree. An Open Badge displays a visual token and has a rich, defined metadata structure containing details about the achievement including required and optional metadata. The technical components of an Open Badge may include issuance metadata such as its period of validity, an achievement claim (assertion), issuer information, recipient identifiers, and/or evidence. Open Badges are interoperable with a range of wallets and verifiers. “Open Badges is one of the first digital credentials standards that describes an assertion of an achievement including who asserted the achievement, how it was achieved, by whom, and when.” (Lemoie, et al., 2023). The Open Badge Specification is currently on version 3.0.

“Open Standards are standards made available to the general public and are developed (or approved) and maintained via a collaborative and consensus-driven process” (ITU, 2024). This definition implies that open standards are not just available for anyone to read and implement, but the process of creating them is itself open to participation. In practice, the definition of open standard is widely interpreted. Some are designed by a small group of organizations in commercial consortia. Others are created using open processes that encourage broad participation. Some standards are voluntarily adopted, others are mandated by regulators." A specification created by a single organization that is available for anyone to freely use and which has been broadly adopted might also be considered an open standard" (Open Data Institute, 2018).

LERs typically make the claim that a subject has an achievement. That achievement is often related to meeting the attainment criteria of one or more skills. Specifically, in Open Badges and CLR, the achievement either directly represents a skill or is connected to one or more skills through alignment to an identifying Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) for the skill. Multiple different issuers may recognize the same skills by referencing the same URI.

Individual skills/KSAOs are often published individually and organized into one or more collections or frameworks. Skills, frameworks, and related entities can be published interoperably with the open data standards/vocabularies CTDL or CASE.Education and employment ecosystems can align their efforts by using skills frameworks in common. Partnerships or sector-based collaborations that enable education and employment parties to understand the same skills are easiest when skills are collected into a framework and published as open data with identifying URLs for the framework as a whole and for each skill. For example, the U.S. Department of Labor's Competency Clearinghouse Advanced Manufacturing Competency Model, using CTDL-ASN as the metamodel, and serialized as JSON-LD (Credential Engine, 2024c).

SBHA is a strategic approach to recruitment, talent management, and career progression that prioritizes the assessment, acquisition, development, and utilization of specific skills, competencies, and capabilities relevant to job roles and organizational objectives.It is a process by which employers and HR service providers identify, recruit, hire, and advance candidates informed by skills and competency data, helping to more effectively match candidates' skills and competencies with the skill and competency requirements of work or learning opportunities (USCCF, 2022).

A structured machine-readable document that contains the following elements, according to the structure of the W3C VC Data Model Specification version 2.0 (W3C, 2024)Issuer identifier, often in the form of a URL or Decentralized Identifier (DID).A set of claims made by the above issuer about the credential subject, including credential type-specific claims such as those defined by the OB 3.0 or CLR 2.0 schemas.A set of standard metadata properties referring to the credential as a whole (when was it created, when does it expire, etc).A cryptographic signature or seal (proof) that provides data integrity / tamper-detection.Note that this standard specifies only the outer envelope of the credential, not the substance of the claims inside. An issuer follows the structure defined by a specific credential type, like OB 3.0 or CLR 2.0 to make claims.

Verification is performed by verifiers using credential verification code libraries or web services and potentially use-case-specific application logic. Verification includes a set of checks appropriate to the credential type and purpose for verification that may include answering many of these questions:Has the credential been signed by the issuer and not modified since signing?Can the signing key be affirmatively linked to the issuer identifier, for example through DID resolution?Has it expired?Has it been revoked? Credential "status" may be checked through one or more "credential status methods" declared by the issuer in the credential.Does it conform to the expected format? (This step is often called "data validation.")Is it fit for the present purpose?Is the issuer a known entity or is the issuer metadata in the credential authentic?Is the issuer trusted to make the claims included in the credential?

Any party (such as an employer, admissions office, or private individual) that receives a Verifiable Credential, and wishes to perform the verification procedure, can be a verifier, also known as a "relying party." Verifiers employ verification software which verifies the information, data, transactions, or identities expressed in VCs.