Snellville: Not a Badge of Honor, But a Badge of Experience
This is the second article in a three-part series. You can find the first part, focused on Watkinsville, here and the third part about Macon, here.
Snellville City Employees
Snellville-area students, job-seekers and employees looking to improve their old resume are fortunate to have access to the city’s newly launched Digital Badge Program through LRNG.org, an online resource “powered by” Southern New Hampshire University. Users identify skills that they need to hone and take a specially designed online course (typically several hours in length but doesn’t have to be completed all at once, or by a specific deadline). Once the course is successfully completed, the user is awarded a digital badge, which the city bills as “an indicator of accomplishment or skill that can be displayed, accessed and verified online.”
So, instead of receiving a paper certificate, the user’s badges accumulate in their account, all of which are shareable with potential or current employers by providing a simple link. Examples of badge programs are financial management, literacy skills and time management, but the city is working with local employers to develop curriculum to meet their trade-specific needs, such as an introduction to welding certificate. (Check out the Snellville-specific portal at
www.lrng.org/o/city-of-snellville.)
“We wanted to find something low-cost that would really be a tool for our residents and high school graduates to close the gap between skills that companies want and those that high school graduates don’t have,” said Eric G. Van Otteren, Snellville’s economic development manager.
The city selected this particular program over others because it offers an added layer of accountability.
“Everything the participant does to earn badges in the platform has to be approved in the back end by someone who’s monitoring or proctoring the badges.”
Perhaps best of all, this skills-development program is free to all those with access to a computer.
“There’s no cost barrier, anybody of any socioeconomic level can just jump in,” Van Otteren said, adding, “You just have to commit the time.”
Van Otteren has big plans for the future of the badge program, particularly to see the number of badge opportunities expand to meet all needs.
“We hope it promotes the city as one that is interested in working with people to help them grow.”
This is one part of a longer article called “Georgia’s Cities Use Technology to Better Engage Citizens” that appears in the March/April 2020 edition of Georgia’s Cities Magazine.