Competency-Based Learning & Human-Centered Design: A Future-Ready Shift | Camp

As automation and artificial intelligence reshape the future of work, educators face a critical question: Are we preparing students for a world defined by automation and innovation?

In this episode of The Brighter Side of Education, Dr. Lisa Hassler speaks with Camp, Head of Teaching and Learning at New England Innovation Academy, about how competency-based learning and human-centered design can work together to support meaningful, future-ready education.

The conversation explores research-backed approaches to assessment, including evidence showing that competency-based environments grounded in strong student–teacher relationships improve student achievement. John shares how schools can maintain academic rigor while shifting the focus from grades to demonstrated mastery, transferable skills, and ethical technology use.

Listeners will gain insight into:

• The limitations of traditional grading systems
• How competency-based assessment supports deeper learning
• The role of human-centered design in student engagement and belonging
• Responsible approaches to integrating AI in teaching and learning
• Small, actionable changes educators can make to innovate within constraints

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This episode supports professional learning for educators, instructional leaders, and education stakeholders seeking research-informed strategies for designing learning that is both innovative and deeply human.

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Sponsored by Dr. Gregg Hassler Jr., DMD
Trusted dental care for healthy smiles and stronger communities—building brighter futures daily.

Chapters

• 0:00 Setting The Human Stakes
• 1:51 Why Competency Beats Seat Time
• 3:39 Evidence, Feedback, And Belonging
• 5:35 Meet John Camp And NEIA
• 6:59 Building A Human-Centered School
• 9:23 Voice, Belonging, And Iteration
• 10:46 The Competency Mashup Explained
• 13:19 Cross-Disciplinary Competencies In Action
• 15:31 Assessments Without Grades
• 18:31 Translating Mastery To Transcripts
• 21:23 Innovation Studio And Entrepreneurship
• 23:21 AI Tools, Guardrails, And A New Competency

Transcript

Dr. Lisa Hassler: 0:19

Artificial intelligence can now write essays, solve equations, and even pass exams, yet none of it replaces curiosity, empathy, or creativity. So what happens when schools start redesigning learning to value those human skills as much as content? Across the country, forward-thinking educators are blending competency-based learning, human-centered design, and emerging technologies to prepare students not just to keep pace with change, but to lead it. Educators across the world share a growing concern. Are we preparing students for a world defined by automation and innovation? Content mastery alone is no longer enough. According to the World Economic Forum, nearly half of today's work activities could be automated by 2055, underscoring the need for students to develop uniquely human skills, empathy, collaboration, adaptability, and critical thinking. Competency-based learning offers a way forward. Unlike traditional grading systems tied to seat time and averages, it allows students to progress by demonstrating mastery to specific skills and concepts. This approach emphasizes flexibility, feedback, and evidence of understanding rather than grades alone, mirroring how professionals learn and grow in the real world. A 2023 study in Frontiers in Computer Science found that competency-based environments grounded in strong student-teacher relationships significantly improve achievement. Other studies show that when CBE is paired with human-centered design principles where empathy and problem solving drive instruction, students demonstrate higher engagement, persistence, and creative confidence. Meanwhile, AI-driven learning tools are opening new possibilities. When used responsibly, they help teachers personalize instruction, provide instant feedback, and support diverse learning pathways, all while freeing educators to focus on mentoring and relationship building. The key, experts emphasize, is ensuring technology enhances, not replaces, the human connection at the heart of learning. Together, these frameworks, competency-based learning, human-centered design, and AI integration, are reshaping what forward ready really means. Students aren't just learning to keep up with change, they're learning to lead it. Here to discuss what it takes to prepare students for the future of work and learning is John Camp, head of teaching and learning at the New England Innovation Academy at Marlborough, Massachusetts. Since NEIA's launch in 2021, Camp has played a key role in developing the school's competency-based grading system, which aligns real-world learning with academic rigor and college readiness. His work combines STEM innovation, entrepreneurship, and human-centered design, creating classrooms where students experiment, collaborate, and use emerging technologies like AI to solve authentic problems. Camp, welcome to the brighter side of education.

John Camp: 3:55

Thank you, Lisa. I'm very happy to be here.

Dr. Lisa Hassler: 3:57

You have helped build this from the ground up. So can you talk about human-centered design as this school was built with the intentionality of one of the first human-designed schools for middle and high school?

John Camp: 4:09

Sure. One of our early taglines that I still believe in every day was that we want to be the school the world needs next. That's lofty ambition, obviously, but the whole concept is to be thinking about education differently. So I say our innovation is not only like our cool makerspace and our storytelling studio, but also like how we teach, how we design things. So we've leaned in on human-centered design as the method by which we do think about making changes or evaluating our program. And basically, human-centered design is just another design thinking mechanism. So we follow that iterative process when we want to make changes or think about building out a program, but also we focus on the phrase human-centered, with the student at the center being the primary focus for why we're doing something, always remembering like what is the student experience at a school the world needs next. Like what does that student need? And that might mean on a macro level as a school, but also we talk a lot as teaching staff about meeting the students where they are in the room and approaching it that way. But the whole root of human-centered design in general, like the design process, is having the user at the center and doing all of your groundwork to create something of value for that user. And so for us, that user is our students.

Dr. Lisa Hassler: 5:24

How has that made a shift in the teacher and the student experience?

John Camp: 5:28

We believe strongly in belonging and togetherness. And so the aspect where we can interact with students in a way where we value their voice and respect their voice, which can often be challenging things at school. So we like to really manage that and invite those conversations and also, you know, have really good interactions with students where we have to push back or coach them on wait, that maybe that wasn't the best way to give feedback or those types of things. But overall, it's really just having a lot of voices be involved in the process for how you develop things. Almost on a daily basis, we're asking questions about what should we do here. Or one of our main concepts is no matter what is working, every year we will evaluate that and be like, should does that need to iterate? Do we need that to change? Because if we're the school the world needs next, we have to be attentive to being relevant and future focused all the time in our decision-making processes. So that's just really important to us for how we engage with our clientele, which again is students, it's families, and it's with our staff.

Dr. Lisa Hassler: 6:27

Now you have a competency-based model as well. How does that work?

John Camp: 6:31

Yeah. So we have a competency-based model that I call a mashup of many competency-based systems. It has mastery elements, it has competency-based elements, it has standard elements, as traditional grading elements, and it has no grade elements. So there are really five different systems that we integrate into what we call our competency-based systems. So somebody might look at our system and be like, oh, that's more standards-based, or like, oh, that's more mastery-based. And I sort of like, yeah, what we were able to do as a, particularly as a startup school, is examine assessment overall and pull from what we think are the best processes for assessment and build it into our program. Does that mean we have it figured out? Absolutely not. We iterate our competencies every year, but it's the way to think about not falling into the inertia of uh traditional grading. So the way our competency system works is we have a bank of competencies that go across the whole school. So I might be using a competency in humanities class, I teach humanities. I might be using that a competency in humanities class that a science teacher is also using, that a visual arts is teacher is also using. Because we believe that our competencies are not just skills that you should be able to apply in school, you should be able to apply them in life. And so we're we're really thinking beyond just somebody doing school well. So after that, those bank of competencies go across the school, each subject area or department also has two to three competencies that are salient to just that subject area. So, for example, in science, science has three competencies. So if somebody came to me and said, Oh, I really want to know how this student is doing in science, we can show them their grade because we do, our system does compute the letter grades, and we'll talk about that soon in terms of transcript. But because that that grade is tapped into many of the different competencies, we can also then go to their specific science competencies to be like, oh, you can see right here how they're doing in the science specifically the skills that matter in that subject.

Dr. Lisa Hassler: 8:25

So, like what competency skills would be in science, for instance, then that would be different.

John Camp: 8:30

Here's one. I model systems to develop scientific explanations and show the interactions among the important parts. Okay. So that very specific to science, and a science teacher can use that. We teach integrated science through from sixth through tenth grade, which means we swirl bio, chem, and physics. So that particular competency right there, I model systems to develop scientific explanations and interactions that can apply to any one of the main domains. And so that's how we think about that as well. That the skills that we want students to do relevant to integrated concepts within science, but also elsewhere. But the other cool thing about our competencies is I could use, as a humanities teacher, I could use a science competency if I wanted, like if it applied to whatever it was I was doing. I very often use visual arts competencies, Innovation Studio is a required course here, those competencies for things I might be doing in a humanities class.

Dr. Lisa Hassler: 9:24

How would you grade a competency-based skill?

John Camp: 9:27

Yeah, the way our system works is we don't prescribe or prevent any type of assessment type. Whatever a teacher for the students, again, students at the center, students, what they need at the time, what type of assessment do you need to have the student show their learning and skills? We use a single panel rubric, and so the competency as it's stated is on there, and how that competency should look on that assessment. That specific assessment is explained to a student. When a student gets an assessment back, they don't get an 87, they don't get a 93, they don't get an A minus or anything like that. They only get the competencies and the measure for each one of those competencies. So rather than just looking at a work as a whole and being like, oh, I get a B, instead, they actually see the skills that they worked on on that assessment with targeted feedback and a measure about each one. And we just believe that deepens the learning and that accentuates the skills involved. And then each one of those competencies does funnel into a course grade. So students still at NIA will get a course grade, will have what looks like a traditional transcript with a letter grade, but on any assessment within a class at any time, they are not getting a grade on it. And what that's done, I'll be honest, is it's helped de-emphasize grades a little bit, right? Like students are still obsessed with grades, but it definitely has de-emphasized that whole aspect, like you get something back and we're like, oh no, I get a C. Instead, it's like, oh, I got these different competencies. And we use a program called Otis as our grade book. And what Otis does is it will tailor to our system. And so they take all of our competencies and they take our matrix by how the competencies compute to a grade and everything, and it's all in there. And then I could look, I could click on that iModel competency that we talked about. Like I could go into Lisa's profile and click on iModel and see a graph of how she's done on that competency throughout the course.

Dr. Lisa Hassler: 11:18

I'm happy to hear that you're using Otis. I did talk to the founder and do an interview with him. So he is in the podcast episodes. Yes. Fantastic concept. And I love that he created it while he was teaching. So when you talk about the alternative assessments, they're not getting grades, but they're basically seeing if they've reached that competency.

John Camp: 11:38

We originally had our competency system without grades, but obviously grades are essential for many reasons for college process and other things. So we were like, okay, keep the integrity of our system, but also convert it into a grade system. So we did many, many, many conversations to get the matrix that we wanted that would equate a B at NIA the same as a B at any other school because we wanted our transcript to look like every other transcript. So a college admissions person wasn't looking at graphs or bubbles and things like that, trying to figure that out. We want it to look like other transcripts. Because we're a school that does things differently, I call it turning the page. We want somebody in a college admissions person to look at a transcript and be like, oh, this looks like every transcript I've ever seen. I can see the grades, I can see the courses, and we want them to turn the page and see the cool things a student has done at NIA through their individual pathway and story. So if we didn't have grades, like if we if we did things like with different bars and things like that, we might, they might not turn the page. And so now we feel very comfortable, like probably the most traditional thing we do is give a course grade and a transcript, but it's very important for our clientele, for the external world, to be able to have a GPA in a transcript, and it works. One thing that I do a lot of times with presentations too is I'll show an example of a transcript because, in terms of the courses we offer, like I said, we require Innovation Studio. We have two credits of entrepreneurship classes required. When a student does an independent study here, we call it a passion dive. And it doesn't just say independent study on the transcript, it says passion dive colon. And then what the student did, like they name it. So it tells the transcript, then is telling more of an individual story for that student in terms of the classes they've taken and those sorts of things. So, like we think our transcript looks like a traditional transcript, but also has some cool knee things in there, and it also has grades.

Dr. Lisa Hassler: 13:29

Can you talk more about the AI innovation of the school and how you're teaching the AI with entrepreneurship skills that does not diminish critical thinking skills? So, how are you able to harness those skills in a way that is helping them advance in whether it's entrepreneurship or creative skills?

John Camp: 13:50

So we require a class called Innovation Studio. It's mostly a design class, but it's a very making class. So there's a furniture design elective, there's an apps for impact elective, there's a games for change elective. So you have things like that as part of the Innovation Studio class. If you want to be an entrepreneur, you could come to NIA as a high school student and learn how to buy and sell a venture. But we also value an entrepreneurial mindset where we teach students those concepts that can be applied in any avenue of life. Like I say all the time, like using my entrepreneurial skills every day as the head of teaching and learning at this school. But back to AI, which I think is really important. Obviously, as a school of innovation, we've leaned into AI. We have a director of innovation here who has overseen our A our AI rollout. We there are three programs that we give access to, all staff and students are right now. There's our Gemini, Notebook LM, and Khan Academy, specifically Con Migo within that. So that way we all have a common language, at least about what we're using for AIs, but we also have very intentional AI scales of use. So there's four scales of note the human only to AI as a collaborator to AI as a thought partner to full AI use. And so on any assignment or assessment, teachers will be saying one of those four scales for whatever it is. We want to embrace it, but we also want to help students understand the value of the tool and also how to manage the tool. And there are going to be times when nope, no AI, and there's going to be times like all AI. And either way, it's our job to teach students that, to work with the students on that. And this scale system helps us articulate and be upfront and honest with students about what those tools are and then help them utilize them well. We actually have a competency based on AI. The wording is I leverage AI critically and creatively, using it to support reasoning, experimentation, and originality. So that competency then is a skill that we can incorporate into any one of our assessments, and a student can understand, get targeted feedback about how did they use AI? We said you could use AI as a collaborator. Well, you're going to get feedback on how you did that.

Dr. Lisa Hassler: 15:55

Yeah, I like that because it's giving them guardrails, a very clear path. This is how you use it in this situation, looking at that human-centered design that you have, which is building the soft skills of collaboration, adaptability, communication. How are you doing that balance of making sure that you are still intentionally building those skills into the instruction and assessment?

John Camp: 16:16

Yeah, so we have a competency called I Collaborate. So again, like our competency system is sort of built around skills that are useful in school and outside outside of school. One of my favorite competencies we have is like connect new ideas to previous learning. And so, you know, for example, as a humanities teacher, I might be like, okay, we learned about colonization when we introduced Haiti. And now we're going into talking about this. Take that previous learning, connect it to this other material. Okay. And I say, listen, in real life, you need to connect your new ideas to previous learning in a relationship with your family when you're applying to college, when you're going for an interview, all those types of things are really important. Those are skills that we're honing in on in school on assessments that then we also believe will translate into life.

Dr. Lisa Hassler: 17:02

Are you seeing that by having, like you're talking about like the four competencies in AI, is that helping with ethical considerations with uh students?

John Camp: 17:10

Yeah. So we obviously need to have a lot of conversations about ethical use of AI. Again, those scales help because we embrace AI, like those are the conversations that happen when you're using AI, right? About the ethical use and those types of things. So yeah, I think it's really important. And that that's where I get scared sometimes when people are like totally accept, let AI it anyway, or don't do it at all. It's like you need to be having those conversations with students about the ethical use and all the nuances that are in between those two poles, basically.

Dr. Lisa Hassler: 17:42

The way that you're handling the AI is the same way that you're handling assessment and how you're handling the different sorts of designs of the school. How do you support teachers when it comes to embracing new innovation and being able to take risks?

John Camp: 17:58

Yeah, so obviously when we hire, we have questions about flexibility, about empathy. Those are like parts of our forgiveness. Those are like parts of our literal interview questions for the type of community you want, but we also the type of mindsets you need to be innovative and be able to adapt and be agile. But what's super interesting about being at a school like this is the box, like I always say it that the traditional box is very strong, like safe. And most people are inside the box. So, you know, with families and students, et cetera, like they might think they want something innovative, right? And then they get there, be like, well, where's this, that, or the other thing? So my biggest thing is always don't think about what you're missing, think about what you're getting. But but back to that concept of teachers, you can tell fairly early on in an interview if somebody does want that. I'll I'll tell a quick story that I was interviewing a math teacher once, and I was like, okay, say I came into your class two o'clock in the afternoon, what would I see? And he said, Well, I'd be up at the whiteboard teaching math. I was like, okay, but like, you know, say I stayed for like 10, 15 minutes, what would I see? What else would I see? He said I'd be at the whiteboard teaching math. Like, okay, that person's not coming to Nia, right? Like that that type of instruction will work for some people in some places, but not here. That's not how we do things. We want to be innovative in in how we teach as well as how we operate. Does that mean we don't have direct instructions? Of course not. We do, but it wouldn't be for 40 minutes or 50 minutes or anything like that. So we believe in UDL, Universal Design for Learning. We have a director of curriculum. So we we have our department chairs that help. So it's having as many conversations about teaching as possible. Because sometimes, even when a teacher comes and they want to do part of this, it's like the slide back in traditional ways is is powerful. So we have to like support them and help them be like, well, how do we can't how do we think about this differently? And sort of the assessment system is one of those things that it takes a little while to get used to assessing that way because you you might be used to, you know, this is going to be out of 10 points or this is going to be out of 100 points. And that's just not how it works. So we have to do a lot of coaching to help that along.

Dr. Lisa Hassler: 19:59

What would you suggest for educators who want to start that innovation to start to infuse the creative energy that you're talking about, going a little bit outside that box into their own classrooms? What's a change that they can make, whether it's a mindset, a structure, maybe a classroom practice that can maybe open the door to more future-ready learning?

John Camp: 20:19

Yeah, the one way I think about that is for any teacher or leader to look at like, okay, what is a problem that you want to improve? Like I always think of the Neil Postman question, what is the problem for which this is the solution? So, like, think about the problem. And then in a lot of times you'll have barriers to solving that problem. And my biggest advice is to have courage to make a change of some sort. So, for example, like one thing we we will do to help teachers is we'll be like, bring an assessment to a meeting. All right. And now we want you to create three different ways you could do that assessment, that type of thing. So, like, okay, you have this assessment that works. That's great. But what are some other ways you can do it? Because then that can be translated into I'm gonna run this session on Hamlet today, I'm gonna do it this way. I'm gonna think about doing it differently than I've done it before in a way that connects with students. So I really think it's about thinking about the problem. And very often that might be like to picture a student in a class that you want to reach or picture something that you feel like needs to be changed, and in the system sort of will wants to fight against that, like having the courage to make a small change if possible. I mean, one of the reasons I'm at NIA is at every school I've been at, I've always been, you know, arguably the most progressive teacher. This is why the competence system, I embrace it so much. Is throughout my career, I've been researching and kind of obsessed with assessments. At some of those traditional schools, I've had to take risks and be like, let's do standards based for this unit or this class. Or, you know, at my last school, I was like, we're gonna try no grades, we're gonna try this. And I was told no. And I was like, okay, what are the elements of the no grade format, particularly like targeted feedback, that I can still do within the parameters I was given by the administration to help achieve some of those aims to adjust? Like one of my favorite quotes is if you don't like something, change it. And if you can't change it, change the way you think about it. And sometimes changing the way you think about it is being adaptive to the uh parameters you're given, but still. Innovating within those parameters.

Dr. Lisa Hassler: 22:20

I think that that leads for a lot of creativity when you have to be able to think about I want this, but I have the constraints of this. How do I still make it happen? And that's where teacher agency on creativity becomes crucial.

John Camp: 22:33

Yes. And one thing we say to teachers is try it. We'll see how it goes. And if it fails, okay, it fails. Like as a school that values innovation where failing forward is literally a part of the DNA, we are very open when, like, it didn't work and it's okay, I'm going to move on and I'm going to learn from that.

Dr. Lisa Hassler: 22:49

That's wonderful. Well, Camp, thank you so much for sharing how innovation and humanity can coexist in education. Your work shows that when we combine technology, empathy, and mastery-based learning, we prepare our students to not only adapt to change, but also being able to lead it with purpose and integrity.

John Camp: 23:08

Thank you so much, Lisa. I really appreciate you having me on.

Dr. Lisa Hassler: 23:11

This week, consider one skill, academic or human, that you want your students to master more deeply. Design one opportunity for them to demonstrate that skill in action, whether through a project, reflection, or peer collaboration. Shifting from what did they score to what can they create can transform how learning feels for both students and teachers. If you have a story about what's working in your schools that you'd like to share, you can email me at Lisa at drlisaarhassler.com or visit my website at www.drlisaarhassler.com and send me a message. If you like this podcast, subscribe and tell a friend. The more people that know, the bigger impact it will have. And if you find value to the content in this podcast, consider becoming a supporter by clicking on the supporter link in the show notes. It is the mission of this podcast to shine light on the good in education so that it spreads, affecting positive change. So let's keep working together to find solutions that focus on our children's success.