The Lab engaged 400 students and 60 college coordinators representing career services, retention offices, and alumni affairs as part of the Thurgood Marshall College Fund’s Annual Leadership Institute. The energy was high as students from 47 publicly-supported HBCUs ‘suited up’ to learn about the skills necessary to be successful in today’s very competitive global workforce.

The Lab’s Don Fraser spoke to the group about the gig economy, crowd-based capitalism, and skills-based hiring as key global workforce trends and begged the question: are our students ready for this world? We rolled up our sleeves to design solutions to help the schools feel more confident answering ‘yes’ to that question.

The Lab’s 21st Century Skills Badging Challenge is one effective way to help build students’ awareness of and capabilities around the skills employers are seeking. We challenged the group to “imagine a world without a resume” and, using real student resumes, developed a “unique display of their skills in a creative format.” The groups came up with examples that utilized VR, mobile technology, podcasts, and video–all more robust than the one-dimensional resume and capable of more clearly displaying the skills and supporting artifacts in which employers would be most interested.