SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 31, 2017 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Degreed, the world’s first career-long skills-building platform, today launched Degreed Skill Certification, a new solution that scores applicants’ existing skills across a wide spectrum of categories. In doing so, Degreed has created a new, standardized way for people and employers to measure and communicate career-relevant skills.

As the world’s first system to certify any skill at any level, Degreed’s goal for this new tool is to close the current skills gap within the labor force by allowing people to clearly rate and share skills that may not be apparent from their formal education or resume, regardless of how they built those skills.

“Degreed Skill Certification is a scalable, standardized way to rate and get recognized for the skills you have in whatever scrappy way you obtained them,” said David Blake, CEO of Degreed. “This should unlock opportunities in people’s lives because it will remove the lack of transparency between the education and labor markets.”

Degreed’s proprietary, scientifically-backed technology ranks candidates’ expertise on a scale of one through eight, based on submitted evidence. Now Degreed Skill Certification is available for more than 1,500 of today’s best-paying, and most in-demand skill-sets, including UX design, leadership, photography, web development, project management, sales, data analytics, and creative writing as well as others like forestry and welding.

Unlike other certification offerings on the market, Degreed Skill Certification is not a course or class, but rather an unbiased way to measure existing skills and human performance. Degreed’s proprietary certification process includes experts who review each application and determine which score a candidate will receive. This certification is not an online badge, behavioral assessment, or performance review system. It is a standardized way to review and assess all skills throughout all industries.

“Credentialing skills is one of the most important issues in the job market today,” said Josh Bersin, Principal and Founder, Bersin by Deloitte. “While there are many college degrees, certifications, and certificates to obtain, the half-life of skills is shrinking and we need ways to certify and re-certify skills as disciplines and technologies change. Offerings like Degreed, which dynamically assess skills based on a network of people and behaviors, can add tremendous value to individuals, hiring managers, and HR professionals around the world.”

Over the past five years, Degreed has become an essential learning and development tool for millions of workers at hundreds of the world’s biggest and most progressive employers such as NASA JPL, MasterCard, Bank of America, Intel and Airbnb. In doing so, Degreed has become a trusted source for insights on employees’ skill sets. Degreed will leverage these relationships to help consumers who complete its new Skill Certification to generate career opportunities with its growing roster of clients and hiring partners.

“A big part of the skills gap is a communications problem,” added Blake. “And the companies we work with are innovators. They’re not just pioneering new ways of learning; they’re also exploring novel, data-driven ways to recruit and mobilize people. We’re looking to build on our relationships as well as our data to better connect everyone to relevant, fulfilling career opportunities.”

About Degreed 
Degreed is an award-winning learning platform built to help individuals and organizations develop, measure and share the skills they need – however they learn. Degreed integrates organizations’ internal talent systems with the world’s largest ecosystem of open learning resources — millions of courses, videos, articles, books, podcasts and more from thousands of sources. As a result, organizations and their people can discover, curate, share and track all their learning and development, however and wherever they learn. Founded in 2012, Degreed is headquartered in San Francisco with additional offices in Salt Lake City and Amsterdam.

Learn more about Degreed at: Website | Facebook | Google+ | YouTube | LinkedIn | Twitter

CONTACT: Media Contacts:
Jocelyn Shaw
Degreed
[email protected]