Agenda Session

For 100 years, grades and test scores have been the standard assessment of student skill. They have been the markers for college admissions, internships, and career opportunities. However, grades alone leave much to be desired in real-world skill assessment. They fail to assess tangible, workforce skills such as teamwork, collaboration, and innovation. They struggle to accurately model hands-on capabilities related to engineering and hardware development that are so crucial to the blue economy. To streamline the workforce development pipeline, we must upend this paradigm and focus on assessment of real-world skills, not teach-to-the-test skills. Robotics competitions provide a valuable alternative pathway toward assessing student workforce readiness. This presentation showcases the work conducted by the Institute of Competition Sciences and the MATE ROV Competition to create an improved workforce readiness assessment using robotics competitions. We will discuss the work to date and explore future opportunities with the audience.