Honoring Educator Voice and Choice: Delaware’s Multi-Pathway Approach to Professional Learning

The Delaware Department of Education (DDOE) is committed to offering deep, engaging professional learning focused on standards-aligned instruction structured around a central goal to honor teacher voice and choice. Towards this goal, Digital Promise has partnered with DDOE to support a professional learning strategy with multiple pathways, including competency-based micro-credentials, which provide a new way for educators to engage in and demonstrate their professional growth and, depending on specific state and/or district programs, count towards relicensure hours.

The move toward multiple pathways grew directly out of educator feedback. Teachers expressed a clear need for professional learning that allowed them to demonstrate what they already knew rather than sitting through required training that didn’t reflect their experience or expertise. Micro-credentials quickly emerged as a natural fit. They offer educators a way to demonstrate specific competencies through evidence-based submissions while engaging in a self-directed, reflective learning process.

Before developing their own micro-credentials in partnership with Digital Promise, DDOE conducted a pilot with existing micro-credentials to better understand how educators experienced this kind of learning. The results provided valuable insight: while some teachers embraced micro-credentials enthusiastically, others preferred more traditional, structured forms of professional learning. This feedback helped shape Delaware’s multi-pathway approach, grounded in the understanding that high-quality professional learning should be as diverse as the educators who engage in it. Some prefer online courses or workshops, while others thrive through the self-paced, reflective structure of micro-credentials. Delaware’s model ensures that educators have the flexibility to choose the format that best meets their needs.

Instead of a top-down mandate, the program grew organically, driven by educators and content experts who saw the value of giving teachers greater autonomy and flexibility in their professional growth. Initially, multiple learning pathways for educators were developed to pursue learning in alignment with the Delaware Early Literacy Plan. As the literacy plan took shape, leaders in other content areas such as world languages, health and physical fitness, and digital learning began adopting similar models to recognize skills in a personalized, competency-based assessment approach. That philosophy has since extended into the new teacher induction program, which incorporates micro-credentials developed by the National Education Association (NEA). Across all initiatives, Delaware’s definition of a micro-credential aligns closely with Digital Promise’s—honoring the various ways educators build and demonstrate their skills.

Educators who completed micro-credentials also identified several benefits compared to other types of professional learning, including:

• Self-pacing, allowing them to learn on their own time and at their own speed
• A focus on relevant skills that directly align with their students’ needs
• A high degree of personalization, ensuring that learning was meaningful to their unique teaching contexts
• A reflection-oriented process that encouraged deeper thinking about practice
• Freedom to choose content most aligned to their goals and classroom realities
• Access to research and resources that supported immediate implementation and growth

To help educators and leaders navigate this new learning landscape, Digital Promise worked with the Delaware team to develop a comprehensive micro-credential toolkit. The toolkit explains what micro-credentials are, how to engage with them, and what it means when an educator earns one. It was designed for all levels of the education system—teachers, coaches, administrators, and district/charter school leaders—so that everyone has a shared understanding of how micro-credentials fit into Delaware’s professional learning ecosystem. Social media, email campaigns, union networks such as the Delaware State Education Association (DSEA) have all been engaged to help drive awareness of the toolkit and learning opportunities. This broad outreach helps ensure that educators across the state know about the opportunities available to them.

As the program continues to expand, Delaware is launching new micro-credentials in areas like health and physical education, with additional topics planned for the future. Across all efforts, DDOE has maintained focus on meaningful, standards-aligned professional learning opportunities that respect educators’ expertise, provide flexibility, and promote continuous growth. By offering multiple pathways, including micro-credentials that validate real-world practice, Delaware is redefining what professional learning can look like.