University of Phoenix has released a new white paper titled “Leveraging Achieved Skills to Improve Confidence Between Students and Employers.” The publication, authored by Francisco Contreras and Brandon Edwards from the university’s careers product team, examines how documenting students’ achievements and attested skills can help both students and employers communicate more effectively about job qualifications.
“When learners can see verified, granular skills mapped from their coursework and experience—and employers can see the same—confidence rises on both sides,” said Francisco Contreras, senior product manager. “This research shows how better skills transparency can prompt potentially qualified students to click ‘apply’.”
The white paper details the university’s process for mapping academic programs to market-relevant skills. It explains that earned course skills are recorded alongside self-attested abilities gained through prior work experience. The team used a standardized taxonomy to create a microservice that tracks student achievements and skills. This system is designed to match students with job postings that fit their current or developing skill sets.
Pilot experiments described in the report showed positive engagement rates: one job posting viewed by 22 students resulted in over 31% clicking to apply, with 71% of those applicants submitting résumés. Of these, 80% were rated as “good candidates” by recruiters. Another pilot saw more than half of 27 viewers clicking to apply, with 40% submitting résumés.
“Our approach structures skills data so talent teams can match real-time job requirements with learners’ earned and self-attested skills,” said Brandon Edwards, engineer. “Behind the scenes, efficient queries allow talent recruiters to tune thresholds and quickly refine the pool of skills-aligned candidates.”
Contreras and Edwards are members of the Career Accelerator Team at University of Phoenix. This group brings together engineers and designers using Agile methods to build products supporting students and alumni. Their achievements microservice is a key part of developing the Talent Sourcing Tool for the Career Navigator platform, which aims to connect employers with university-affiliated job seekers.
The product team emphasizes early engagement with both students and recruiters during integration planning. Regular interviews help them understand user experiences in real time so they can build tools that efficiently link organizations with suitable candidates while providing clear application paths for job seekers.
