Riipen has partnered with labor market analytics company Lightcast to integrate the Lightcast Open Skills Library to help teachers connect classroom instruction with real-world skills.
VANCOUVER, B.C., Sept. 24, 2024 /PRNewswire/ — Riipen, developer of the popular marketplace platform that helps learners connect with real-world work projects, today announced the launch of a new integration to make it easier for educators and students to translate their education experiences into the labour market. Through a collaboration with Lightcast, a world-leading labour market analytics company, the company is integrating Lightcast’s Open Skills Library into its platform, enabling universities and employers to use a common vocabulary of 32,000 real-world skills in their work-based learning projects.
Lightcast logo.
“Expanding access to real-world workplace learning experiences is critical to helping learners prepare and understand the skills employers are now looking for,” said Dr. Squanto Jaji, vice president for academic innovation and student achievement at Arizona State University. “This new partnership will help the university and its faculty further bridge the gap between education and the evolving demands of the labor market. Aligning curriculum with real-world skills requirements will better prepare students to enter the workforce confidently and competently, and contribute and succeed in their chosen careers.”
According to a recent report from the Strada Future of Work Institute, more than half of recent college graduates are underemployed and working in jobs that don’t require a degree. At the same time, more and more business executives believe that college graduates are unprepared to solve real problems. The latest National College Internship Survey revealed that most college students are unable to pursue internships due to time and financial constraints, further widening the skills and equity gap in the workforce.
To bridge this gap, the Riipen experiential learning platform allows instructors and course designers to incorporate employer-created projects into courses and activities to facilitate work-based learning. Lightcast Open Skills Library integration allows university faculty to use advanced datasets available through the open source library to match course-level instruction to role- and industry-specific skills validated by real employers. Students gain a new level of insight into the world of work and are able to accumulate and transfer a portfolio of specific skills they have demonstrated to future employers.
The Lightcast Open Skills Library is based on data from millions of online job postings, resumes, and profiles, and is continuously updated by a dedicated team of expert economists and labor market analysts. The library is an extensive list of 32,000 skills categorized into 32 broad skill categories with over 400 subcategories. This integration allows Riipen to add a “skilling feature” to all users for free. When creating a project or experience in Riipen, the skills in the Lightcast Open Skills Library are automatically analyzed, and creators can add or refine tagged skills to ensure accuracy.
“Our integration with Lightcast’s Open Skills Library is crucial in further connecting instructors with the skills employers value most, allowing educators to further refine and customize their courses in real time,” said Dana Stephenson, CEO of Riipen. “We’re excited to partner with universities to create a more dynamic, responsive educational environment that further equips learners with the skills they need to succeed in today’s rapidly changing job market.”
To learn more about Riipen and its work with the Lightcast Open Skills Library, visit riipen.com/skills.
About Riipen
Riipen creates transformative opportunities for businesses to collaborate with higher education students to address real-time, real-world challenges embedded directly into the classroom. To date, Riipen has delivered more than 242,000 learning experiences at 680+ higher education institutions and completed 16.2 million hours of applied learning with 41,000 employers. The company’s mission is to help students from all backgrounds and geographies advance their skills, clarify their careers, build their networks, and find work they love. To learn more about Riipen’s workplace-based learning platform, visit riipen.com.
About Lightcast
Lightcast (formerly EMSI Burning Glass) delivers trusted global labour market data, analytics and expert guidance to help communities, businesses and learning providers make informed decisions and navigate an increasingly complex world of work. With a database of over 2 billion job listings and 400 million career profiles, our team delivers best-in-class customer service with robust skills, jobs and opportunity data, clear analytics and expert guidance.
Source: Riipen
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