At the 9th Commonwealth Youth Ministers’ Meeting in Kampala, Uganda, Ministers reiterated their commitment to promote youth work as a profession across sectors that work with young people, and in relation to advancing the Commonwealth Higher Education Consortium for Youth Work (CYMM Communique, 2017, p.3). The University of Mauritius is part of the Consortium and a full-fledged curriculum has been designed as open educational resources (OERs). In this project, it is proposed to repurpose these OERs into stand-alone eLearning modules to be delivered on a state-of-the-art MOOC based platform to address a key gap the social work sector. The project aims to apply the concept of digital micro-credentials in a lifelong learning context to promote professional development in an innovative context. A professional development framework focused competency-based approach will be elaborated using the concept of open badges, as microcredentials and supported by blockchain technology to maintain integrity of the credentials acquired. Such credentials will be institutionally recognised and transferable into university credits which can lead to official qualifications (certificate or diplomas and even degrees) in time and in a flexible manner. This model will help to address the current capacity building needs in line with the pressing issues to be address with the SDG context especially in Youth Work and promote employability potential of its target audience. However, the model to be developed will be scalable to apply in other areas (Human Rights, Climate Change, Health and Safety) to facilitate the development of knowledge societies.
