If you’re passionate about building a better future for individuals, communities, and our country—and you’re committed to working hard to play your part in building that future—consider WGU as the next step in your career.

Driven by a mission to expand access to higher education through online, competency-based degree programs, WGU is also committed to being a great place to work for a diverse workforce of student-focused professionals. The university has pioneered a new way to learn in the 21st century, one that has received praise from academic, industry, government, and media leaders. Whatever your role, working for WGU gives you a part to play in helping students graduate, creating a better tomorrow for themselves and their families.

The salary range for this position takes into account the wide range of factors that are considered in making compensation decisions including but not limited to skill sets; experience and training; licensure and certifications; and other business and organizational needs.

At WGU, it is not typical for an individual to be hired at or near the top of the range for their position, and compensation decisions are dependent on the facts and circumstances of each case. A reasonable estimate of the current range is:
 

Pay Range: $75,400.00 - $113,100.00

Job Description

Job Profile Summary

Western Governors University is hiring a Lead Skills Architect to join our team onsite in Salt Lake City, Utah.

The Lead Skills Architect assumes broad responsibility for creating, maintaining, and using program maps comprised of outcome stacks & assessment trajectories that are aligned with applicable marketable skills and standards. The Lead Skills Architect is responsible for creating program maps that improve student outcomes and create the foundation for a variety of educational program needs such as personalized pathways, career planning, industry, and accreditation alignment, prior learning assessment, alternative credentialing and pathways, open loop learning, curriculum development efficiency, and student success. This individual will collaborate closely with stakeholders across various roles and functions to research and incorporate tools, techniques, and best practices from curriculum development, instructional design, content management, and information science to implement the WGU approach to program architecture. The Lead Skills Architect is responsible for the success of many simultaneous projects, assessing risk, reporting progress, and communicating effectively with stakeholders to promote collaboration and accountability.

Essential Functions and Responsibilities

• Manages the development of assigned program maps, including identification and creation of frameworks, pathways, sequences, outcome scaffolds, and assessment trajectories for online learning environments and competency-based education

• Creates, maintains, and utilizes ontologies, taxonomies, vocabularies, and tagging codes, clusters, classes, and hierarchies to mark, organize, and maximize the usefulness of relevant relationships between domains, competencies, outcomes, content, levels, assessments, standards, skills, credentials, occupations, etc.

• Advises and participates in the preparation of materials for stakeholder partners

• Assists in the development, delivery, and maintenance of program products and services, including program maps, curriculum resources, and online learning experiences

• Contributes to the creation or acquisition of tools to scaffold, create, organize, tag, visualize, and store program maps, as well as automate these processes

• Participates in the development of processes, workflows, methodologies, and strategies for the creation, review, refinement, tracking, sharing, and use of program maps throughout the university

• Serves as a catalyst for appropriate and productive change that increases both operational efficiency and student outcomes

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities

• Thorough understanding of curriculum development, instructional design, competency-based education, adaptive/personalized learning, and assessment development

• Knowledge of accreditation, policies, and procedures

• Ability to apply processes and requirements related to the program mapping effort

• Ability to identify requirements for ontologies and taxonomies and develop and adapt these to current curriculum mapping needs.

• Advanced technical writing and editing skills

• Advanced critical thinking, analysis, and synthesis skills

• Ability to develop and use metrics to measure and improve both processes and program maps

• Ability to collaborate with content specialists, technologists, and development teams to maximize the value of curriculum maps to the WGU user community

• Ability to facilitate collaboration, support, and approval from a variety of stakeholders

• Ability to manage multiple projects efficiently and work independently under minimal supervision

• Thorough understanding of project management, needs assessment, and risk management

Competencies

Organizational or Student Impact:

• Accountable for decisions that impact the program or course.

• Leads program/course initiatives to improve Key Results.

• This individual is a go-to person at the program/course level.

• May actively contribute to university, college, or cluster-level initiatives.

Problem Solving & Decision Making:

• Resolves problems that require broad-based consideration of variables at the program/course level.

• Work is situational and highly complex, and difficulties faced require detailed information gathering and analysis at the program/course. 

• Acts as a technical advisor and may assist in completing tasks to achieve team deliverables.

Communication & Influence:

• Communicates with students if/as appropriate to the teaching practice area.

• Communicates and collaborates with fellow faculty members within and across disciplines and practice.

• Drives feedback and continuous improvement recommendations to discipline/practice leadership.

• Attends professional conferences and association meetings focused on the faculty member’s discipline or practice area and engages in discourse with fellow attendees.

• May contribute to WGU and college brand development

Leadership & Talent Management:

• Considered program, course, or practice leader.

• A source of advice, mentoring, and counsel within the applicable discipline or practice.

• Leads program, course, or practice learning and quality initiatives within area of specialty.

• Model’s best practices within specialty areas use insights to guide other discipline or practice members and produce measurable results.

• Establish coverage within and between teams to meet service-level agreements.

• Implements workflows and optimizes team resources.

• Model sound change management practices.

Job Qualifications

Minimum Qualifications:

• 3+ years of relevant professional experience and experience relevant to the specific practice at WGU

• This role will be a demonstrated subject matter expert in job-relevant content or practice areas

• 2+ years of highly successful practice, based on student outcomes, in the role area/practice

• 2+ years designing and implementing projects, processes, or practices with measurable results

Department Specific Minimum Qualifications:

• Master’s degree in instructional design, education, information science, or relevant field

• 3+ years’ experience in curriculum mapping, creation of outcomes, or learning science and experience

• Knowledge of and proficiency with online learning and assessment

• Experience in online learning technologies and pedagogies

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience with or knowledge of user experience design or software development will be viewed favorably

• Experience with content management, metadata, and content management systems will be viewed favorably

#LI-SC

#D&I

To explore more about our company and what makes working here special, visit our website at https://www.wgu.edu/about.html. To view current career opportunities and apply, please visit https://www.wgu.edu/about/careers.html.

Position & Application Details

Full-Time Regular Positions (classified as regular and working 40 standard weekly hours): This is a full-time, regular position (classified for 40 standard weekly hours) that is eligible for bonuses; medical, dental, vision, telehealth and mental healthcare; health savings account and flexible spending account; basic and voluntary life insurance; disability coverage; accident, critical illness and hospital indemnity supplemental coverages; legal and identity theft coverage; retirement savings plan; wellbeing program; discounted WGU tuition; and flexible paid time off for rest and relaxation with no need for accrual, flexible paid sick time with no need for accrual, 11 paid holidays, and other paid leaves, including up to 12 weeks of parental leave.

How to Apply: If interested, an application will need to be submitted online. Internal WGU employees will need to apply through the internal job board in Workday.

Additional Information

Disclaimer: The job posting highlights the most critical responsibilities and requirements of the job. It’s not all-inclusive.

Accommodations: Applicants with disabilities who require assistance or accommodation during the application or interview process should contact our Talent Acquisition team at [email protected].

Equal Opportunity Employer: We are an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability or protected veteran status. #DEI