How Do NFTs Support Education?

Reading Time: 4 minutes

Since the rise of non-fungible tokens in the art industry, their use has been implemented in various areas, including education. What is its impact inside and outside the classroom?

How Do NFTs Support Education?
Photo: iStock/Grandbrothers
Reading time 4 minutes
Reading Time: 4 minutes

Based on blockchain technology, non-fungible tokens add credit, recognition, and merit to the career paths of students and teachers.

Non-fungible tokens, better known as NFTs, have arisen in the market to bestow originality and value to certain digital assets. Today, they are used in the artistic field and various areas like education, which ventures with these resources to improve academic quality.

The NFTs are certified digital objects that guarantee ownership authenticity. These use the same blockchain technology as cryptocurrencies; thus, the tokens distributed by their creators are unique, immutable, and encrypted, distinguishable from their copies. According to OpenSea, the largest online NFT market, “the blockchain provides a coordinating layer for digital assets, granting users ownership and management permissions.” They also “add several unique properties to non-fungible assets that change users’ and developers’ relationships with these assets.”

The blockchain system provides interoperability that lets assets move through different ecosystems and become recognized through various NFT storage providers. They are interchangeable and auctionable in worldwide markets and displayable within virtual worlds. So, how does the presence and implementation of non-fungible tokens contribute to education?

Issuance and management of certificates

NFTs can substitute for diplomas, recognitions, or certificates and securely verify academic credentialing and achievements. The use of tokens reduces the possibility of falsification while managing student records and credits, tracking lifelong learning progress, and preserving educational data.

Other efforts to develop digital certificates do not require a blockchain while they still provide a trustworthy mechanism for verification. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Tecnológico de Monterrey, Harvard University, and other higher education institutions worldwide formed the Digital Credentials Consortium, an international network of universities with a shared system of traceable digital academic credentialing accessible to employers for verification.

Moreover, the process is more applicable than one might think. Professor Beau Brannan of Pepperdine University incorporated NFT awards at the end of his course. So that students could have access to a grouping of their academic achievements online, he asked them to complete and submit their curricular assignments to demonstrate their mastery of the subject. Brannan also asked his students to issue him an NFT to represent his performance as a teacher. He explains that “the token is something that students and faculty can display publicly or not, and it can be an entry point for jobs or other opportunities.” He adds, “This concept of token exchange as a ‘credential’ can help further legitimize and elevate teachers and courses on all kinds of platforms worldwide, making them more accessible and improving the quality of education.” Some universities also use NFTs for their graduates’ diplomas. In 2019, Tecnológico de Monterrey became the first Mexican University to offer digital degrees to its new graduates with validation on the blockchain network.

Protection of rights

Another benefit of non-fungible tokens is attributing authorship to the creators of different content or works. Students spend most of their time producing largely original content. According to Peter Thomas, Director of the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, usually, in the educational field, copyright protection for students’ works and projects is not considered. For this reason, creative recognition is necessary. NFTs allow these achievements to be known and shared, giving the corresponding credit to the authors.

Sometimes researchers or inventors lose recognition of their discoveries because they fail to patent them. The University of California in Berkeley created non-fungible tokens for two research winners of the Nobel Prize; these were subsequently auctioned off to fund further studies. James Allison received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2018 for his cancer immunotherapy research, while Jennifer Doudna was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2020 for her CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing. The NFT auction for Allison’s invention was conducted through Ethereum, a transactional blockchain network. The proceeds funded the University’s innovative education and research, including the campus blockchain center.

Rewards for teachers

As in Brannan’s class, some teachers use NFT technology to verify their work. An example is Preply, a language learning platform that registered three NFTs in OpenSea in 2021 to reward its number one tutors who enrich their students’ experience. The top three English, French, and Spanish professors completed 11,000 hours of classes that year. They were contacted to claim their NFT through their cryptocurrency wallet. Amy Pritchett, Preply’s student success manager, said creating an online “trophy cabinet” can be stored and shared with prospective clients, employers, or university admissions offices.

Impact beyond the classroom

Christin Bohnke, a freelance writer, specializing in EdTech and East Asia, suggests that the range of opportunities for NFTs stored reliably on the blockchain goes far beyond the classroom. For example, if a student lost their academic record or certificates, their credentials could be checked, which would greatly help conflict zones. Should any country’s educational records system collapse, blockchain functionality would allow displaced people to verify their training and continue their career paths.

Another added value of NFTs that Bohnke mentions is verifying non-formal learning. Information such as research experience, projects, skills, mentoring, and online learning can be added to the student’s portfolio. The dossier may contain the massive open online courses (MOOCs) completed by the students, evidencing the
knowledge acquired outside higher education institutions.

Privacy Control

However, Bohnke also raises some questions about incorporating NFTs into the educational sphere. Because token information is digitally secured, it is difficult to alter and must be validated collectively to make any changes. So, what if students change their minds about exposing specific data in their learning paths? Will they be able to select what information would go in their permanent records?

 Audrey Watters, an educational technology writer, expresses these same concerns and questions whether the students will have control over their privacy once blockchain technology has been adopted. Similarly, she proposes an example: what if a person wants to “start from scratch” after gender confirmation surgery? What if someone wants to hide their identity from a harasser or abuser? The essential question in education concerns how you design educational strategies to defend privacy by default.

 The adoption of non-fungible tokens in education helps authors and content creators to defend their intellectual property rights. Their value includes making students’ and teachers’ achievements measurable, recognizable, and verifiable. These advances make lifelong learning efforts visible and protect records; however, it is necessary to ask relevant questions to discover the most appropriate way to adopt NFTs.

Translation by Daniel Wetta

Correction: A previous version of this article stated thatThe Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is one of the leading institutions to implement NFTs. MIT created the Digital Credentials Consortium, an international network of universities with a shared system of traceable digital academic credentialing accessible to employers for verification.” The correct data is thatOther efforts to develop digital certificates do not require blockchain while they provide recognition. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Tecnológico de Monterrey, Harvard University, and other higher education institutions worldwide, formed the Digital Credentials Consortium, an international network of universities with a shared system of traceable digital academic credentialing accessible to employers for verification.”

Nohemí Vilchis

EdTech Specialist in Observatory for the Institute for the Future of Education (nohemi.vilchis@tec.mx)

This article from Observatory of the Institute for the Future of Education may be shared under the terms of the license CC BY-NC-SA 4.0