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DaFranker comments on Who Wants To Start An Important Startup? - LessWrong
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A certification system to replace high-school and college.
With the explosion in independent study on all education levels, certification is the main missing piece. One solution is tests. For example, Pearson's is offering this service to Udacity students. However, certification-by-testing has had a hard time getting prestige. In the high-status parts of the software industry, getting Java/Microsoft/etc. certification is a slight negative on your job value -- i.e., one is expected to countersignal.
So, we need a certification system that succeeds at serving as a signal.
What successful examples can we find? The actuarial industry has a system of advancement with ten exams. There is no requirement to get a certain degree to take them. The top level is considered an intellectual achievement roughly equivalent to a PhD.
Perhaps the certification we're offering should test useless skills which require a long time to acquire, proving that one is not just smart but hard-working. Compare Latin in earlier periods, and the software language Scheme (a language used mostly for theory, not for product development) in the software industry today.
The usual trappings of signaling, like association with prestigious people, would be an essential part of the marketing.
This, do-super-want. Perhaps a more specific version/implementation/tactic would be compulsory education alternatives. Of course, the signalling part remains a major problem.
One other possible element of the signalling problem is to counter a particular subset of common responses that seem particularly available: "What makes your special certification any different from all those bogus sham 'buy-a-high-school-degree-online' diploma mills?"
Establishing trustworthiness is also made more difficult by the trend that employers don't really seem willing to verify and learn about nonstandard accreditations. If someone has qualifications that they don't expect and don't immediately recognize as a good signal, it'll be dismissed without further investigation. Targeting employers seems like it would be a requirement of an optimal certification system.
Many countries, including Israel where I live, have long had matriculation tests at the end of high school. Passing them is considered far more important than the high-school graduation diploma, which is given separately.
You can sign up to take the matriculation tests even if you are not in high school. This option is generally intended for drop-outs who are catching up later in life, but you can do it as a teenager too.
After passing the tests, no one cares about your actual high-school grades.