Stage 1 of 10 · Design and release
Discover
Who is this for, and what do they need?
- Purpose
- Establish the need and the learners.
- Defining artefact
- Needs analysis, learner profiles, delivery constraints
- Exit gate
- Need and cohort agreed
- Failure it prevents
- Building the right course for the wrong learners
Discover establishes why the program exists and who it is for. It is often skipped when a standard is mandated externally, yet the same standard should produce different programs for different cohorts. A program for school-leavers needs more scaffolding than one for experienced workers.
What happens
- Agree the need: the capability gap, who asked for it, and what changes if it is closed.
- Profile the likely learners: prior experience, language and literacy, access needs, how and where they will study.
- Record the delivery constraints that will bind later stages: duration, modes, locations, staffing, equipment.
Learner profiles are working tools, not marketing personas. They should be specific enough that a reviewer can ask, at any later gate, "does this work for these learners?" Designing for variability from the start echoes Universal Design for Learning.
At the gate, ask
- Can we name the cohort this release is for?
- Would a different cohort need a different program from the same standard?
- Are the delivery constraints written down, or only assumed?