Building on the 2025 National Academies Pharmacy Workshop: A Philosophical Shift to Competency-Based Pharmacy Education

Pharmacy education has long relied on time-based progression measured by credit hours and semesters instead of demonstrated competence. Although this model has produced many pharmacists, it is misaligned with contemporary societal demands for accountability, patient safety, and population outcomes. Competency-based education (CBE) offers a framework that aligns outcome competencies, curriculum design (sequencing, tailored learning experiences, and competency-focused instruction), and programmatic assessment to build and demonstrate mastery of knowledge, skills, and attitudes of entry-level pharmacists. Implementing CBE requires coordinated changes at the system, institutional, and individual levels. At the system level, academic pharmacy must apply outcome competencies as expectations for demonstrated performance, not solely as guides for content. Accreditation standards should support the core components of CBE, and licensure standards should place greater emphasis on competency attainment. At the institutional level, redesign of curriculum and assessment are needed to support individualized learning pathways, adopt authentic assessments that provide frequent, actionable feedback, and embed faculty development focused on coaching, feedback, inter-rater reliability, and bias mitigation. At the individual level, faculty must shift from an emphasis on content delivery toward coaching students to support their development. Students must embrace a professional identity that transforms their achievement from earning a series of points toward developing mastery of knowledge, skills, attitudes, and values of a medication specialist. CBE represents a fundamental philosophical reorientation of pharmacy education that aligns competencies, curricula, and assessments to meet societal needs. Successful implementation requires the coordinated integration of the core components of CBE across the profession, institutions, faculty, and learners.