For our Pointers* website, each member will have their own profile page where they could share their own skills, as well as find people that have the skills they want to learn. One of the aspects we hadn’t really ironed out was a verification system for teaching. Originally, we thought of just “requesting” a teaching status to the administrators, but realized we would not be able to grant that status to people from other areas that we did not know.
I’m a big fan of LinkedIn’s endorsement section:
Your peers are able to “endorse” certain skills on your portfolio. We want to use this model to “certify” people as teachers on specific topics. If someone is certified in a subject, they can post courses related to that subject matter.
It remains to be seen (both on LinkedIn and Pointers*) whether or not people will verify their friends without knowledge of their actual expertise in a field. However, this solution makes more sense than a “request to teach” button.