ACE Reimagining Transfer for Student Success

REIMAGINING TRANSFER FOR STUDENT SUCCESS The National Task Force on the Transfer and Award of Credit Cover photo courtesy of ACE member institution University of Redlands. American Council on Education ACE and the American Council on Education are registered marks of the American Council on Education and may not be used or reproduced without the express written permission of ACE. American Council on Education One Dupont Circle NW Washington, DC 20036 © 2021. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. CONTENTS Acknowledgments ..........................................................................................................................................iv Letter from the Task Force ...............................................................................................................................v Executive Summary .......................................................................................................................................ix The Work of ACE’s National Task Force ..........................................................................................................1 Why Improving Transfer and Award of Credit Matters ..................................................................................10 Policy and Practice Recommendations ...........................................................................................................13 Resources ......................................................................................................................................................26 Appendix A: A Portrait of Student Transfer and the Awarding of Credit Toward Degree Completion ............28 Appendix B: Designing a Transfer Student Experience to Support Persistence and Completion .....................46 Appendix C: An Overview of Transfer and Articulation Agreements ............................................................58 Appendix D: Enabling the Transfer and Award of Academic Credit for Prior Learning ..................................73 Appendix E: Technology as an Enabler of Credit Transfer ..............................................................................89 Appendix F: A National Snapshot: How Students Experience and Perceive Transferring Earned Credit .......104 Appendix G: A Pilot Transcript Study: Exploring the Impacts of Institutional Advising and Credit Evaluation Policy and Practice ..........................................................................................................128 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ACE would like to thank the many people who contributed to this important work and the production of this final report, which we hope will lay the foundation for improved policies in credit transfer and increase opportunities for students to succeed in the twenty-first century. Our Task Force members were so generous with their time and dedication to this project during an historically challenging year. Co-chairs Anne Holton and Timothy White played an invaluable role in guiding all stages of the Task Force’s work. The ex-officio and advisory board members provided key support and consultation. We also would like to thank our white paper authors, especially Debra Bragg, Gloria Crisp, Jon Fink, Wendy Kilgore, and Kenneth Sharp for their guidance and expertise throughout the process. Finally, our thanks to Steven Taylor of ED2WORK and ACE Government Relations staff members Terry Hartle, Anne Meehan, and Karina Pineda for organizing the Task Force’s deliberations and shepherding the report to completion. A number of other ACE staff members were also instrumental to this work over the past year, including Ally Hammond, Audrey Hamilton, Dasiril Richards, Jon Riskind, Laurie Arnston, and Sarah Zogby. ACE is grateful to Strada Education Network and Charles Koch Foundation for their generous support of this project. - iv - LETTER FROM THE TASK FORCE Dear Colleagues, The National Task Force on the Transfer and Award of Credit was convened by the American Council on Education (ACE) in March 2020 with the aim of improving transfer and award of credit practices in an effort to spur student success and reduce the cost and time to complete a degree. Comprised of more than two dozen college and university presidents and chancellors from institutions nationwide—two- and four-year, public and private—the Task Force spent the past year assessing critical topics related to transfer and award of credit. Our work was bolstered by ex-officio Task Force members representing several higher education associations, regional accreditors, and experts and practitioners involved with transfer credit at their institutions. The report that follows is the culmination of our work; we ask you to give it consider- ation to help you identify modifications to existing practices to best support student success. Today’s students are likely to arrive at our institutions already having earned credit at a prior institution of higher education or acquired college-level learning through a variety of other experiences, such as direct assessments or military or employment training opportunities. A 2018 snapshot found that one-third of the 2.8 million students entering college for the first time in fall 2011 earned credits from two or more institutions within six years. We know it can be difficult for students to successfully transfer credit between institutions, and it can be even more difficult for students to receive credit for prior learning acquired outside of an institution of higher education. While some institutions do a good job ensuring that the transfer process does not unnecessarily cost students time and money and recognizes the learning they have already acquired, many do not. The Task Force began its work acknowledging that the higher education community must do better to ensure students receive academic credit for college-level learning, regardless of where it was acquired. This problem is a matter of growing concern to college and university presidents and the entire higher education community, as well as policymakers at the state and federal level. The need for higher education leaders to reform transfer policies took on a new urgency in 2020. No one could have anticipated that the worst pandemic in a century would place unprecedented stresses on students and their families and the institutions that serve them—and raise awareness of this particular issue. The global health crisis and the resulting economic fallout have widened equity gaps and threaten two decades’ worth of gains in access to higher education for first-generation, low-income students, and students of color. In addition, changes in enrollment patterns exacerbated by the pandemic may result in more students moving between multiple higher education institutions, as well as between higher education and the workforce. While improving transfer and award of credit practices is insufficient on its own to address the unprecedented challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, it is a necessary and critical component to supporting student success going forward. The increased focus on racial injustice and widening socioeconomic gaps also demand that higher education reduce the barriers for underrepresented students to transfer, persist, and complete their degree. Low-income students and students of color are more likely to rely on transfer to decrease cost and time to degree, but this choice requires practices and policies for the award of credit that are easier to navigate. - v - For higher education to effectively address equity gaps and be more effective about addressing equity and being an engine for upward social mobility, we must do better with the transfer and award of credit. Better supporting today’s students and helping them successfully complete a quality postsecondary degree is a social justice issue that demands a renewed commitment from all of higher education. While we are under no illusions about the sustained and multi-pronged effort required to close equity gaps for today’s students, we know that we will not succeed without tackling the issue of transfer and award of credit head on. The impact for students will be to make college more affordable, reduce the time it takes to earn a degree, and increase overall student success. The result of our work is a set of six concrete recommendations that will enable higher education leaders to carry out a more seamless and efficient transfer and award of credit on their campuses. For each recommendation, the report highlights examples of the strategies and policies other institutions have adopted in their efforts to better serve students. We hope these will provide a useful road map for other institutions looking to improve their policies for the betterment of their students. We urge institutional leaders to carefully consider each recommendation to determine whether modifications to their existing practices would better support student success. College and university leaders are encouraged to adapt recommendations as necessary to best meet their students’ needs and in a way that aligns with unique institutional missions and maintains academic quality and integrity. Taking a hard look at how institutions can best serve the sizable population of students who move in and out of higher education in a nonlinear fashion

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