1. CREDIT FOR PRIOR LEARNING
Facilitated by
Melanie Booth - Marylhurst University
Margaret Kimble – Lane Community College
May 19, 2013 ~ OrACRAO

2. What Are We Doing Here?
Learn about various forms of Credit for Prior Learning (CPL)
Discuss how CPL works, ways to incorporate it at your institution, and why might you need to
Discuss the 5 different types of CPL -- with in-depth attention given to Prior Learning Assessment ("Portfolio Assessment“ / PLA)
Identify implications of CPL on your institutions’ policies and practices
Consider other "disruptive" forces, including MOOCs and competency-based learning
Learn about the work of the Oregon Credit for Prior Learning Advisory Committee in regard to Oregon House Bill 4059
Thanks to cogdog on Flickr for making this image available to use

3. Glad To Meet You! Please tell us: Your name Your institution
Your title / role
One burning question you have about CPL
Thanks to shannon.yey on Flickr for making this image available to use

4. LET’S GET STARTED

5. Inventory of Knowledge
An inventory of knowledge is a “prior learning assessment” technique to determine what individuals and groups of people already know about a given topic.
WHAT DO YOU KNOW and/or DO?
About Prior Learning Assessment?
About challenge exams / processes?
About credit-by-examination?
About ACE or other credit recommendation services?
About industry certifications for credit?

6. House Bill 4059
Directs HECC to report to the OR Legislative Assembly on CPL
HECC created CPL Advisory Committee
CPL is defined by 4059 as:
Granting college credit for “the knowledge and skills gained through work and life experience, through military training and experiences and through formal and informal education and training from institutions of higher education in the US and in other nations.”

7. 4059 Goals
Increase # of students who receive academic credit for prior learning
Increase # and type of academic credits accepted for prior learning
Develop transparent policies and practices
Improve prior learning assessment practices
Create tools to develop faculty and staff knowledge
Develop articulation agreements
Develop outcome measures to track progress on these goals.

8. Took initial inventory Analyzed current policies / practices
Advisory Committee
October – December 2012:
Formed committee
Defined the 5 types
Took initial inventory
Analyzed current policies / practices
Created a work plan
So far in 2013:
Created strategies for each goal  starting to implement
Representatives from:
OSU system
Community colleges
Private, independents
Private, for-profit career colleges
HECC member(s)
State Board of Education
Community advisors
Labor community
Military education

9. 5 Types of CPL PLA / Portfolio Challenge Exams Credit-by-Exam
Recommendation Services (ACE, etc.)
Industry Certifications
Thanks to squidish on Flickr for making this image available to use

10. PLA 101
All you need to know about Prior Learning Assessment – in 20 minutes!

11. Operational Definition
PLA = Prior Learning Assessment
“Any knowledge-building or skills-attainment that occurs prior to enrollment or outside of enrollment at a post-secondary institution, assessed for the purpose of awarding college credit The term ‘prior learning’ has evolved to encompass the knowledge and skills one attains as a result of life experiences, including volunteer service, travel, parenting, and employment experiences as well as non-credit courses and independent studies” (Zucker, Johnson, & Flint, 1999, p. 3).

12. PLA / RPL Has Developed Around The World
Context & History
Acknowledging multiple ways of knowing in Australia’s and New Zealand’s aboriginal learners;
Offering educational opportunities to people who live a great distance from Canadian higher educational institutions;
Improving the labor market and unemployment conditions in Ireland;
Diminishing the deleterious educational and workforce effects of apartheid in South Africa.
PLA / RPL Has Developed Around The World

13. Context & History - cont.
In the U.S., PLA has been a result of 3 significant social movements:
The adult education movement
The non-traditional higher education movement
The increasing sophistication of assessment (Keeton, 2000)

14. Context & History - cont.
Student’s Lived Experience
Workplace
Life
Higher Education
The value of the PLA portfolio lies in its ability to bring the student into active engagement with academic and nonacademic cultures of knowledge by providing “a reflective bridge connecting the learner, higher education, and the workplace” (Brown, 2001).

15. CAEL’s Suggested Steps
Advising + Instruction + Assessment + Records
Identification of learning areas – by the faculty or adviser with student
Articulation of credit to goals – student + faculty
Documentation of learning and experience – student in the course: evidence
Measurement / assessment of learning – content-area faculty determines degree and levels of competence
Evaluation – faculty determines credit equivalency
Transcription – record of results - administration (registrar)

16. PLA Philosophy
Experience can be a source of significant learning and knowledge
When adult learners come to college – whether as new college students or with transferable credit – they are not blank slates or empty pails.
They bring with them life and work-place experiences from which they have gained significant learning.
Experience is the learner’s “living textbook” (Lindeman, 1961).

17. Philosophy - cont.
CAEL’s perspective: the source of information obtained in learning is the key difference in thinking about assessing learning that has occurred through experience versus learning that has occurred in a more traditional classroom setting (Whitaker, 1989, p. 3).
BUT … “experience alone does not teach” (Fenwick, 2001, p.11).
In most PLA situations, instruction is provided to teach learners how to identify, articulate, reflect on, and document their prior learning at the college-level.

18. Learning From Experience
One Significant Learning
Exp 3
Exp 2
Exp 1
One Major Experience
Learning 1
Learning 3
Learning 2
Experience
One Major
One Significant Learning

19. Learning From Experience
The Kolb Cycle
“Reflection is the process by which experience is turned into learning.”
Boud, D., Keogh, R., and Walker, D. (1985). Reflection: Turning experience into learning. Kogan Page: London.

20. STANDARDS & POLICIES
Ensuring academic quality and integrity

21. CAEL Standards - Academic
Credit should be awarded only for learning, and not for experience.
College credit should be awarded only for college-level learning.
Credit should be awarded only for learning that has a balance, appropriate to the subject, between theory and practical application.
The determination of competence levels and of credit awards must be made by appropriate subject-matter and academic experts.
Credit should be appropriate to the academic context in which it is accepted.

22. CAEL Standards – Admin.
Credit awards and their transcript entries should be monitored to avoid giving credit twice for the same learning.
Policies and procedures applied to assessment, including provision for appeal, should be fully disclosed and prominently available.
Fees charged for assessment should be based on the services performed in the process and not determined by the amount of credit awarded.

23. CAEL Standards – Admin.
All personnel involved in the assessment of learning should receive adequate training for the functions they perform and there should be provisions for their continued professional development.
Assessment programs should be regularly monitored, reviewed, evaluated, and revised as needed to reflect changes in the needs being served and in the state of assessment arts.

24. NWCCU Policy 2.C.7
Credit for prior experiential learning, if granted, is:
guided by approved policies and procedures;
awarded only at the undergraduate level to enrolled students;
limited to a maximum of 25% of the credits needed for a degree;
awarded only for documented student achievement equivalent to expected learning achievement for courses within the institution’s regular curricular offerings; and
granted only upon the recommendation of appropriately qualified teaching faculty.

25. NWCCU Policy 2.C.7
Credit granted for prior experiential learning is so identified on students’ transcripts and may not duplicate other credit awarded to the student in fulfillment of degree requirements.
The institution makes no assurances regarding the number of credits to be awarded prior to the completion of the institution’s review process.

26. IMPLICATIONS
Identify implications of CPL on your institution's’ policies and practices

27. Future forces
Competency-based learning, online learning, Open Educational Resources (including MOOCs), demographics, funding … the list goes on and on.

28. What might these ideas have to do with CPL at our institutions?
The Future
TEDxVillanovaU - Michele Pistone - The Future of Higher Education
What might these ideas have to do with CPL at our institutions?

29. Reflection on Learning
What did you learn?
So what do these ideas mean to you, your office, your institution?
Now what should Margaret take back to the CPL Advisory Committee for consideration?
What?
So What?
Now What?
A framework used in PLA to support reflection and action.