A couple of months ago, CollegeTransfer.Net hit a milestone quietly. That is, we reached 600,000 course equivalencies in the Course Atlas. That is a lot of course rules under management in CollegeTransfer.Net. This may seem insignificant and not relevant, but it is a reflection that our long term strategy to help institutions publish their transfer information including course equivalencies is working. Along the way, CollegeTransfer.Net has also amassed the largest collection of Transfer Articulation Agreements.
Each day, we are working hard to add more and more content to CollegeTransfer.Net. Obviously, it is only as good as the data gathered and published. The data also has to be maintained. Which is how AcademyOne helps institutions. The original concept of our business plan is the same. Publish accurate transfer and articulation information for all types of transfer and provide tools for institutions and students enabling them to navigate the complex waters of transfer. Student transfers from one college to another is a complex process because it touches many issues. It requires the institution to review prior learning of a prospective student and match to current program requirements. Courses evolve as knowledge in general evolves. As such, the planning process for transfer, for prospective students should begin well before the transfer. But, in many cases is does not happen that way.
Adult students, military, and corporate employees aspiring to complete a degree, often re-enter college. In the process, the age of courses completed come into play. Thus, the added requirement many institutions must track relates to the currency of course information and the historical context. Often course information held in summary descriptions is not enough. CollegeTransfer.Net helps institutions track additional course information including learning outcomes and helps students map their prior course work to help institutions review prior learning using objective measures over subjective ones. In doing so, we hope institutions provide all types of students the respect for their prior learning investment and the fairness in the review process.
CollegeTransfer.Net utilizes the National Course Atlas, a database and repository of course level information. It is compiled and maintained for free by AcademyOne. Students, advisor's and all members of the academic community can access it for no cost. Faculty and administrative users can also add content to each course, helping the academic community review the context of each course when comparing one course to another. It usually is not good enough to just look at a course title and description. Often, the evaluation requires to know the text book, the level of learning, the length of learning, the time period, etc. Learning outcomes is the fairest way to compare courses, so, if you are a student, as you take courses, compile your course learning outcomes in the student passport. It offers a free storage cabinet for life. Upload your course syllabi's. And, when you transfer, share the course information with your target institution. That way, you have the evidence you need to show what your investment means, especially when you transfer to another institutions.