Alternatives?

[Ryan Watkins]

To help build structure for the conversation I believe that a thread
on alternatives would also be valuable since several were mentioned in
the previous listserv discussion.

Thanks
Ryan

[Tom Abeles]

hi ryan

I agree. Why don't you start a general discussion on this and we can then break them out as we find certain ones deserving of separate discussion. for example, a number of institutions use "portfolios" which seems to have some traction. The OxBridge model of reading for a degree might be at the bottom of current lists, though it is similar to prelims for a Ph.D.

tom

[Ryan Watkins]

Here is an email from John Sener that was part of the earlier
discussion and we will not want to lose his suggestions. Unfortunately
I cannot seem to locate the prior email listing the five "Options" he
refers to in this follow up message. If anyone has the earlier message
please post it here for our records.

Thanks
Ryan

**********************************************************************************
Sue,

Thanks for the feedback. Glad to hear that you found my efforts to be
useful. The conversation was very useful for me as well.

Re whether it's "possible for an institution to use multiple
"currencies" within its academic programs to define learning", I would
say absolutely. Institutions with credit for prior learning programs
(Empire State, Thomas Edison, Charter Oak, UMUC, Excelsior, WGU, et
al.) do this already. The 1,800 institutions which participate in the
Servicemembers Opportunity Colleges program do this for their (ex-)
military students. Apprenticeship type experience is another
excellent idea and is probably being done somewhere (though I don't
know exactly where).

Responses to your comments [they didn't show up in blue for some
reason, but I think I know which ones they are]:

To me, the "reasonable research methodologies" would be critical to
validating the currency. Agreed. I'm not sure the "word count"
methodology described to me by one CEU provider would fly in higher
ed., for example. But I think that Frank's methodology would. And
the beauty of it is that a variety of such methodologies can be used
not only to establish "equivalency" but also (if used well)
superiority.

Is this [equivalency exam credits] a direction of the EU? A
standardized curriculum? It might be. I was using UMUC's Course
Challenge Exam program as a model. To be honest, the prospect of a
standardized curriculum scares me much more than the persistence of
hours-for-credit. So I would advocate the use of equivalency exam
credits in a judicious and somewhat limited manner, which is what most
schools do that use them (except for WGU, I suppose). CLEP should
also be here (not under Option 5) where I erroneously put it
previously).

With accrediting agencies emphasis on assessment of student learning,
there already be some preliminary work within colleges & universities
that lays the foundation for this taxonomy/competency definition. Like
assessment, an institution would need to create a culture and champion
to move forward. Agreed -- using competency-based systems also fits
well with the originally-stated formulation of a college-based
initiative ("in cases where there was no formal class, the college,
with the accord of its accreditor, could establish equivalents").

John

[Gary Miller]

Ryan,

Here is John Sener's message listing the five options. :

> From: John Sener <jse...@senerlearning.com>
> Date: January 7, 2010 9:31:24 PM EST
> To: "Sloan Consortium Mailing List" <slo...@listserver.sloan-c.org>
> Cc: Sue Day-Perroots <Sue.Day-...@mail.wvu.edu>
> Subject: Re: [sloan-c] Defining Credit Hours
> Reply-To: John Sener <jse...@senerlearning.com>
>
> Sue, Gary, and everyone,
>
> There is one more factor to consider. The credit hour is tied not just to student seat time but also to other system components such as faculty workload, faculty pay, and facilities scheduling. The credit hour is a durable and accepted currency with some pedagogically useful affordances and is as quantifiable and comparable across institutions as time itself. This is why totally scrapping "hours-for-credit" is such a daunting proposition despite its voluminous faults.
>
> So I'm going to suggest a different tack: multiple "currencies." Sounds unduly complex? No more complex than what we already have now. Build a "common language" based on the multiple currencies already in use:
>
> 1) As Gary Miller recommended, define course length based on expected or "typical" level of student effort.
> - Provide time estimates of that effort which correlate approximately to current time expectations.
> -- Document throughly course elements with fixed time periods (e.g., classroom lectures, required videos or webinars to watch, etc.)
> - Calculate time estimates based on reasonable methodologies (e.g., time studies, task time analyses, et al.)
>
> 2) Define course length based on expected level of faculty effort in terms of time spent.
> - Provide time estimates of that effort which correlate approximately to current time expectations.
> - Calculate time estimates based on reasonable methodologies (e.g., time studies, task time analyses, et al.)
>
> 3) Use equivalency exam credits. This sidesteps the issue of time altogether.
>
> 4) Use other competency-based systems (e.g., Ryan Watkins's) as appropriate.
>
> 5) Credit by portfolio based on prior life experience.
> - Use existing methodologies for calculating time required.
> - Use existing criteria for allowing acceptable credit.
> - Use existing programs (DANTES, SOC/SOCAD, CLEP, et al.)
> Look at how the main providers of this already do it. For example, UMUC allows credit by exam for certain courses but not others; likewise for portfolio credit. They require a certain amount of life experience (5 years, I believe), so the learning time is presumed to have already been put in. They require a theoretical component as well as a practical one (a very interesting distinguishing characteristic for an educational experience, BTW).
>
> Options 3) and 5) are crucial to consider because they demonstrate how accredited institutions already deal with the credit hour issue in multiple ways. The solution Sue seeks does not have to be a 'one size fits all' solution any more than what currently exists. Greater use of Options 3), 4), and 5) would also open the door more to allowing solutions which are not time-based or even student-effort based. Conversely, they would encourage a more judicious use of time, including assignments or learning paths which require more time than is currently allocated.
>
> John

------------------
Gary E. Miller
421 Balmoral Way
State College, PA 16801
Blog: http://garyemiller.blogspot.com/
Phone: 814-237-9203
Cell: 814-883-3442
Skype: garyemiller

[Gary Miller]

Reviewing John Sener's five options raised a couple questions that we
might want to consider:

1. We should be careful of what we use as a measure. For instance,
John's second option is to define a course based on the amount of
faculty effort. I can imagine agencies that would then require
faculty to report "time on task" for each course.

2. Most of John's options refer back to a "credit" (or something like
that). We should ask ourselves: What is the basic building block of
the curriculum? Is it the "credit/equivalent" (120 credits equals a
baccalaureate degree)? Is it a course (40 courses equal a degree)?
Is it performance a final examination regardless of the number of
courses taken, lectures attended, etc.?

My sense is that the "credit" (or something equivalent to it) remains
the basic building block of the curriculum. If this is acceptable,
then we would be interested more in finding the multiple ways in which
student activity could be validated to give students credit for having
achieved learning. The many alternatives we've discussed could all be
relevant measures of a credit. There are some rhetorical issues
around the term "credit" that we need to address before we can make
progress, I suspect.

Gary

[Tom Abeles]

Hi Gary

My initial premise was that there is enough information for an institution to seriously seek an alternative path. John has taken the time to list a number of institutions that have taken an alternative route and not via some matrix for currency conversion. The question, I believe, is not that we need to revisit the past but to determine if there is an extant institution caught in the "currency" model that has sufficient interest in creating an alternative and not just a way to map variants onto the same surface. 

This goes for all dimensions of The Academy, from student evaluations to faculty loads and for evaluating all members of the community from the groundskeepers to the president, including students and faculty. 

My sense is that academia is still struck with the 81th century hopes of the philosophers of the Enlightenment, that there are sets of mathematical models that can be used with the same success that Newton and colleagues were able to accomplish in the sciences.

tom

tom abeles

[Gary Miller]

Tom,

I have to disagree on your final note.  I'm pretty sure that the credit idea flows not from the 18th century curriculum--the idea of an integrated liberal arts curriculum that provided "the discipline and furniture of the mind" as the 1828 Yale Report advocated.  Instead, it came in with the idea of a curriculum based on free electives--a by-product of the entry of research on the German model into higher education in the mid-1800s.  What the elective system gave us was diversity--the ability of faculty to develop courses based on their research and for students to tailor their education to their own academic and professional goals.  

What I see happening today is that we have a much broader array of ways in which students can accomplish learning--John and others have listed many of them.  The practical challenge is to find ways to encourage and support more diverse learning methods.  

Gary

[Tom Abeles]

Hi Gary

yes, I see the differentiation. I am not certain though that the credit concept or the ability of faculty to "design their own courses", while having some advantages in the beginning has not, in the long run created cylinders and protected turf. The oxbridge model seems to have been a bit less prone to such turf building. American University is pushing for cross discipline exchanges in research and teaching- difficult in itself but also, under current budget models and models for promotion and tenure becomes almost untenable. As for grades 13-16, it makes it even more difficult because students become confused because, for most, they seek a clear label, e.g. "Chemist". We ran into this problem many years ago with both students and faculty, though employers seemed to understand this mixed skill sets quite readily.

So, in the end, I do understand why Harvard gets the credit. But, I am pained to see that it has become such a reductionist practice within The Academy- as with credit or credit-hours.

Modern society seeks a reductionist solution to problems- a pill to cure an ache or a bad habit such as smoking, a switch to give light and clear "categories" and measures in The Academy. Not bad, in and of themselves except when carried to the simplistic extreme.

It will be interesting when the coming generation of e-learners and those in "one-classroom" schools come in numbers to the post secondary institutions.

tom

[Ryan Watkins]

It is probably useful to remember the "credit hour" approach was not
created to reform higher education from the ground up... rather it was
for the task of creating a pension system for faculty. And thus, my
guess is that future transforming changes in higher education will
also begin with a very distinct purpose (potentially to address the
challenges of measuring the administrative variables of distance
education courses) and then work their way into the fabric of colleges
and universities over time as administrators, faculty, students, and
others find value in the changes.

Before identifying "solutions" therefore it may be value to identify
the specific "problem(s)" we are hoping to addressing, come to
agreement on prioritizing the "problems" to be addressed, establish
criteria for viable "alternatives", and then go forward from there
with linking "alternatives" to the challenges they address. Not an
easy set of tasks, but one that may help give us focus.

Thoughts, ideas, suggestions, etc.?

Ryan

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[Tom Abeles]

hi Ryan

yes- in part, see quote from Wikipedia (Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh My) below.

Let me point out that the Carnegie folks also were behind the report of Abraham Flexner which resulted in the establishment of Johns Hopkins medical school and the raising of allopathic medicine. Thus while the efforts of the Carnegie folks were very instrumental in standardizing and cleaning up much that was rather "loose", euphemistically speaking, in a variety of areas, the result was to marginalize much that, today, we find was/is important. In an era where we can handle, often with technology, more ambiguity, there is a very strong tendency to want to hold fast.

The question before us is whether we can or even want to change or continue to "patch" an extant system. If one sees merit in the models that Clayton Christensen has developed, then there might be serious questions as to whether the extant systems can survive. And that is the issue at hand.

If those of us on this list believe that Carnegie Units must survive, because of history and value or other criteria, then this discussion takes a different path than looking at alternatives. As I have said earlier "red pill" or "blue pill"  changing the system or living with what exists.  As Morpheus says, blue pill and you wake up and life goes on.

thoughts?

tom

These units came about, during the late 1800s and early 1900s, through a series of three disjointed events, all designed to standardize the collegiate educational experience.

Event One-Arbitrary Comprehensive Exams Discredited. Prior to this time (late 1800s) admission to post-secondary education involved comprehensive examination, either by public oral process, or private written process. These processes varied greatly among U.S. colleges and universities, due to the highly subjective nature of these types of examination. Eventually, these methods were slowly discredited due to their poor reliability and validity.

Event Two-Creation and Advocacy for Standard Education Unit. Charles W. Eliot (Harris 2002) at Harvard University, in the late 1800s, devised both a contact-hour standard for secondary education, and the original credit-hour collegiate post-secondary standard. In 1894, the National Education Association endorsed the standardization of secondary education. (Shedd 2003)

Event Three-Widespread Enforcement of Standards by Carnegie Foundation. Widespread adoption of the 120-hour secondary standard did not occur until the Carnegie Foundation (established in 1906) began to provide retirement pensions (now known asTIAA-CREF) for university professors with the qualification that universities must enforce the 120-hour secondary standard. By 1910, nearly all secondary institutions in the United States used the "Carnegie Unit" as a measure of secondary course work.

As part of their framework, the Carnegie Foundation also established that both high school preparation and college "work" would include a minimum of four years of study.

On a parallel track, the Carnegie Foundation also underwrote the work of Morris L. Cooke's "Academic and Industrial Efficiency." Again, the motive here was to standardize educational outputs and faculty workloads. Cooke established the collegiate Student Hour as "an hour of lecture, of lab work, or of recitation room work, for a single pupil" (Barrow 1990) per week (1/5 of the Carnegie Unit's 5-hour week), during a single semester (or 15 weeks, 1/2 of the Carnegie Unit's 30-week period). (The Student Hour would technically be 1/10 of the Carnegie Unit: 1/5 hour per week times 1/2 year = 1/10.) ...