Photo: Shutterstock

Photo: Shutterstock

Su Jin Gatlin Jez
June 4, 2020

Right now, California has a unique opportunity to level the playing field when it comes to our public colleges and universities.

For as well long, our organisation of college teaching has served a specific population ─ students direct out of high school with their families' financial support, equipped with skills from college prep courses and a load of Advanced Placement (AP) credits to fast track them toward a caste.

Governor Newsom's May Budget Revision shows the pandemic's impact on our postsecondary institutions, but it too expands opportunities and sets goals for low-cost ways less privileged students can get degrees.

A world of learning happens outside traditional college and university classrooms, and now is peculiarly the time for our system of college educational activity to pay attending. Many of California'south newly unemployed adults accept impressive skillsets and cognition bases that should merit higher-level credit.

Acquired through employee grooming, industry certification programs and military courses, these qualifications plant real, practical education — nevertheless, for the vi.eight million working-age Californians who lack a college caste, translating this expertise into credits toward a formal credential is difficult if non impossible.

Credit for prior learning is a solution that deserves a closer wait and new linguistic communication in the governor's revised budget besides as a new neb being considered in the California legislature show policymakers agree.

Unfortunately, almost of California's public college education institutions lack policies to consistently offer credit for education that happens exterior an accredited classroom. Now and in the future, we must connect unemployed and underemployed Californians with the qualifications they need for in-demand jobs — and that starts with fast-tracking new, innovative options for higher education that serve traditionally underserved populations.

While the California Community Colleges, the California Land University and the University of California do offer some credit for outside learning, eligibility requirements are inconsistent and there is picayune evidence these options are widely used — even though data from other states underscore the programs' benefits.

In i study by the Council for Adult and Experiential Learning (CAEL), students who earned xiii-24 credits through prior learning shaved 6.6 months off the typical five years it takes to complete a bachelor'south degree.

Especially for those students who already rely on financial aid, decreasing fourth dimension to degree increases college affordability, accessibility and completion across the board. Students who are non required to pay for and retake courses with content they have already mastered are two and a half times every bit likely to consummate a degree and can ultimately save up to $vi,000 on their education.

More degrees completed in less time ways more than upskilled graduates joining our labor forcefulness — and fewer public dollars spent to help enact the change.

A related proposal awaiting in the state Legislature, Assembly Bill 2494, would likewise be a fundamental step in the right direction, by formalizing a consequent policy across California's public higher pedagogy segments for application course credit to war machine personnel and veterans. For Californians like my ain father — who could non use his ain decades-long military career in service of a degree — this could be a game-changer.

Indeed, military veterans often receive rigorous job preparation that does non authorize for college credit simply considering it was offered by the war machine, non an accredited higher. If we award credit for AP classes completed in high schoolhouse, why would we present our state's own veterans with a double standard?

Amidst the pandemic-induced recession, credit for prior learning could provide higher didactics with boosted capacity and cost savings that would let more students to enroll and graduate, fifty-fifty with budget cuts.

But the advantages of a strong and consistent statewide policy are not only financial and logistical. At its heart, this is an issue of access and fairness — and of giving every Californian the gamble to succeed. To be truly and equitably student-centered, our leaders in higher didactics must not simply prioritize this approach but also offer models for replication to ensure the program's spread.

Formally recognizing students' previous high-level learning means that our land values all pathways to and through higher education — and that California believes in its workers' skills and success. By embracing inclusivity, our postsecondary system can assistance rebuild our land'due south economy and allow more families and communities to thrive.

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Su Jin Gatlin Jez, PhD is executive manager of California Competes: Higher Didactics for a Strong Economy , a higher pedagogy and workforce policy inquiry organization. She is also Associate Professor of Public Policy and Administration at California Country University, Sacramento and served as the Managing director of the CSU Student Success Network and Academic Advisor for the California Executive Fellows Program.

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