As part of the efforts of higher education to reach additional audiences, this study deals with an alternative non-traditional pathway that leads to higher academic education. This alternative, the stackable credentials pathway, uses short-cycle tertiary VET as a way to an academic degree. The study describes the extent of users of the pathway in…

Community college students often hold knowledge from various professional and academic experiences. A challenge for these students, and for their institutions and employers, is how to formally bridge these competencies to support students' efforts to reach their academic and career goals. This issue brief looks at the practice of awarding credit…

"Research Messages 2020" highlights the diverse range of research activities undertaken over the past year by the National Centre for Vocational Education Research (NCVER). Research published during 2019 encompasses a range of themes and topics categorised according to three broad areas: (1) structures and systems for skilling and…

Many students -- as well as potential students -- have acquired a great deal of learning through their day-to-day lives outside of academia: knowledge acquired from work experience, on-the-job training, formal corporate training, military training, volunteer work, self-study, and a myriad of other extra-institutional learning opportunities…

In this report we walk through a systematic review of how PLA [prior learning assessment] was implemented under the ideal circumstances provided by the TAACCCT [Trade Adjustment Assistance Community College and Career Training] grant program. We found that there was positive policy development, but student use of PLA opportunities remained low. In…

This study synthesizes lessons learned about the promising role of "career navigators" at community colleges to aid students in the transitions through disjunctures in their careers. Career navigators are student support personnel who follow students from recruitment, through their studies or training programs, to job placement. Findings…

Supporting adult learners as they complete their postsecondary certificates and degrees is essential to meeting the state's educational attainment goals and the employment needs of students and Washington employers. Students come to college with skills and knowledge acquired through work, military, and other experiences. Awarding academic credit…

This article recognises the well-established processes available to educators for the validation of competence, however acquired, and suggests that these mechanisms could be deployed more frequently in future. This proposition is based on employers' adoption of work-based learning strategies that focus on learning outcomes rather than on…

This document was produced by the authors based on their research for the report "Student Traffic: Two-Way Movement between Vocational Education and Training and Higher Education," [ED495183] and is an added resource for further information. The original report investigated the extent and nature of student traffic between the two…