Prior Learning Assessment and Recognition (PLAR) is a new field, but it has a long history, since children have always learned from adults and demonstrated their competence by observation of their work or by the quality of their products or services. Later, formal learning became more valuable and recognized school credentials paved the way to…

Demographic trends promise to force sweeping changes on postsecondary higher education, particularly the inevitable steady decline in 18-year-olds and the birthrate decline since the early 1960's in the white middle class. The decline in public confidence in American institutions is also a factor to be considered in educational planning. In…

Adults learn from many sources, such as volunteer work, community services, homemaking, jobs, and other activities, and they increasingly want this learning to be recognized so that they can reenter the job market, get a promotion, or return to college. Therefore, scientific methods have been developed to help adults document their experiential…

Educational institutions need to help women get a better education by taking into account the learning they have acquired through experience in homemaking, volunteer work, and other activities. This paper examines the need for recognition of women's prior learning by educational institutions and delves into some of the intricacies of the process.…