Collaboration for Student Transfer

Book excerpt: Collaboration for Student Transfer: A Nationwide Degree Qualifications Profile Experiment highlights key lessons learned from AAC&U's Quality Collaboratives project. It focuses on learning outcomes assessment and faculty leadership in the context of increased rates of student mobility and transfer. The project sought to build the capacity of educators to use the Degree Qualifications Profile (DQP) as a framework for successful student transfer that emphasized the quality of student learning, rather than seat time or credit hours; and sought to help partnering two- and four-year institutions strengthen transfer students' achievement of AAC&U's LEAP Essential Learning Outcomes. The publication reports on the work of two-year and four-year institutions in nine states--California, Oregon, Utah, Wisconsin, Indiana, Kentucky, Virginia, Massachusetts, and North Dakota--that built on existing transfer articulation policies and practices and explored ways to enhance student transfer success. The report highlights potential models-described through comprehensive case studies-for enhancing student transfer through the lens of quality learning and demonstrated achievement. Collaboration for Student Transfer is accompanied by two smaller booklets--Assessment Practices for Advancing Transfer Student Success, which features practical advice about developing collaborations to advance learning outcomes assessment in the context of transfer; and Action Steps for Advancing Transfer Student Success, which highlights lessons learned from cross-campus engagement and robust collaborations, presented in ten case studies. These publications are ideal for campus practitioners and state systems who are actively working to enhance transfer student success and build capacity to assess and track achievement of learning outcomes.