The Role and Benefits of Articulation Agreements
Articulation agreements make smooth transfers from one institution to another possible while ensuring that students do not lose credits in the process. Effectively implemented, they essentially facilitate overcoming the barrier of credit acceptance and applicability leading to less duplication of courses, potentially lowering tuition cost and ensuring faster graduation for a student. “Articulation agreements constitute one of the most important issues in higher education because their success or failure is central to many dimensions of education, including access, affordability, and quality, in addition to the promotion of degree achievement” (Wellman 2002). Articulation agreements are 10 beneficial for all parties involved. For the student, there is a high degree certainty that they will gain admission and the course work from previous learning will not have to be repeated thereby potentially saving costs by reducing the time taken to a attain a degree. For the educational institutions, articulation agreements can be a valuable marketing tool and means of attracting students.
OVERVIEW OF ARTICULATION AGREEMENTS
Articulation agreements, particularly international agreements, is mostly between individual institutions. In simple terms, designees or representatives of each institution communicate and make arrangements to compare courses. They will determine which courses are comparable or equivalent and clearly establish how they will be used when transferred. After this determination is made, the outcome is then formalized in a written document endorsed by all parties. This document, or details of it, will usually be made public or marketed, regularly updated, maintained and used as a guide by students, faculty and administrators.
STUDENT MOBILITY AND TRANSFER OF CREDITS
As noted earlier, students are mobile and becoming increasingly aware that they can move beyond geographical boundaries, without loss of prior academic work. As a result of this mobility comes the need for universal frameworks to ensure seamless transfer of academic credit. Or in other words, systems that make it easier for students to move from one institution to another without loss of prior education. Europe has the regional student mobility framework known as ECTS / ERASMUS (European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System / European Action Scheme for the Mobility of University Students) which makes transfer of credit across EU national borders easier. In the Asia-Pacific region, there is a similar initiative called the UMAP (University Mobility in Asia Pacific) program.
One of the major barriers to student mobility and credit portability is the multiple acceptance level constraint. In summary, if a student wants to transfer from a certain University UA to University UB in program ZZZ, the ZZZ credits earned at UA could be accepted as credits toward a degree at UB level by the responsible office, admissions or registrar. But at the departmental, faculty level or academic program level, the credits could be rejected. In addition, UB's ZZZ program could also still demand that the student take certain courses, which in some respects, duplicates credits already taken at UA. With transfer from or to an international institution, there is an added layer of complexity. The process may involve having an external company which specializes in transcript evaluation to examine the transcripts from the sending institution and convert the credits into the system of the receiving institution before equivalency and usage is determined. Essentially, the core issue here are in the terms “acceptability” and “applicability”. A credit might be accepted or rejected at the discretion of the receiving institution. If it is accepted, how or to what purpose is it applied at the receiving institution? This is where articulation agreements are appropriate.
