Date Sent: Friday, October 22, 2004 7:32 AM
From: "Merickel, Mark" (mark.merickel@oregonstate.edu)
To: (gilkey@darkwing.uoregon.edu)

Peter Gilkey:

First I would like to apologize for not making my point clear in the meeting yesterday regarding the proposed General Education Transfer Module (GETM). I believe that my questions and suggestion were not understood. I will try make my suggestion more clear in this email, but please, if you have any questions feel free to contact me at your earliest convenience.

My questions and suggestion centered on the bundling and unbundling of the AA/OT for effective and efficient transfer of general education courses/credits between the community colleges and OUS institutions.

Currently the AA/OT is a 90 credit hour transferable degree and in only a bundled form. That is, all 90 credits must be obtained and the "degree" earned, before the entire degree can be transferred. The data appears to show that only a "small" percentage of community college transfer students actually transfer the full AA/OT. The example given for UO was 200 students were transferring the AA/OT out of 900 transfer students in totalÉor 22%. Obviously, the majority of transfer students are not using the existing AA/OT pathway. It was also pointed out that many of the contemporary community college and OUS students are "swirling." Indeed that is the case both in Oregon and Nationwide. According to the University Continuing Education Association (2004), "Students are shopping for courses that meet their schedules and circumstances." It has been up to the student to work with the advisor(s) to insure that these courses, whether taken from PSU, PCC, Chemeketa, OSU, or University of Phoenix, will be transferred into the AA/OT degree program. But the data are pretty clear that this pathway is limited for various reasons and new systems, processes and pathways need to be developed to insure that students are able to transfer either part of their AA/OT courses or the full AA/OT (90 credit hours).

The proposal to transfer part of the AA/OT was presented as the General Education Transfer Module (GETM). This "bundled" transfer module allows 45 credit hours in specific subject areas (foundation skills and introduction to disciplines) to be transferred to any OUS institution. The theory behind this transfer module appears to be that more students would potentially use this transfer pathway because of the fewer courses/credits which comprise it. I appreciate everything that the committees have done to assist students with having greater opportunities and capacities for transferring general education coursework between the community colleges and OUS institutions. This is essential, and as pointed out in the meeting, unless the institutions are proactive in addressing transfer issues, there is a strong likelihood that the Oregon Legislature would produce and implement their own version of transfer policies for Oregon institutions.

Where I am heading with this message is to suggest considering a new transfer model/process for Oregon community colleges and OUS institutions. My suggestion is that we create an Oregon System for Dynamic Bundling of AA/OT transfer classes/credits. How this system would work would be something like thisÉ

When a student completes a term, their classes are automatically reviewed against the database list of approved AA/OT transfer courses. If twelve of the studentŐs credit hours match the approved database list of courses, then this student has twelve transferable credit hours in the designated subject areas. If the following term the student takes courses from their local community college, a neighboring community college, and even the University of Phoenix these courses are reviewed against the database list of approved AA/OT transfer courses and if accepted are added to the studentŐs "dynamic" transfer record. And so on.

When the student is ready to transfer to an OUS institution, their transcripts include a list of successfully completed AA/OT approved courses and credit hours. This list and the number of credit hours are calculated "dynamically" or when the student wants to transfer AA/OT approved courses or the entire AA/OT degree. If the student has 15 AA/OT approved credit hours, they can transfer them. If they have 31 AA/OT approved credit hours, they can transfer those. This can continue with any number of credit hours up to the approved AA/OT total of 90 credit hours in the specified subject areas. The key point is that these approved credit hours/courses are automatically "bundled" when the student is ready to transfer.

Of course I realize that with all concepts and systems there are issues and potential problems. In this message I am only presenting a concept that I believe will greatly benefit students, our institutions, and the state of Oregon.

I would be happy to discuss this transfer concept with you or anyone interested in improving the transfer systems used in Oregon education.

Thank you for your time and good luck with your important project.

Mark Merickel, Ph.D.
Associate Dean
Professor of Education
http://ecampus.oregonstate.edu/staff/vita
OSU Extended Campus
http://ecampus.oregonstate.edu
Oregon State University