Across postsecondary education, quality influencers are working hard to improve the economic and educational outcomes of noncredit learners. In a recent study, we identified at least 50 such organizations seeking to influence quality in a range of ways.
One approach, though, almost never appeared: direct observation and mentoring for quality assurance. This model, commonly used by institutional accreditors at colleges and universities, has typically not been used in noncredit education. After all, accreditation is a formal process codified in the Higher Education Act for institutions that want to enroll students who qualify for federal financial aid. There is no federal funding for noncredit education, and therefore, no federal mandate or engagement between accreditors and noncredit providers.
Until now. For the first time, two intrepid accrediting organizations are preparing to carry out evaluation processes for noncredit education providers. This raises some thorny questions:
- What is quality in noncredit education?
- How should accreditors measure it?
- Which providers should accreditors measure?
- Who is the audience for this exercise?
- Should it even be called accreditation?
The New England Commission for Higher Education (NECHE) and the Chicago-based Higher Learning Commission (HLC) are exploring the potential for review of noncredit providers. Their strategic visions differ, yet also share important common ground. Both are early-stage startups launched with support from the Lumina Foundation. More important, both initiatives are driven by a vision of quality assurance that questions the sharp distinctions traditionally made between credit and noncredit education.
NECHE is developing a rubric for “recognizing” noncredit providers. Laura Gambino, vice president at the accreditor, sees a need for NECHE’s engagement.
“There really is no quality assurance in the space,” she says. “The Commission felt that there was something NECHE could contribute to ensure that organizations are offering high-quality programming and that students and employers are aware of high-quality programming, because we know that not all noncredit programming is created equal.”
Gambino convened a group of six colleges to brainstorm the key markers for a framework. Next the colleges stress-tested the rubric through a reflective self-study report writing process.
They emerged with the Quality Assurance Framework for Non-Credit Programming, a set of 17 markers in two broad categories: high-quality noncredit programming and institutional or organizational commitment to noncredit programming. Those markers probe both the hands-on components of noncredit instruction, such as student learning, design, and content relevance, and the superstructure that makes quality instruction possible, such as governance, institutional research capacity, and mission alignment.
NECHE then embarked on another round of self-studies and peer review visits using the quality assurance framework. And it plans to release public documentation of the process later this year.
HLC has launched the Credential Lab to carry out two interrelated tasks: Establishing a quality assurance framework for noncollege providers and developing resources and programming on short-term workforce credentials. The initiative emerged from an in-house think tank, Partners for Transformation, HLC created to consider how changes in the U.S. economy and society should inform its planning for the future.
“That group was collectively talking about how higher education would be evolving,” says Karen Solomon, vice president and chief transformation officer at HLC. “The pricing model is changing, the type of learner is changing, technology is reshaping the workforce. We’re going to need re-skilling on a more regular basis than just the one degree learners might have earned in the past.”
In January, Credential Lab released its first resource, the “Microcredential Partnership Planning Tool.” This publication offers a guide for institutions seeking to launch a collaborative employer- or community-based partnership: inventory current and potential partners, mine data on local labor market needs, and choose partnerships that align with the institution and promise the most impact.
It’s not as though noncredit providers don’t already think about quality. After all, students typically enroll in such programs seeking new careers or job opportunities. But NECHE and HLC plan to systematically assess and validate quality for the benefit of key audiences, including employers, prospective students, and stakeholders within institutions or other provider organizations, with a focus on continuous improvement.
Yet HLC has even more in the pipeline. Credential Lab is piloting a framework to evaluate and endorse third-party education and training providers, and testing a prototype for an innovation center to strengthen institutions and providers in the fast-evolving learn-and-work landscape.
Melanie Booth, a consultant with Credential Lab, views the question of quality outcomes as much bigger than accreditation. “It’s about expanding perspectives of what quality is,” she says. “We’re having a conversation that’s about the outcomes and the impact; not just learning outcomes, but the impact of that noncredit training program on that group of learners’ career trajectories.”
Leaders of the two accreditor initiatives argue that transformations in the American economy have outpaced change in traditional higher education, making the disconnect at many institutions between noncredit and credit study increasingly problematic.
“There are things we can learn from this noncredit work that will expand our thinking on the credit-bearing side,” says Gambino. “Learning doesn’t just happen when you’re in that classroom for 50 minutes three times a week. Learning is happening everywhere.”
An ”aha” moment for Gambino came in a peer review visit to Boston’s Bunker Hill Community College, when Provost James Canniff declared: “A student is a student is a student.” This seemingly simple insight started Gambino down a path of follow-through ideas.
“How can we change our structures and processes at an institution so a student is a student is a student? It shouldn’t matter if they’re in credit-bearing courses or noncredit-bearing courses. How do we create one student information system? How do we create pipelines from noncredit to credit? How do we create support systems, tutoring, advising, career services, so that at the end of the day a student is a student is a student? How can we break down those distinctions and start recognizing all of our learners as learners?”
The two accreditors are on a journey to rethink and expand the way they approach quality assurance, moving beyond traditional accreditation to the vast ecosystem of noncredit education. For now, that dictates a voluntary model attractive to the providers themselves. But it’s not hard to see a point at which states that invest in noncredit education demand some validation for the taxpayer dollars they spend. Indeed, Congress is now wrestling with the possibility of extending Pell Grants to some noncredit workforce programs, raising the stakes of the federal debate over noncredit quality.
In the meantime, HLC and NECHE are creatively blending some traditional tools of accreditation with a direct-service model to provide value to providers and their key stakeholders.
Tom Hilliard is a consultant and former research engagement manager at the Education and Employment Research Center (EERC) at Rutgers University’s School of Management and Labor Relations, which focuses on better understanding how education intersects with the labor market. Michelle Van Noy is director of the EERC.