Innovative Credentials

AACRAO Resources

• Enhancing Accessibility and Inclusion: The 2024 Landscape of Credit for Prior Learning in U.S. and Canadian Higher Education (2024)

  
  The challenges and successes in implementing CPL within educational institutions are explored in this report. Issues related to institutional policies, mechanisms for assessing and awarding credit for prior learning, staffing, technology and learner awareness are examined.

• Credential Confusion: A Call for Uniformity in Practice and Terminology(2023)

  
  Insights from a June 2023 Survey aimed at determining if the terms for various credentials, referred to as innovative credentials in this report, are defined and used differently based on their institutional context.

• FINAL REPORT: Alternative Credentials: Considerations, Guidance, and Best Practices(2022)

  
  The AACRAO Alternative Credentials work group published their final report in July, 2022. This report provides research on best practices for members' institutions considering or already offering certificates and micro-credentials. The intention of this report is to create standards for definitions and portability of alternative credentials.

• Implementation of the IMS Global Comprehensive Learner Record Standard: A Practical Guide for Campus Personnel(2022)

  
  The IMS Global CLR Implementation Guide is a comprehensive data standard that meets the objectives of an official institutional learning-focused and comprehensive learner record.

   

• CLR Phase II Report(2021)

  CLR Phase II seeks to expand the understanding and use of CLRs among additional institutions. Download the CLR Phase II Report to learn more.

• 2020 Guidance on the Review of the Comprehensive Learner Records (CLR) Standard from IMS Global(2020)

  Per our review, the CLR Standard from IMS Global is the only comprehensive data standard in place today that meets the objectives of an official institutional learning-focused and comprehensive learner record.

• 2019 Standardized Components for a Competency-Based Educational Record(2019)

  For this second phase of the Lumina grant there were four main goals:

  • Facilitate the scaling of CLRs in up to 150 colleges and universities
  • Standardize the components of a CBE transcript/record with the goal of achieving 10 participating institutions in this second phase
  • Address the data integration issue
  • Leverage existing degree audit technologies to track progress toward learning outcomes/competencies.
  To achieve the goals outlined for the second item above, AACRAO partnered with the expert organization on competency-based education, member institutions of C-BEN, a “network of colleges, organizations, and individuals, dedicated to realizing the potential of competency-based education”.
• 2018 CLR Data Integration Work Group White Paper(2018)

  During the first phase the CLR project, one of the most significant barriers to the development and implementation of the student record was the integration of data to populate the record with data and evidence of learning.

  In the second phase of work, AACRAO assembled the CLR Data Integrations Work Group to identify the barriers to data integration that exist today at most institutions. While some colleges and universities will be able to address these challenges through internal resources and expertise, most lack the infrastructure to address the barriers they may face. This Work Group provided universities with information on moving forward, creating potential guidelines, and working to promote standards that not only benefit students but also employers and other admitting institutions.

• 2016 Fact Sheet(2016)

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AACRAO Supported Resources

• C-BEN Enrollment Management & Competency-Based Education (2023)

  
  Valuable insights and practical tips to successfully support students and manage enrollment management functions within the context of competency-based education programs.

• IMS Global: Enabling an Opportunity Ecosystem(2018)
• 2016 Fact Sheet(2016)
• 2016 Comprehensive Student Record Report(2016)

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