Resource: From Patchwork to Pathways: State Approaches to Improving Transfer
As postsecondary transfer enrollment continues to grow, a more unified approach across systems and states can help mitigate credit loss (and excess credit), so that more adults are able to attain degrees and improve their economic outcomes.
More than 40 states have passed statewide policies addressing general education curriculum and transfer in higher education. A small handful of solutions have emerged as modern pillars of transfer policy, tackling the student experience from various directions:
- Common course numbering creates statewide credit equivalencies among introductory course offerings, making catalogs easier to navigate for transfer students and advisors alike.
- Transferable core policies seek to standardize general education curriculum statewide, improving credit transfer among in-state institutions.
- Guaranteed associate degree programs establish motivating checkpoints for transfer students, offering assurance that their community college coursework will set them up for on-time graduation at in-state universities.
This brief explores the policies that are most effective in addressing “the transfer problem”—and the states leading the way in this postsecondary innovation.
