AACRAO's 3rd Annual Transfer Conference: February 14-16, 2010
Academic Mobility: Perspectives on the Future of Transfer
The United States offers the greatest degree of inter-institutional student mobility and the most extensive system of portability of academic credit in the world. Despite this lengthy history of facilitating student transfer, many obstacles to seamless transfer persist. Transfer of academic credit-already a complex issue in its own right-has, in recent years, become a highly politicized topic of debate among the public and policy community.
To fully understand the transfer student population, one must recognize that students bring with them varied backgrounds, experiences, and academic portfolios. One thing is certain: The number of students who transfer is increasing, and the complexity of dealing with those students' needs has brought on more questions and concerns for professionals in the field. Today, the "2-plus-2" model is only one of many options. There are also "reverse transfers" (4-year to 2-year), "lateral transfers" (2-2 or 4-4), "swirling students" (co-enrolled in two or more schools simultaneously), to name just a few. And transfer students pose special challenges - and opportunities - to the American ethic that higher education should be accessible to all who possess the desire and capability to achieve a college degree.
AACRAO's Transfer Conference will bring together practitioners and managers from admissions, retention, enrollment management, transfer center, and registrar organizations to discuss and debate current issues in transfer. Experts will share their ideas, information, and solutions for working with different transfer student populations.
The conference will address several facets of transfer and the transfer credit debate, including:
- Transfer of credit and best practices in articulation
- Community college issues
- Enrollment management of transfer students, including recruitment and retention initiatives
- Organizational models, staffing, and staff training
- Transfer centers
- Degree partnership programs
- Specific transfer populations (i.e. military, non-traditional, reverse, international)
- Public policy and legislation
- Delivery of services and/or application of technology
- Research on transfer initiatives, needs, or trends
Participants will explore voluntary, community-wide methods of facilitating transfer of academic credit and serving transfer students as well as technologies and strategies for implementing mandated outcomes and to develop principles of best practices that members can use as guidelines for handling transfer issues.
