Runner Run-Down: Prior Learning Recognition at KPU

Learning isn’t limited to the classroom

Have you ever taken a class that didn’t teach you anything you didn’t already know? Maybe you’ve already dealt with the subject matter at your job. Maybe you’re an international student and you took a similar course back home. Whatever the reason, if you have a course between you and your degree that doesn’t offer you any knowledge you don’t already have—and you can prove it—you might not need to grind through the curriculum after all.

All post-secondary institutions in British Columbia offer some form of prior learning assessment, but the extent and method of assessment vary wildly from institution to institution. The gist of it is that the university may grant you credits for a course if you can show, through assessment and submission of a relevant body of work, that you’ve already achieved the learning described in the course goals.

“At KPU there is, I think, the sense that we want to support all learners because we are an access institution, and prior learning comes into that,” says KPU Facility of Academic and Career Advancement Dean Patrick Donahoe.

Last month, Donahoe penned an opinion piece for University Affairs about the importance of prior learning assessment in higher education as he sees it. In it, Donahoe explains that students are increasingly finding learning opportunities in venues other than the classroom. Donahoe argues that universities ought to support and encourage students to apply this informal learning outside of the classroom to their education at KPU.

“Today’s savvy students are quickly learning to curate their own learning experiences. They are often out ahead of their institutions in their understanding that learning happens in multiple venues beyond the classroom,” Donahoe writes.

In the past, many higher learning institutions have been leery of prior learning assessments. According to Donahoe, there has been a perception that PLA were giving away free credits. Today, this perception is fading, but Donahoe says that colleges are typically better at handling prior learning than universities.

“People who are against prior learning always think that we are giving something away. Rather, it’s building on what somebody has done and can do,” says Donahoe.

As a means of standardising the PLA process in Canada, and to ensure quality assessment from various institutions, the Canadian Association for Prior Learning Assessment published a manual last year to guide the development and implementation of PLA. KPU is currently engaged in updating its PLA system according the manual’s guidelines.

“We said to the federal government, ‘We need some quality insurance when people are doing prior learning assessment,’ and so we put the [the manual] together and it’s been a big hit,” says Donahoe.

Here’s how prior learning assessment works at KPU: Once a student has determined they can satisfy the course’s learning outcomes based on the course outline, they go to the Student Enrolment Services counter to obtain an Application for Prior Learning Credit form and contact the relevant faculty adviser. The completed form is then submitted to Student Enrolment Services along with the assessment fee. After that, assuming the application is approved, all that’s left to do is celebrate the saved time.

The key thing to remember here is that these are not simply free credits being given out; nobody who comes in for assessment is guaranteed prior learning credits. It can be difficult to demonstrate prior learning to the faculty’s standards, and there’s always a good chance the student will end up taking the course after all.

Still, a prior learning assessment could be worth a shot.