Standardization and Alignment of Student Learning Outcomes for Sociology Courses in Maryland Public Colleges
In Spring 2020, the Chancellor of the University System of Maryland (USM) and the President of the Maryland Association of Community Colleges (MACC) asked the provosts of MACC and USM institutions to address the course transfer process between the 2-year and 4-year schools and created the MD Provos...
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| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Community College of Baltimore County
2025-08-01
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| Series: | Teaching and Learning Excellence through Scholarship |
| Online Access: | https://tales.journals.publicknowledgeproject.org/index.php/tales/article/view/3486 |
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| Summary: | In Spring 2020, the Chancellor of the University System of Maryland (USM) and the President of the Maryland Association of Community Colleges (MACC) asked the provosts of MACC and USM institutions to address the course transfer process between the 2-year and 4-year schools and created the MD Provosts Transfer Council (PTC) which was made up of Provosts or Vice Presidents from several MD public colleges. The leadership requested a course outcomes-based transfer process that would allow students to seamlessly transfer credits and courses from their home institutions to receiving transfer institutions. The process started with the development of affinity groups for the top MD academic transfer programs and the highest-enrolled general education courses, which included sociology. The MD Sociology Affinity Group started in Fall 2020.
In September 2020, the PTC leadership provided guidance on student learning outcomes or objectives (SLOs) including limiting SLOs (with fewer better than more), SLO language reflecting course level (e.g. 100, 200, etc.), colleges being able to add more SLOs as needed, and faculty having the opportunity to provide input on the standardized SLOs before finalizing them (Charge letter, 2020). The PTC asked each affinity group to identify co-chairs and the 3 most common courses to be evaluated for course outcome alignment by each affinity group. By March 2021, the PTC expected each affinity group to identify the aligned course outcomes for the entry level courses. For sociology, this meant the Introduction to Sociology course. By May 2021, the PTC expected course outcome alignment for the second and third entry level courses in each program.
In May 2021, the Transfer With Success Act (TWSA) was signed into law. This law required the MD Higher Education Commission (MHEC) to develop policies in 2 areas: the process of transfer acceptance or denial, and how course equivalencies were identified. In terms of acceptance or denial, for MD public higher education institutions that receive requests for course transfer from students which are denied, to notify the sending institution and the student of the course transfer denial within a reasonable period. In the case of denial, the sending and receiving institutions should conduct a review of the course transfer denial. Lastly, each MD public higher education institution must submit an annual report to MHEC of any course denials and the reasons for those denials.
The formalization of the process of determining equivalencies was the more difficult and controversial element and is what will be focused on in the remainder of this paper. In essence, transfer equivalencies were to be determined based solely on SLOs, ignoring the level (100, 200, etc.) of the transferring course. In addition, the priority was for courses to transfer as the equivalent course (i.e., Social Problems as Social Problems, regardless of level), and not as program elective credits.
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| ISSN: | 2766-8991 |