BILL ANALYSIS Ó
AB 372
Page 1
Date of Hearing: May 11, 2011
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Felipe Fuentes, Chair
AB 372 (Hernandez) - As Amended: April 26, 2011
Policy Committee: Higher
EducationVote:9-0
Urgency: No State Mandated Local Program:
Yes Reimbursable: Yes
SUMMARY
This bill:
1)Requires California Community Colleges (CCC), as part of the
matriculation process, to assess prior college-level learning
gained by military service personnel, trade apprentices, and
journey-level professionals through non-college credit means.
2)Requires the above assessment to be determined by relevant
faculty and requires academic credit per (1) to be awarded
based on specified standards.
FISCAL EFFECT
1)Major ongoing costs in the $3 million range.
As discussed below, 50 community colleges are already
conducting the assessments required under this bill for
military personnel. For the remaining 62 campuses, first-year
implementation would be around $100,000 ($6.2 million
statewide) for the equivalent of one full-time faculty
position for training and research on evaluation standards,
reviewing college curriculum in relation to the evaluation
standards, reviewing student records, interviewing and
counseling students, and administrative oversight of this
process.
By establishing this process as a state requirement, the other
50 colleges will be eligible for state reimbursement for this
activity, which is estimated to cost about $25,000 per campus,
or $1.25 million total. Thus the first-year cost would be
AB 372
Page 2
around $7.4 million, and annual costs thereafter would be
about $2.8 million. ÝGeneral Fund, Prop. 98]
2)Additional costs to implement similar assessments for trade
apprentices and journey-level professionals would be similar
in magnitude to those described above.
3)To the extent the colleges' approval of course credits reduces
the time that veterans and other students require to complete
their community college educational goals, the colleges, as
well as students, will benefit from these efficiencies.
COMMENTS
Purpose . According to the author, veterans who return from
service and use higher education as a means to receive a
degree and gain employment are not able to use their service
training and technical certification towards their college
course work. This bill specifies the following two approaches,
or their equivalent that community colleges can use to award
college credit from prior training:
American Council on Education (ACE) Guide . The military
issues academic transcripts for active-duty service members
and veterans. The transcripts issued by the various service
branches are endorsed and periodically evaluated by ACE and
bear its seal. ACE also publishes the Guide to the Evaluation
of Educational Experiences in the Armed Services, which
provides recommendations to colleges for evaluating these
transcripts. The Guide's credit transfer recommendations are
based on reviews of military coursework by a panel of
university faculty members convened by ACE. These faculty
members review military coursework and occupational training
descriptions pertaining to their own academic disciplines,
evaluating them according to disciplinary standards and
expectations.
Council for Adult and Experiential Learning (CAEL) , is a
national non-profit organization that creates and manages
learning strategies for working adults through partnerships
with employers, higher education, the public sector, and
labor. CAEL offers services to facilitate successful
matriculation of adult learners in higher education, including
assessment tools to assist in evaluating current policies and
practices for serving adult learners, best practices utilized
AB 372
Page 3
by successful institutions, and research and evaluations of
prior learning assessments and student academic outcomes.
Since the determinations required in this bill are made at
each campus, the application of prior learning credit is
uneven. However, 50 community colleges are members of the
Servicemembers Opportunity Colleges (SOC) Consortium, which
provide educational opportunities to servicemembers to
facilitate degree attainment such as 1) reasonable transfer of
credit to avoid excessive loss of previously earned credit and
course work duplication, and 2) credit for military training
and experience, including use of the ACE Guide in evaluating
and awarding academic credit for military training and
experience.
In addition, the CCC Academic Senate recently passed a
resolution urging local senates to apply credit for
educational experiences during military service toward the
associate degree-including the fulfillment of general
education, major coursework, and other degree requirements-in
accordance with the recommendations listed in the ACE Guide.
Analysis Prepared by : Chuck Nicol / APPR. / (916) 319-2081