The PLA Boost: Results from a 72-Institution Targeted Study of Prior Learning Assessment and Adult Student Outcomes. Revised. Executive Summary

Adult students--whether just starting college or returning after stopping or dropping out--often have significant college-level learning they have acquired outside of academia. Postsecondary institutions have the option to evaluate that learning for the purpose of awarding credit or otherwise recognizing the learning so that it can count toward a postsecondary degree or other credential. The methods that colleges use to evaluate this learning are typically referred to with terms like prior learning assessment (PLA), credit for prior learning (CPL), or recognition of learning. An important question is whether earning credit through PLA makes a difference for the adult student in terms of their ability to complete a postsecondary credential. This study examined data provided by 72 postsecondary institutions about the enrollment, credit-earning, and degree-earning of more than 465,000 students of all ages, focusing in particular on more than 232,000 adult learners (defined as students age 25 and older) from 69 of the participating institutions that were able to provide the most detailed data on PLA credit-earning. Academic record data was provided for the period between the academic year 2011-2012 and the end of 2018, a seven-and-a-half-year period. While this report provides clear and compelling evidence that PLA can be an important tool to support adult student credential completion, there is still much work to do. Institutions must make concerted efforts to encourage low-income adult students and adult students of color--particularly Black adult students--to take advantage of PLA offerings and to understand why their benefit from PLA appears to be lower than that of other students. By assessing learning, recognizing learning, and valuing learning, postsecondary institutions and workforce agencies will help more learners and workers earn the credentials they need to reach their goals. [This report has been revised from the original due to the discovery of an error in the dataset. For the updated full report, see ED609770. For the updated appendices, see ED609772.]