CHALLENGE:
Most Americans do not go from high school to college and leave four years later with a degree. Life gets in the way. Some start college but never finish; others can never afford the time or money to even start. Still others simply weren't ready, or went into the military, or didn't know what to do. Years later, these people have a tremendous amount of life experience, but no degree to prove what they know to potential employers. These learners need to complete their degrees to be successful.

RESPONSE:
CAEL built LearningCounts.org, which provides:

Advice from a College Credit Specialist
Students talk about their background and interests, and together, determine the fastest and most affordable path to finish their degree.

Enroll in a Course
Our online portfolio courses help students learn how to demonstrate the college-level learning they acquired through work, volunteering or military service. We offer instructor-led and do-it-yourself courses.

Portfolio Development and Assessment
Using what they have learned in our courses, they create an online knowledge portfolio that matches their knowledge and experience to college-equivalent courses. Once they have completed their online portfolio, a member of our expert faculty assesses the portfolio and recommends it for college credit. Students can earn up to 12 undergraduate credit hours for each portfolio they submit.

Predict Potential to Earn College Credit
Students can also use the prior learning credit predictor for free to estimate how many college credits they may be able to earn.

Transfer Credit Recommendations
CAEL is now partnering with universities to directly award college credit based on its LearningCounts assessments of knowledge learned outside the classroom.

Alamo Colleges, Bellevue University, the Indiana Institute of Technology, the New England College of Business, North Iowa Area Community College, Roosevelt University and Southern New Hampshire University have already signed on to the new process, which will streamline the credit acceptance and reduce transcription costs for students.

COLLABORATORS:
An advisory group of Prior Learning Assessment theorists and practitioners from a wide variety of institutions helped launch LearningCounts.org. LearningCounts Partner colleges have made it a reality for their students and other learners.

“No one in the world of Prior Learning Assessment is more respected than CAEL and SNHU is happy to accept CAEL’s credit recommendations directly. They are the experts. They have unassailable integrity and an unmatched track record of almost 40 years in this area. They invented PLA.” - Paul LeBlanc, President, Southern New Hampshire University
 

CHALLENGE:
Ohio’s bioscience sector is poised to grow 20% over the next decade – that’s great news for Ohio. Bioscience jobs pay well and are nearly recession proof – that’s great incentive for Ohioans looking for work. However, Ohio bio employers are having difficulty attracting the volume of workers required to meet these growth projections. People simply don’t realize that there are great bioscience jobs for entry-level workers. And, many of the candidates who do apply don’t have the right skills and competencies they need to be successful.

RESPONSE:
Research and document 300+ bioscience job options available across Ohio’s bioscience sector, then validate with Ohio bioscience employers. Thereafter, build and socialize an online bioscience career exploration tool to:

• showcase bioscience careers and jobs in a friendly and engaging way, and

• highlight local bioscience education programs and tuition benefits that people can leverage to secure great bioscience jobs.

Feedback on the tool has been tremendous like this quote from N. Pietras, Executive Director for Northwest Ohio Tech Prep - “The website is awesome. It is impressive and useful for folks looking into bioscience to understand what it is, and how to get involved. Great work.”

Visit www.BioOhioWorkforce.org to view the website.

PARTNERS:
In March 2010, BioOhio, six Ohio-based community colleges, and CAEL were awarded $5M dollars to train 700 underemployed, dislocated and unemployed workers for entry level positions in bioscience careers. This group calls itself the Ohio Bioworkforce Training Partnership.

The grant was designed to pay for tuition, books and fees for qualified participants and give graduates of the program a hand in finding employment.

CHALLENGE:
How does an industry fill its future worker pipeline and ensure its current workforce:
• has the right skills and competencies for a productive future,
• understands the opportunities available to them, and
• connects to the right education to best use tuition dollars?

RESPONSE:
Through its telecommunications industry coalition NACTEL, CAEL built VIVIDfuture.org to arm incumbent telecom workers and job seekers with useful industry information, telecom-specific education options, and tools to match and connect them to telecom job opportunities.

PARTNERS:
NACTEL (National Coalition of Telecommunications Education & Learning), CWA (Communications Workers of America), IBEW (International Brotherhoood of Electrical Workers), AT&T, CenturyLink, Verizon, Frontier Communications

“Our industry depends on highly skilled workers. And VIVIDFuture.org is a great training and educational resource for new telecom job-seekers as well as those wanting to grow within the industry.” - Randall Stephenson, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, AT&T
 

CHALLENGE:

The energy industry is facing a retirement bubble, a shift to greater use of renewable energy sources, and sky-rocketing demand for power. These factors have created a demand for workers skilled in new energy technologies. Meanwhile, many workers and high school students are seeking stable employment.


RESPONSE:

• Created new online curriculum for training current and future electric power industry workers that supports clean energy solutions and smart grid deployment

• Trained more than 1,800 electric power industry workers across a wide range of job categories on alternative energy sources and the smart grid, operational considerations for the smart grid and/or on the impact (financial, security, etc) of the smart grid

• Combined online instruction with company training, both classroom and apprenticeship training

• Developed a replicable model partnership between Bismarck State College and the Connecticut Community College System to deliver a joint clean energy/smart grid-focused electric power technology certificate and degree program

• Built a model move high school students directly from energy industry coursework into employment and/or into a postsecondary energy industry certificate or degree program

PARTNERS:

Energy Providers Coalition for Education (EPCE), National Rural Electric Cooperative Association (NRECA), American Public Power Association (APPA), Arizona Public Service (APS), ComEd (an Exelon company), JEA, Northeast Utilities, Oklahoma Gas and Electric (OGE), PJM Interconnection