Announcement of a Sole Source Purchase

The current state of transfer articulation in higher education is highly problematic, to say the least. This onerous process involves students petitioning one institution at a time to recognize previously earned academic credits from one or more other institutions. Ideally, these prior credits will satisfy some of the degree requirements associated with the academic programs students are transferring into. Prior credits accepted as transfer credits in degree programs enable students to proceed more efficiently towards on-time graduations. There are, however, myriad reasons why prior credits are lost during the transfer process. We contend that academic institutions are in fact fighting a losing battle in their current attempts to address this problem. This is borne out by the massive number of credits lost annually by transfer students, and the fact that U.S. Department of Education surveys show this problem is only getting worse over time. As recently highlighted by InsideHigherEd, Often quoted is the United States Government Accountability Offices figure of 43% of credits being lost as a result of transfer, and credit loss has been described as a major reason why students who begin community college with the goal of attaining a bachelors degree are less likely to achieve that goal than students who begin college in a bachelors program.

We believe that building an online Transfer Articulation Degree Planning Portal will address these frustrations, which are largely a result of existing practices that focus on course-level rather than requirements-level analyses. The final system will provide transfer students earlier insights, and clearer pathways to their bachelors degrees, optimizing credit transfer opportunities along the way.

The University has determined that this purchase is only economically available from this source because the item or service is copyrighted or patented and is not available except from the holder of the copyright or patent. Also for trial use/testing.