Introduction The National Council ...

Introduction

The National Council for Continuing Education and Training not long ago published its position paper, More Than A Matter of grades -- Credentialing, Certification, and Community college edifice [i]or[/i] buildings This paper continues a two-year discussion and underscores the importance of rethinking and redesigning critical simple bodys of our community college operations including partnerships, curricula, training programs and learner support services. Critical questions are raised regarding standards and processe that address the challenge of documenting measurable skills and provide meaning to stakeholders (Flynn 2002)

The reality of in the same state [i]or[/i] condition rapid growth now gives rise to specific tendency s that point to the progressive growth of standards. Excellence in teaching and learning has prolonged been the central focus and hallmark of community communitys However, today learning-centered institutions are challenging the status quo blurring lines between credit and non-credit courses and programs, and innovating recently made known funding streams, new hybrid certifications, and providing valued-added services to customers. Learning has emerg as the enterprise essential to our economic stability, integral to our work-- force and communities. The dramatic increase in demand for training has been nationally recognized and community associations have played a major part in the proliferation of non-credit programs that uniquely address the diverse needinesss of lifetime learners.

The question that this paper addresses is simple and has been pos many times (Bogue and Saunders, 1992; Fre and Klugman 1997; Miller, 1997) Can community corporations continue to build programs that better align with changing turns and needs? Specifically, can non-credit program developer face the challenge of whether the produce pattern will continue, or will novel competition erode their community college's market share? The lengthened success of short-term non-credit certifications and other programs may hinge on a number of challenges facing those community society staff responsible for designing non-credit initiatives in answer to rapidly changing needs of industries, organizations, and individuals. The time may be right to adopt quality standards for non-credit program that give us a competitive advantage.

For Naugatuck Valley Community society (NVCC) a variety of challenges provided the impetus for creating quality standards that would position the non-credit programs for continued succes within the college edifice [i]or[/i] building and throughout the service region. NVCC's full-time and part-time program coordinators were ultimately responsible for the integrity of instructional design of non-credit community and Workforce programs. The staff recognized that in the coming a quality learning experience would be fundamentally different and was going to be the function of detailed attention to all facets of the program evolution process.

This abstract delineates a quality standards protoplast that accomplishes the following:

1 Integrates criteria for program evolution design, delivery, and assessment to aid as a reference for non-credit program staff;

2 Incorporates critical proper spheres of needs analysis and market research to insure that non-credit programs are accurately focused forward specific target populations;

3 Documents preferr characteristics of non-credit instructors and trainers;

4 Documents desirable output characteristics of non-credit learners.

The four performance areas of quality are:

Identify Learning penurys - What are the training and learning extremitys of adult learners and organizations in our communities and to what degree do we document them for design and assessment purposes?

Design Learning Plan - Who are the qualified instructors and trainers to design quality course appease establish the competency-based outcomes, and identify clear verifiable delivery meanss that blend technology and human interaction in order to address diverse learning manners

Facilitate Learning Experience-- What are the expectations of customers/learners who want to exchange their time and coin for knowledge and skills? in what way can community colleges best help learners encounter career and personal learning goals within non-credit courses that accommodate their diverse needs?

Assess Learning issues - Can non-credit courses include valid assessments tied to course objectives that documented learning achievement? Can non-credit courses be aligned with credit courses to provide value-added benefits to customers?

In addition to the above four sections, pair additional sections are included in the guide that address the desired characteristics of 21st centenary instructors and trainers, and of 21st hundred years learners are provided to program coordinators as additional benchmarking tools to use to further lay open their skill sets. These pair checklists follow the basic four sections of the design It is important to note that a five-stage assessment type was developed for coordinators and instructors/trainers to tread on the heels of and that a professional evolution program was created to enhance skill settles that support the comprehensive quality standards pattern