Students to cash and carry credits

The practice of awarding academic credit to students is common in most universities and in many colleges. The award of credit has enabled institutions to recognise incremental progress towards named awards.

Credit has made learning portable, giving students flexibility over where and when they undertake their studies. Growth in the practice of awarding credit has been matched by a proliferation of credit systems.

This complexity undermines the whole purpose of awarding credit. What is needed is a unified framework which is sound in principle and easy to use.

Since the purpose of credit is to recognise learning, it makes no sense to have artificial credit tariff barriers between further and higher education and between "vocational" and "non-vocational" courses. In the Higher Education Quality Council report Choosing to Change (1994), David Robertson proposed a unified compositional framework based on the principle of awarding credit in respect of learning achievements adopted in a national framework for FE developed by the former Further Education Unit, now the Further Education Development Agency (FEDA). A credit corresponds to 30 hours of successful learning (a 30-hour credit) and full-time students attempt a minimum of 30 credits in a year.

This framework has operated successfully at the University of Derby for the past two years where it encompasses all provision from the modular foundation programme, offered by our partner institutions in further education, to our own taught masters programmes.

This framework contrasts with the impositional framework developed by the former Council for National Academic Awards, which works by subdividing the honours degree (360 credits) and attributing to each module the appropriate credit rating.

In the proposed framework, a level is defined as "a minimum acceptable standard of achievement within a hierarchy of levels". This definition is unsound because it conflates levels and standards, which leads to practical difficulties. Each level is defined by a set of 13 generic level descriptors. The problem arises if the level is also to be considered as the standard. An academic standard may be defined as an established criterion, or a set of criteria, against which the quality of a student's performance is measured.

It is not expected that in designing individual modules, the designer will select all 13 descriptors from a single level. Some descriptors will be inappropriate to the area of work. It follows therefore, that the descriptors of a level cannot define the standard but merely serve as an important guide. It is for those who design individual modules and programmes to devise the criteria which will constitute the standard.

A more satisfactory definition of a level is, perhaps, "an indicator of the relative intellectual demand and rigour of an academic study". This definition is consistent with the generic level descriptors, and with the approach adopted in the FEDA framework. Further and higher education need to continue to work together to establish a single set of levels, and their descriptors.

An essential attribute for the framework is that it should be easy to understand and use.

The Dearing review of qualifications for 16 to 19-year-olds seeks to establish a "framework of qualifications". This is conceptually unsound because qualifications do not possess the necessary parameters to form a frame any more than apples and pears possess the parameters necessary to provide a basis for weighing fruit.

A National Credit Framework recognising a number of credits and credit levels would provide a frame within which awards and qualifications may be placed.

Paul Bridges is dean of modular studies at the University of Derby.