Welcome iPLA Evaluators

Thank you for your interest in the Empire State University program of evaluating individualized prior college-level learning for our students.

About the Evaluator Resources

These resources will assist both the evaluator new to iPLA and the experienced evaluator to understand the steps in the evaluation process, learn the requirements for evaluations of college-level learning and make credit recommendations.

SUNY Empire grants credit for college-level learning obtained in traditional and nontraditional settings. The focus of this guide is on evaluating individual learning, which we call individualized Prior Learning Assessment or iPLA.

Information about other types of evaluations of prior college-level learning is available in other sections of this website.

The iPLA Evaluator's Role

The three tasks of an iPLA evaluator include:

• gather information on the student's learning
• assess the student's learning
• complete a credit recommendation report.

The iPLA Evaluation Process

The evaluation process is significant for students and we are mindful of the critical importance of providing thorough and effective college-level learning evaluations by qualified individuals.

With our evaluation process, you will:

• review students' learning descriptions and supporting materials
• interview the student to
  • explore areas not covered in the learning description
  • clarify and verify the students’ learning
• determine whether to recommend college-level credit
• write a recommendation report,
  
  • documenting the evaluation process
  • describing the student's learning
  • justifying the specific number of credits, type of credits and the title of the learning.

We are grateful for your assistance.