Greetings all and I trust you all had a wonderful holiday season with some well earned time off. As we move into 2026, Law or Lore will keep going strong! I am excited about the new year and the opportunities it brings us.

Every so often, a familiar set of questions makes the rounds in our community college circles:

“Can we award credit for prior learning based on a continuing education course?”
“What if the continuing education instructor isn’t credentialed like our curriculum faculty?”
“Does that make it invalid for transfer?”

And just like that, another layer of accreditation lore takes hold. Let’s set the record straight.

What the Law Actually Says

SACSCOC does not prohibit awarding curriculum credit for learning that originated in continuing education. What matters is how the institution determines that learning is equivalent to what’s expected in a credit-bearing course.

Under the Principles of Accreditation, institutions must:

• Maintain and follow policies for awarding credit that ensure integrity and consistency (Standard 10.7).

That means a college may award credit for prior learning (CPL) from continuing education if credentialed faculty evaluate and document that the learning outcomes, assessments, and competencies are equivalent to those in the corresponding curriculum course.

The credentials of the original continuing education instructor do not determine whether CPL can be granted. The critical factor is that qualified curriculum faculty—those who meet institutional and SACSCOC credentialing standards—make and document the equivalency determination.

If the instructor’s credentials are unknown, CPL can still be valid if the evaluation process is clearly documented and demonstrates equivalent rigor and learning outcomes.

Where the Lore Comes From

Much of the confusion stems from conflating two unrelated concepts: the qualifications required to teach a curriculum course versus the qualifications required to evaluate prior learning.
Institutions sometimes assume that because a continuing education instructor might not meet curriculum credentialing standards, no credit can ever be awarded for learning that occurred in that setting. That’s lore, not law.

CPL is about the student’s demonstrated learning, not the instructor’s background. The faculty who conduct the CPL evaluation, not the CE instructor, are the ones who ensure compliance with SACSCOC standards.

As long as the institution’s CPL policies and documentation show that the learning has been reviewed, assessed, and verified by credentialed faculty, it meets the Commission’s expectations.

Law vs. Lore

✅ Law: Community colleges may award credit for prior learning from continuing education courses if faculty determine and document that the learning outcomes and assessments are equivalent to those of a curriculum course.

❌ Lore: Community colleges cannot award credit for prior learning if the continuing education instructor is not credentialed or if their credentials are unknown.

✅ Law: Once credit for prior learning is officially awarded and transcripted, institutions receiving transfer credit that includes prior learning credit as part of the transcript may also evaluate/consider awarding prior learning credit in accordance with its own policies and evaluation of student learning.

❌ Lore: Prior learning credit from continuing education cannot transfer because it “doesn’t count” toward a degree or lacks a letter grade.

The Pruitt Perspective

There’s an old adage in education: “It’s not where the learning happened, but whether it happened.” The Principles of Accreditation align squarely with that idea. Our mission isn’t to protect the walls between continuing education and credit—it’s to build the bridge between them. When a student demonstrates that they have achieved the same learning outcomes as those in a curriculum course, the path to credit should be guided by evidence, not assumption.

If your institution’s faculty-driven processes confirm that a student mastered the outcomes of a curriculum course, regardless of how or where they learned them, then awarding credit for that learning is fully consistent with both SACSCOC expectations and the broader goal of expanding access and opportunity through sound academic judgment.

SACSCOC’s standards are clear: quality and integrity rest in the process, not the pathway. When faculty validate learning and institutions document it, credit for prior learning becomes a powerful tool for efficiency and opportunity.

So the next time someone says, “We can’t award credit because it started in continuing ed,” you might just smile and ask:

Is that law or lore?