Foreign Language Credits via Portfolio?

[retro]

Just out of curiosity, has anyone here ever gotten foreign language credits via portfolio from the Big Three?

Example:

You are reasonably fluent in X as a second language, but it's not French, German, or Spanish, so taking a CLEP exam to "certify" this not an option. Instead, you take the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CFER) exam for your language. Additionally, you have a small number of not well recognized "certificates of completion" from locally available courses or exams in X language to bolster your case. You use these things together as the basis for your portfolio.

Has anyone attempted to do this at the big three? Did it work? If it worked, were there any other hoops you had to jump through? How many credits did you get?

[jamshid666]

I don't know if the CFER is recognized by the "Big 3" or not. Typically within the US, we would need to take the NY University Foreign Language Proficiency Test: https://www.sps.nyu.edu/professional-pat...sting.html. In addition to that exam, government employees can take the Foreign Service Institute proficiency tests and military students can take the Defense Language Proficiency Test in their chosen language. That said, there are some American schools that do give credit for the CFER, for example, the University of Washington will provide up to three years of language credit if you certify at the B2 or higher level on the CFER: https://germanics.washington.edu/credit-transfer. In my opinion, I'd say give it a shot and if it doesn't go through, take the NYU FLPT as a backup option.

---

Here is a list of language proficiency tests other than the CFER that might be of use to obtaining language credit within the U.S.: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_la...ency_tests Note that the ACFTL recently had their ACE accreditation extended to 11/30/2019. We're not sure if that is temporary, but generally speaking, most extensions mean the company is working with ACE for a proper long-term renewal of their accreditation. Out of curiosity, what language are you trying to get college credit for? I have 22 SH of Persian Farsi, but I haven't studied that language since 1989, so I would not consider myself fluent anymore. There aren't many opportunities to use the language on a frequent basis here and language is a perishable skill.

[wow]

Just out of curiosity, has anyone here ever gotten foreign language credits via portfolio from the Big Three?

Example:

You are reasonably fluent in X as a second language, but it's not French, German, or Spanish, so taking a CLEP exam to "certify" this not an option. Instead, you take the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CFER) exam for your language. Additionally, you have a small number of not well recognized "certificates of completion" from locally available courses or exams in X language to bolster your case. You use these things together as the basis for your portfolio.

Has anyone attempted to do this at the big three? Did it work? If it worked, were there any other hoops you had to jump through? How many credits did you get?

TESU has its own set up for awarding foreign language credits based on real-world experience. Look at their webpage for alternative sources of credit, and there is a link to information about foreign language knowledge. I think it involves a written test and phone interview (in the target language) carried out by a language testing agency; I don't remember the details, but they're there.

[retro]

You appear to be thinking of a test through the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages. Amazingly, if your target language isn't in their list of readily available language testing options, if you contact them they'll try to accommodate you with a test in your target language.

This could be very useful for fulfilling a foreign language requirement with a minority language and not simply one of the "big five" languages.

[allvia]

Not sure if you saw this thread: https://www.degreeforum.net/mybb/Thread-...l-11-30-19

[retro]

Not sure if you saw this thread: https://www.degreeforum.net/mybb/Thread-...l-11-30-19

Oh, I did not know that. I don't have time between now and November to devote to this. How many times have the Big Three dropped and re-added ACTFL as a recognized credit source?

[tesu-acct-student]

I like this idea a lot (huge fan of portfolios). But I'm not sure if it will work. Let me explain what I mean.

At TESU portfolios are evaluated by somebody who is qualified to evaluate them. For example, my accounting portfolios were evaluated by somebody who had an MBA degree. Similarly, I wanted to do a portfolio on sales taxes and property taxes as applied to business, and even found a couple course descriptions from other universities that TESU could have used, but TESU turned me down because they didn't have somebody who was qualified to evaluate it.

So... if they don't have somebody on the faculty who is qualified in that language, I am not sure if they would be willing to give credit for that sort of portfolio. The types of evidence you gave as examples don't really require the elevator to know the language. But even so, I'm not sure what they would say in that kind of a situation. It would be worth asking, because the examples you gave for evidence sound like persuasive and reliable forms of evidence.

[dfrecore]

Not sure if you saw this thread: https://www.degreeforum.net/mybb/Thread-...l-11-30-19

Oh, I did not know that. I don't have time between now and November to devote to this. How many times have the Big Three dropped and re-added ACTFL as a recognized credit source?

It's not the Big 3 that have done this: ACTFL chose not to renew with ACE, so their recommendation for credit expired.  Apparently, they are in the process of renewing now, so ACE has extended their prior recommendation for a short time until the evaluation is complete.

If you are fluent in the language, you don't have to "devote" any time to this - you just schedule a time and take the online test.  Any day/time you want.

If you need to study to become more fluent (I guess is what you might be saying?) then you could hope that they pass the ACE evaluation.  This also means that the amount of credit and level of credit can (and probably will change).  Right now, you can get up to 6cr of UL and 6cr of LL for the highest level, but it used to be 12cr UL/12cr LL a few years ago, then went down from there.  So, you need to gamble on the fact that they'll get ACE credit again AND that it won't go down some more.

If I was fluent in something and needed credit, this is what I'd spend my time on right now (between 2 exams you could get 12cr UL and 12cr LL for $210).  You can't beat that with a stick.  It's cheaper than any type of PLA you could possibly do (which would take MUCH more time you'd need to devote to doing).

[retro]

> If you need to study to become more fluent (I guess is what you might be saying?)...

Right, that's exactly what I'm saying.

Thanks for your explanations about what's going on behind the scenes. The situation with accreditation now makes much more sense in my head than it did.

[cookderosa]

To emphasize, you don't have to be fluent in reading AND writing AND listening AND speaking. Just pick the ACTFL that matches your abilities. I would expect a solid ACE renewal (following their current 1 month renewal) but I also wouldn't risk it - you can always go back and add a second ACTFL exam after you've worked on your weaknesses and feel more prepared.

I am not a super-fan of Portfolios. I think that the carrot is enticing, but you STILL have to pay to take the portfolio classes PLA100 (1 cr) and PLA200 (2 credits) before you even can attempt to put it together. Once you've done the work of assembling your portfolio and PAID $389 for them to review your work, they can still deny the credit. Of course if it's more than 12 credits, that costs extra.

-or-

You pay a hundred bucks and take the ACTFL worth a TON of credit!

OPIc (speaking) $105, up to 6cr UL + 6cr LL
WPT (writing) $105, up to 6cr UL + 6cr LL
LPT (listening) $50, up to 6cr LL
RPT (reading) $50, up to 6cr LL

Official ACTFL OPIs are currently available in the following languages (but are subject to change): Afrikaans, Akan-Twi, Albanian, Amharic, Arabic, Armenian, Azerbaijani, Baluchi, Bengali, Bosnian, Bulgarian, Burmese, Cambodian, Cantonese, Cebuano, Chavacano, Czech, Dari, Dutch, Egyptian, English, French, Georgian, German, Greek (Modern), Gujarati, Haitian Creole, Hausa, Hebrew, Hindi, Hmong/Mong, Hungarian, Igbo, Ilocano, Indonesian, Iraqi, Italian, Japanese, Javanese, Kazakh, Kashmiri, Korean, Kurdish, Lao, Levantine, Malay, Malayalam, Mandarin, Marshallese, Nepali, Norwegian, Pashto, Persian Farsi, Polish, Portuguese Punjabi, Romanian, Russian, Serbian Croatian, Sindhi, Sinhalese, Slovak, Somali, Spanish, Swahili, Swedish, Tagalog, Tajik, Tamil, Tausug, Telugu, Thai, Tigrinya, Turkish, Turkmen, Uighur, Urdu, Uzbek, Vietnamese, Wolof, Wu and Yoruba.