Articulation of Military Earned College Credit into the University of North Carolina University System

The University of North Carolina System (UNC System) includes seventeen campuses. In response to an increasing interest in enrolling military service members and veterans, faculty and staff at individual campuses and also at the state level have been in collaboration to determine the best practices to integrate American Council on Education (ACE) credit recommendations into an easy to follow guide which academic advisors may use to advise military students and veterans. The difficulty in generating a standard articulation lies in the extensive variety of training the military provides and an equally varied set of regionally accredited university academic programs. The amount of credit service members receive varies widely with time in service and occupational area. When service members pursue a degree, they may choose academic programs not related to their service occupations. Additionally, university program administrators must maintain regional accreditation standards and often professional accreditation standards such as those promulgated by the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET) for engineering and technology. This paper examines the potential to create a waiver of liberal studies requirements for military students and veterans with particular emphasis on credit earned at the senior noncommissioned officer (NCO) rank levels. A variation of the liberal studies waiver currently granted to graduates of certain associate degree programs offers a promising model for a statewide, standard articulation. A review of the process that any transfer student undergoes to transfer to a program at a campus of the UNC System is also discussed.