La’Markus Bragg | Reporter
Feb. 23, 2016 | Lindenwood Legacy

Transferring to Lindenwood may become easier thanks to a proposal easing the process for transferring credits.

The proposal, which would adopt Missouri’s Coordinating Board for Higher Education transfer guidelines, would allow Lindenwood to change its credit transferring policy for incoming students.

The guideline states that “transcripts that students have completed a 42 semester-hour general education block of credit that is consistent with statewide general education policy” would be accepted by other colleges.

Currently, credits that would transfer to other schools, such as college math courses, may not transfer to Lindenwood, and the student would have to take the course again. If the guideline is adopted, a large portion of credits denied by Lindenwood in the past would be accepted.

The proposal to adopt the guideline came from the general education task force made up of faculty and administrators that have been meeting for more than a year to develop new policies.

The taskforce said the proposal is meant to better serve transfer students by keeping in line with standard industry practices.

Patrick Walker, chair of faculty council, said that transfer students who come from community colleges often have to take more general education courses to fulfill the university’s requirements.

“When we make it harder for students to come here, in the end we lose, especially, when it comes down to them getting out of college within a reasonable amount of time,” Walker said.

Walker said that he believes the transfer guidelines proposal could boost Lindenwood’s enrollment.

“There are a number of different reasons why students don’t want to come to Lindenwood University, but this issue shouldn’t be one of them,” Walker said. “For some students it might be better for them to attend a community college before transferring to another school. That is a good idea to save as much money as you can.”

This decision to adopt the credit transfer guidelines from the state’s Coordination Board for Higher Education has not yet been approved by the dean’s council.

Erin Mann, the Interim Associate Provost of the Lindenwood University system, is not certain if and when this decision will be in effect.

“The idea of the 42-hour transfer is that when a student completes an associate’s degree at a community college, and it has a liberal arts component or a general education component, we would then accept that block in fulfillment of the student’s general education requirement,” Mann said.