Narrating unfinished business: adult learners using credit transfer to re-engage with higher education

Abstract

This paper seeks to advance our understanding of the credit transfer phenomenon in the UK. Drawing on interviews with twenty-six part-time mature learners this paper examines the progressive and retrospective orientations to study that surfaced in students' accounts of credit transfer and their life-long learning journeys. A common theme of "unfinished business" appeared to dominate these accounts and a narrative-oriented analysis of the findings revealed the role of credit transfer in enabling students to complete varied personal projects or forms of "unfinished business. The findings of this work suggest that understanding a range of possible narratives that students draw upon to support successful learning is necessary to move forward the flexibility of the student centred curriculum and to support students in re-engaging with higher education.