Assignment: Appropriate Academic Standards
Assignment: Appropriate Academic Standards
but are particularly important when using portfolio evidence to gain academic credit for prior learning from a university.
Academic accreditation for prior learning Accreditation of prior learning (APL) is a process whereby academic credits can be awarded for previous learning that an individual has undertaken either through formal courses of study (Accreditation of Prior Certificated Learning – APCL) or through unstructured, informal learning
box 3. An example of using portfolio evidence to map against a specific competency Competency
Candidate is able to work innovatively and be highly committed to providing holistic care with a passion to improve the patient experience for service users.
Demonstrated by:
Led and managed a change development project to set up a nurse led tel- ephone follow-up service for post-operative patients.
Evidence from portfolio
Project plan
Minutes of steering group meetings
Audit report of first 3 months of service
Short reflective account of the process of implementing the service.
PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
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British Journal of Community Nursing Vol 15, No 11 551
PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
at work or home (Accreditation of Prior Experiential Learning – APEL). Essentially this means that universities will review evidence of learning presented in a portfolio and award academic credits if it meets the appropriate academic standards. The academic standard a practitioner is seeking should be demonstrated in the academic level of the writing, as set by the Quality Assurance Agency (2001), such as structure and referencing
Credits gained can be used towards an academic award, for example, a diploma or degree or used to grant exemption from part of a course of study. In addition, evidence of prior learning can be used to provide evidence of the ability to study for a specific level of study and so enable the potential student to gain exemption from the usual academic entry requirements. With the ending of diploma programmes and a move to all graduate pre-registration nurse preparation programmes from 2013, many registered nurses may want to consider returning to academic study on a part-time basis to achieve a degree. Guidance on APL processes can be obtained from individual universities but having a current and intelligently presented portfolio reflecting past experience and learning is an excellent starting point for those wishing to seek APL
You must proofread your paper. But do not strictly rely on your computer’s spell-checker and grammar-checker; failure to do so indicates a lack of effort on your part and you can expect your grade to suffer accordingly. Papers with numerous misspelled words and grammatical mistakes will be penalized. Read over your paper – in silence and then aloud – before handing it in and make corrections as necessary. Often it is advantageous to have a friend proofread your paper for obvious errors. Handwritten corrections are preferable to uncorrected mistakes.
Use a standard 10 to 12 point (10 to 12 characters per inch) typeface. Smaller or compressed type and papers with small margins or single-spacing are hard to read. It is better to let your essay run over the recommended number of pages than to try to compress it into fewer pages.
Likewise, large type, large margins, large indentations, triple-spacing, increased leading (space between lines), increased kerning (space between letters), and any other such attempts at “padding” to increase the length of a paper are unacceptable, wasteful of trees, and will not fool your professor.
The paper must be neatly formatted, double-spaced with a one-inch margin on the top, bottom, and sides of each page. When submitting hard copy, be sure to use white paper and print out using dark ink. If it is hard to read your essay, it will also be hard to follow your argument.
