Title: AN HISTORICAL CASE STUDY ON THE ILLINOIS ARTICULATION INITIATIVE

Abstract

The purpose of this case study was to gain understanding, from an historical perspective, of the Illinois Articulation Initiative (IAI), a statewide policy on the transfer and articulation of college courses. Specifically, this research was designed to describe the IAI policy, explain the social, political, and economical influences involved in transfer operations, and discover how the IAI initiative reflects the community college role in higher education. Based on the premise that all those involved in developing the policy were mainly concerned with student success, the qualitative inquiry methods employed were interviews, as well as the review of Board minutes, reports, personal documents and accompanying literature to reach the conclusion that IAI is built with sound structure, but lacks the final phase of an evaluation to rightly determine its value in student success.