Two-Year Programs and Articulation to a Chemistry Degree: A Faculty and Student Perspective

Each year, a large number of higher education students in the UK transfer from programs at further and higher education colleges to the second or third year of a bachelor’s degree. The success of this movement is largely dependent on how closely the curricula of the two programs are aligned. Over the past two years, students from the Higher National Diploma in Applied Chemistry have been supported in their progression through the development of a bridging course which efficiently covers gaps in key knowledge and skills. Crucially, the bridging course was developed with the input of past students, who brought their own lived experience of articulation. By using past students as cocreators and adjunct faculty, we were able to offer a highly interactive and supportive bridging course, which not only ensured buy-in from current students but also provided faculty with the basis for critical reflection and mapping of future program development.