Earn Credit for Prior Learning

Undergraduate students with prior educational experience in a particular field of study in the liberal arts may be interested in earning credit in one or more of the statewide Guaranteed Transfer (GT) Pathways general education curriculum categories without taking a traditional course at CU Boulder. Students may earn GT Pathways credit without taking a course by passing a challenge exam. 

Challenge Exam

Students may request a challenge exam for any one of the 14 categories in the GT Pathways general education curriculum. Students must take and pass a proctored examination (usually a CLEP exam) or other approved assessment to demonstrate their knowledge and mastery of the state-approved content and competencies for that GT Pathways category. By successfully challenging a GT Pathways category, a student will earn 3 or 4 generic credits toward the equivalent category in their CU Boulder general education requirements. They will not earn credit for a specific CU Boulder course.

  • Students must be enrolled at CU Boulder, meaning they must be either:
      matriculated new students who are registered for classes as of the first day of their first semester at CU Boulder, or
      continuing students who are registered for the current or upcoming term.
     
  • Students may only challenge guaranteed-transfer (GT Pathways) categories not specific CU Boulder courses. These categories are similar to the College of Arts and Sciences General Education categories and the general education categories in the other CU Boulder colleges and schools.
     
  • Students may not take a challenge exam in a GT Pathways category once they fulfill that category.
     
  • Credit earned via a challenge exam will apply to general education requirements, but will not apply to specific major requirements (see your college or school's policies).
     
  • Students may earn a maximum of 36 credits through general education challenge exams, though the limit may be lower for specific degree programs, which do not include the whole 31-credit GT Pathways curriculum.

If you have additional questions about the policies related to the GT Pathways challenge exam, or if you have questions regarding the status of your challenge exam request, please contact the Office of the Registrar.

Before you apply for a challenge exam, we recommend speaking with your advisor to ensure you have the requisite knowledge for the exam and to identify how many of the GT Pathways categories are required in your degree program and how many you have already completed.

Note: Many of the degrees in Engineering, Music, Business and Environmental Design do not require completing the entire 31-credit GT Pathways curriculum.

Once you've spoken with your advisor, complete the General Education Credit for Prior Learning Request Form and return it to the Office of the Registrar.

An initial eligibility review (see restrictions above) will be performed and your request will be forwarded to the Office of Academic and Curricular Affairs in the College of Arts and Sciences for further review.

If approved, the College of Arts and Sciences will explain which challenge exams are available for the GT Pathways category you wish to challenge, and then will direct you to take a CLEP exam either at the testing center of a local community college or at home with remote proctoring.

The local community college or the College Board, which offers online CLEP exams with remote proctoring, will charge a fee for the exam.

After you take the exam and earn a high enough score, you must ask the College Board (the company offering the exam) to send your scores to the CU Boulder Office of the Admissions. Admissions will then post your transfer credit to your record as a generic Arts and Sciences course. This course (ARSC 1999TC) will count toward the appropriate general education requirement in your degree audit. As transfer credit, the course will not be assigned a grade or any quality points and will not affect your GPA.

Other Methods

Please note that students may also earn GT Pathways credit for prior learning via:

  • Advanced Placement (AP) exams
  • International Baccalaureate (IB) exams
  • College-Level Examination Program (CLEP) exams
  • DANTES Subject Standardized Tests (DSST)

Please see the CU Boulder catalog's  page for information about earning credit for those exams.