Equivalence Systems LLC, or EQS, a spin-off from the UC Berkeley Computational Approaches to Human Learning research lab, recently developed CourseWise, a platform that uses AI with hopes of making the transfer student process smoother. This platform is currently in a period of testing at the UC system, among other places.
The cloud-based platform evolved out of decade-long research. According to the CourseWise website, it combats problems that post-secondary learners can face when transferring between institutions, such as losing about 43% of their earned credits.
Zachary Pardos, campus associate professor of education and founder of EQS, led the team that developed CourseWise, all of whom are campus alums.
“(CourseWise is) the beginning of putting into practice the lab’’s research on transfer and AI in higher education administration and pathfinding in general,” Pardos said in an email.
First, institutions are to upload their equivalency rules and “articulation agreement,” which is a handshake agreement between two institutions regarding what course they accept in exchange for one that they offer, to the platform.
Then, CourseWise uses an AI algorithm to analyze equivalent courses between universities that a user is interested in.
“From a student perspective, the planner feature along with the AI articulation suggestions can give students trying to transfer in from the CCC a better path into Cal and once they are here, give them a clear path to the BA that can ‘re-route’ if bumps in the road occur,” Pardos said in the email.
EQS is testing the platform using “communities of practice,” where they are able to receive direct feedback from experts and institutions. So far, the response has been positive, according to Angikaar Singh Chana, Chief Operating Officer of EQS.
As of press time, users must be at the institutions that are already implementing CourseWise in order to use it. However, EQS’ future plans involve making CourseWise public for students. Chana hopes more institutions implement the platform to expedite the process for their transfer cohorts.
According to Chana, UC Berkeley as an educational and research institution is “what has allowed this technology to take shape.” Furthermore, the operation of CourseWise is supported by funding from the College Futures Foundation; the Evelyn and Walter Haas, Jr. Fund; and the Gates Foundation.
“(CourseWise) enjoys a very big connection between the research aspect and the educational industry, and that’s not a relationship that I think many other tools or platforms have,” Chana said.