What is Graduate Credit Quest?


Graduate Credit Quest was created by the Midwestern Higher Education Compact (MHEC) and the Northeast Wisconsin Educational Resource Alliance (NEWERA) to help concurrent-enrollment teachers in their quest to be qualified to teach college-level courses.

Higher Learning Commission (HLC) requires colleges and universities awarding college credit to have qualified faculty. College-level instructor qualifications apply to concurrent-enrollment educators as they apply to college instructors. Therefore, concurrent-enrollment educators may require additional coursework to teach or continue teaching in their chosen field. Graduate Credit Quest provides these teachers with a list of relevant courses they can take to earn the credentials necessary to teach college-level courses.

High School Teachers Are Expected to Hold These Credentials By 2025.

Browse Our Course Listings

What is the Higher Learning Commission (HLC)?

The Higher Learning Commission (HLC) is the accreditation body for public and private colleges and universities in 19 states. In 2015, the Higher Learning Commission (HLC) clarified the policy language used to define the educational credentials expected of postsecondary faculty members, including high school teachers who teach concurrent-enrollment courses for which high school students earn college credits.

These reworded HLC guidelines require postsecondary concurrent-enrollment instructors to:

Option A:

Hold a master’s degree in the field that they are teaching

 

Option B:

Hold a master’s degree and complete 18 graduate credits in the field they are teaching

For teachers who already hold a master’s degree in education, but need 18 graduate credits in the field they wish to teach, there are a range of options for earning graduate credits through GCQ. 

Options include, but are not limited to:

Stand-Alone Graduate Courses

18 Credit Course Sequences

18 Credit Graduate Certificates

Are You In the Right Place? – Teachers and Students


Graduate Credit Quest’s mission is to help teachers who currently hold a master’s degree and need additional content-specific graduate credits. Further information on course certificates, references, and sequences is available within the course listings.

Currently, Graduate Credit Quest does not fully support students seeking or pursuing specific course certificates, sequences, or education graduate degrees. We advise students to contact the graduate school advisor at their chosen graduate institution for information on courses that are part of specific sequences, certificates, and master’s degrees.