Business degree from Excelsior- HELP! Please

[wingedmigration]

Hey everyone,

This forum is SUPEr helpful for me, thank you all SOOO much for posting and replying, I appreciate it a lot.

I have a question. I am just beginning my journey to get a Bachelors in General Business from Excelsior. I have almost no credits under my belt and have a lot of time, hope to finish within 12-18 months (is that possible?)

1. What are the best exams/courses to take for all of the requirements? I see that some of them are offered via ALEKS or STRAIGHTERLINE or CLEP or DSST or UXEL. Is there any advantage of one of those versus the other?

2. I will probably take the ALEKS College algebra, where can I get a good online calulator or math tool site to get me through it?

3. What is the benefit, if any, of doing any classes through Study.com ?

Here is the link to the degree plan for the degree I am trying for. https://my.excelsior.edu/documents/7...a-f32d9687245e

THANK YOU ALL!!!
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[KayV]

Welcome!

You may be able to tell that many more people use TESU's BSBA in General Management instead of the Excelsior College one, especially thanks to the 6-hour Capstone requirement (TESU's Capstone can be completed with a $114 exam). Do you have a particular reason for choosing Excelsior over TESU or COSC? For example, IT or professional certifications? Those might offset the cost somewhat.

Excelsior is pretty straightforward about what they will take for upper level credit: generally, some of their UExcel exams, some DSST and possibly TECEP exams, and upper level credits earned in regular classes. At this point they do not accept any Study.com, Saylor, or Straighterline classes for upper level credit. However, if you prefer the online class model (as opposed to earning credits by testing out with CLEP/ DSST/ UExcel), you can complete most of your lower level credits that way.

ALEKS is a non-proctored online math source that has been covered extensively on the forum. For Excelsior, take IN ORDER Beginning Algebra, College Algebra, Precalculus, and Statistics to max out your credits. Shmoop is a non-proctored source for history credits and offers Modern European History and American History I and II.

Also, Excelsior offers partnership pricing which saves a great deal over regular tuition and fees. Join the Peace Officers Association of Georgia as an associate member for $25/ year to get partnership pricing; you MUST mention it when you enroll to activate the offer.

Peace Officers Association of Georgia

[wingedmigration]

Thank you so much for your help.

I have not looked into the other 2 BIG schools. Is there a benefit of Thomas Edison vs. Excelsior.

I am getting the degree so that I can have a bachelors so I may begin teaching. My my district, all that is required is a bachelors (in any subject) to begin teaching.

[dfrecore]

Thank you so much for your help.

I have not looked into the other 2 BIG schools. Is there a benefit of Thomas Edison vs. Excelsior.

I am getting the degree so that I can have a bachelors so I may begin teaching. My my district, all that is required is a bachelors (in any subject) to begin teaching.

For a BSBA, the TESU degree is much cheaper, as is COSC. Excelsior, unless you have special pricing, is more expensive because of the 6cr capstone which is $3,000. It comes out to be about $2,000 more than TESU or COSC.

[KayV]

There is a sticky at the top of this board that is a "Beginner's Guide." It is very useful and would help you to get more of an idea about the process.
Are you wanting to teach business or teach a different subject? You mentioned a few credits; what do you have already?

[wingedmigration]

There is a sticky at the top of this board that is a "Beginner's Guide." It is very useful and would help you to get more of an idea about the process.
Are you wanting to teach business or teach a different subject? You mentioned a few credits; what do you have already?

You all are so helpful, thank you.

I am hoping to teach special education students, or history. In our area, teachers are on HIGH demand, so as long as a bachelors degree [in anything] is earned, that is good enough.

$2-3k is a big difference. Im glad you told me that. Hmmm.

I have so far:

History 1a - 3 credits
Sociology 1- 3 credits
Pysc 1- 3 credits
Microeconomics - 3 Credits
History of Civilization- 3 credits
Health 1- 3 credits
History of Art - 3 credits
History of Music- 3 credits
Interpersonal Communications- 3 credits

I got A's in all of them. Just need help putting together my plan now. Thinking of banging out all that I can with ALEKS and then with Straighterline then CLEP/DSST. ANY advice is great cuz I am just getting started on this and want to complete it within a year. I have a lot of free time to do it.

[KayV]

That's a great start! Did you happen to get AP credit or institutional credit (your college's in-house credit by exam service) for English?

Also, it's great that you want to be a teacher! I have taught for over 20 years and currently teach special ed and math at a private school. I would *strongly* encourage you to take some tests/ classes in both history and education. Psychology credits like General Psych, Developmental Psych, Educational Psych, etc. would be really helpful. So would the DSST Foundations of Education and UExcel Literacy Instruction in the Elementary School. Obviously History credits would be useful too. As a potential special education teacher, you would be in charge of complying with laws and documentation so any exposure to education lingo would help.

[principal]

Welcome!

You may be able to tell that many more people use TESU's BSBA in General Management instead of the Excelsior College one, especially thanks to the 6-hour Capstone requirement (TESU's Capstone can be completed with a $114 exam). Do you have a particular reason for choosing Excelsior over TESU or COSC? For example, IT or professional certifications? Those might offset the cost somewhat.
...
Also, Excelsior offers partnership pricing which saves a great deal over regular tuition and fees. Join the Peace Officers Association of Georgia as an associate member for $25/ year to get partnership pricing; you MUST mention it when you enroll to activate the offer.

Peace Officers Association of Georgia

Hi everyone,

I couldn't help but chime in since I have a number of questions, too. I'm also just about to bite the bullet and start testing--super excited--but I've still got a couple of questions. First of all, I need a Bachelors because I'm planning to go into Educational Leadership for my Masters and I wanted that to be a well regarded state school. The Graduate School has a GPA requirement of 3.0 and that's probably my main reason for leaning towards Excelsior for my BS; I need to have a GPA. Would I be able to have a GPA if I went to TESU?

I'm also starting from zero. I've got some 9 year old AP and IB credit, but I don't imagine that would amount to much? I would like to go for General Business just like OP. Is there any plan (recent) that details specific tests to go off of? I have downloaded the relevant materials from the Excelsior website and read the sticky threads through, but I still would like to see a full plan for testing out. Also, I noticed that the DANTES test are letter graded, but that the CLEPs aren't. Does that mean that I should plan on just getting a Pass on the CLEPs, but that I should prepare for an A (or B) on the DANTES?

On a side note, the partnership pricing that you mention, that would reduce the cost of fees? Do you know by how much?

Thanks in advanced!

[wingedmigration]

Great info.

To answer one question, CLEP and Dantes are both UNgraded at Excelsior.


GREAT information about the history/education courses you recommend, I appreciate that a lot.

KayV, fantastic to hear about your educational background too. I asked the right person! Thank you. Are any of those courses you mentioned able to go towards my general ed courses required? It seems like I should take them either way, just curious though.

[dfrecore]

Hi everyone,

I couldn't help but chime in since I have a number of questions, too. I'm also just about to bite the bullet and start testing--super excited--but I've still got a couple of questions. First of all, I need a Bachelors because I'm planning to go into Educational Leadership for my Masters and I wanted that to be a well regarded state school. The Graduate School has a GPA requirement of 3.0 and that's probably my main reason for leaning towards Excelsior for my BS; I need to have a GPA. Would I be able to have a GPA if I went to TESU?

I'm also starting from zero. I've got some 9 year old AP and IB credit, but I don't imagine that would amount to much? I would like to go for General Business just like OP. Is there any plan (recent) that details specific tests to go off of? I have downloaded the relevant materials from the Excelsior website and read the sticky threads through, but I still would like to see a full plan for testing out. Also, I noticed that the DANTES test are letter graded, but that the CLEPs aren't. Does that mean that I should plan on just getting a Pass on the CLEPs, but that I should prepare for an A (or B) on the DANTES?

On a side note, the partnership pricing that you mention, that would reduce the cost of fees? Do you know by how much?

Thanks in advanced!

Any school will give you grades if you take courses there. EC is not special in that way. I think (but am not sure) that EC will give you grades for the Uexcel's, so that might be a good way to go. On the other hand, UExcel's are considered more difficult than other tests like CLEP or DSST, so that might not be the best way to go about getting your GPA up. You may actually want to take some courses at a school (any inexpensive school) to get a good GPA. It's especially helpful to find out what the prerequisites are for the Masters program you want to get into, and then think about taking those prereq's as graded courses.

Just as an example, if you want to go to get an MBA at ENMU, they want a 3.0 in 9 or so courses. I have graded courses for 5 of them, so my GPA for those 5 courses will be what they look at. If I wanted to raise my GPA on those courses, I could take some additional courses at my local CC (which in CA is very cheap) and shoot for A's, and an improvement in my prereq GPA. I don't have to take the courses at TESU. My GPA at TESU will be nothing, since I'm not taking anything there. But the MBA program does not say that they require a GPA at the school where I have my BSBA from - just that my overall GPA is something, and my prereq GPA is 3.0.

So, when looking at masters programs, my advice is always to begin with the end in mind. Work backwards from there.