Excelsior. Good College? Anyone Liked/Hated It?

[Christopher]

Okay so at some point I’m going to take on one of the three colleges here. I’m leaning towards Excelsior but not for at least another semester as I want to knock off a few G.E. classes at the community college that’s 10 minutes from my house and have online/night classes. Funny how to get an AA you might only need English 1A but to get an BA you need 1 and 2. Or for an AA just two sciences courses but for a BA you need that extra lab class. So I need to fill in those “holes” of GE left between the AA and BA.

Excelsior is is Latin for “Higher” which I guess in this case is a reference to higher learning or higher education. Smart name for a college hehe. But, that’s not why I’m interested in the college. I like their format, Master’s Degree option, and their liberal policy on transferring credits in (my “Theater Arts: Stagecrafts” class won’t go to waste) Just curios on people’s views of it. Positive, negative, neutral experiences? I know all colleges have their ups/downs. Even UCLA here in Los Angeles. Some people love UCLA some people claim it’s a biased college. So like anything else, it’s a matter of personal opinion. The key I’m looking at is online flexibility. I work like most people so I need the option to be able to work on my classes at night/morning/lunch time. Be able to communicate with teachers if I need help with something. Only thing is, Excelsior has only a 3.8 rating. Rate My Professors - Review Teachers and Professors, School Reviews, College Campus Ratings

One of my main question is classes. Are classes all year around or can you start in sessions? Traditional colleges like UCLA have the standard 18 week Fall/Spring and that’s about it. Summer is limited and once Fall/Spring starts…that’s it. You pretty much start in January or August and there’s no other options. I rather focus on two classes in one eight week period then five classes spread out of a long 18 weeks. If that makes any sense.
My runner up is Charter Oak. I like Charter Oak, but everything seems to be “General Studies with a Concentration on…”

Colleges I’m not interested in is anything not regionally accredited. Or technical schools like ITT Tech, etc. My best friend went to ITT Tech and quit after two semesters. None of the colleges/universities would accept his credit. Even some jobs wouldn’t recognize it as legitimate.

Thanks,
Christopher

[Yanji]

Excelsior is the state motto of New York, where Excelsior College is located...

IMO, Excelsior is a good choice if you're not planning on taking a lot of classes because of the transfer credit you've built up + the tests you intend to take. Otherwise, there are probably better options out there, although they probably won't offer the same number of majors that Excelsior does. One (often overlooked) reason I say this is that they're located in Eastern Time, so if you live out west, customer service hours will suck, although Excelsior is so big that they have operate longer than both TESC and COSC, which pretty much operate on East Coast business hours and observe all state holidays because they are public. This may end up being more important than you may think, especially if you're on a rushed timeline.

[ajs1976]

Your take on the Excelsior name is better then mine. I think it sounds like a bad 80s hair band. "Dude! Bro! Did you get the new Excelsior cassette? It's b!tichin!" Regents, or whatever it was before, sounded better to me. Something about their site turned me off a few years ago. Made it seem like one of the for profits and I never give it much consideration after that.

Not sure about the class schedule at Excelsior, but an advantage of the big 3 is that you can start studying and take a CLEP or DSST exam or a Straighterline or ALEKS course whenever you want to and have that fill in the down time.

I don't like the general studies degree aspect of COSC, but for me it was which one can get me to an IS degree faster and because of my previous credits and exams it was at COSC. The new Info Sec program is a major and not a concentration.

If your AA is in business or IT or have some recent IT certs, you may want to look into WGU.

[GoodYellowDogs]

I finished my BS in August after having "attended" for 6 years (I was slow!). I loved the school. My only concern was my informal review of my app versus the formal review of my credits. Once I was enrolled they applied more credit than I thought they would. The rest was smooth sailing. I had Matthew Flowers as an advisor and he was outstanding. I can't say enough good things about the school.

[JohnnyHeck]

Here is a heads-up concerning English Comp requirements for any Calif. AA student: As you no doubt are aware, at a CA CC you can get your AA with only one true English !A comp course (4 hr credit) because the rest of your 3 course "Oral and Written Critical Reasoning and Communication" requirements can come from other departments with a writing intensive critical reasoning component. At all of the Big 3 if you just have your ENG 1A, your Initial EVAL will say you are short 3 hr. of Eng. 102 composition which is focused on research writing. Both ECE and COSC will conditionally accept your CA 1A as fulfilling their Eng. Comp. requirement if you complete a course in Tech Writing, but TESC will demand an actual Eng. 102 equivalent for research writing. I would recommend you take the second English comp course at your CC focusing on research writing. You are really going to need these skills when you get to your Capstone/Cornerstone courses at any of the Big 3.

[Christopher]

I would be coming in with about 70-80 credits after semester end. Most of the GE would be done except. 1: Science Lab. I only have Physical Anthropology and Astronomy. No one credit lab as I didnt needed back then. 2: College Math. At the time only Elementary Algebra was required to graduate and I wasnt sure about going on to BA/BS. Thats without following the IGECT plan. And that additional English course. I only have the following writing courses complete. Journalism 02: News Reporting/Writing (3 credit, and if that wasn't compressive writing; I don’t know what was. I had to write articles for the college newspaper lol). English 02: Intro. to College Writing (3 credit). English 01A: English Composition (4 credit). English isn't my concern. I got A+ in all English classes. Writing/English is fine with me. I also have Speech 1 - Intro to Communications (now called Comm 01 at the same college). Im not sure..would I need another English class or would those fulfill? It's math that's my weak point. Any important needed lower division classes can be taken at my CC especially during the summer. It's ten minutes from my house, and the tuition is pretty cheap. Not as cheap or as close to cheap as 1998...but still cheap lol. CLEP testing is also only about fifteen to twenty minutes from me at Cal Luthern University.

I'm not in a huge rush. Two years is good. Summer classes too. I don't want to spend five to ten years as I'm 34 years old. But, I don’t need to rush and have it all done by next summer. I have an AA already, and decent work experience at a major unified school district, and actually will be getting a second (unintentionally it just falls that way as one of the classes fulfills one of new general majors they added in 2009). I’m single / independent. So I only support myself. I have the funds so wont be using loans. Makes it easier for school; I figure its now or never. Work is about my only other obligation in life. Im not a Business major. I looked for colleges in California that are online only(because if in California if I can show I have 90 regional credits, and enrolled, I can obtain a temporary permit to sub teach) but the ones Ive seen are non-accredited. Except University of Phoenix, but I didn't click with them at all. I guess I'm leading towards Libral Arts. I can take another year at CC and get "AS: Child Development" which is all that is needed to gain a teaching credential permit in California to teach Pre-School then work on my BA, but the pay is extremly low I'm hearing. In California if you have a BA in any subject from a regional accredited college, and past CBEST, and dont have a criminal record, you can easily get your Sub Teaching Permit and sub teach. Believe me...if you live in Los Angeles you can make a career out of just sub teaching as you'll work everyday, pay is decent, and they offer health benfits for sub teachers. That's how desperate they are for substitute teachers. http://www.ctc.ca.gov/credentials/leaflets/cl505p.pdf

Here is a heads-up concerning English Comp requirements for any Calif. AA student: As you no doubt are aware, at a CA CC you can get your AA with only one true English !A comp course (4 hr credit) because the rest of your 3 course "Oral and Written Critical Reasoning and Communication" requirements can come from other departments with a writing intensive critical reasoning component. At all of the Big 3 if you just have your ENG 1A, your Initial EVAL will say you are short 3 hr. of Eng. 102 composition which is focused on research writing. Both ECE and COSC will conditionally accept your CA 1A as fulfilling their Eng. Comp. requirement if you complete a course in Tech Writing, but TESC will demand an actual Eng. 102 equivalent for research writing. I would recommend you take the second English comp course at your CC focusing on research writing. You are really going to need these skills when you get to your Capstone/Cornerstone courses at any of the Big 3.

[Yanji]

Search CSU Degrees
All of these should be cheap for CA residents and CA CC transfers will be straightforward. Not a whole lot of choices, but the usual distance ed suspects like Business Admin, Sociology, General Studies and CJ are all there, aside from perhaps Psych.

[Christopher]

Yes, I looked into that too. Only three are located in my area (Channel Islands and Northridge and a bit more distant but still near Santa Barbara). Business and Sociology I believe. Not my area of major. CSU is popular with students out of H.S. as of 2009 because of a bill signed by the former Governor that anyone that takes courses meeting what is called an "AA-Transfer" automatically gets into CSU no matter what. Its called "Degree with a transfer". Before my time as CC lol. Back in those days you had to compete to get into any University even out of CC and SAT's were the big way in. Associate Degree for Transfer

Interesting what website says:

"Even if you do not complete or have to delay finishing your bachelor’s degree, you'll still have an associate degree and no one can take that from you. It can significantly increase your earning potential and provide you with the skills employers are looking for in this difficult economy."

It's true. I couldnt have gotten into my job without an AA. Why AA/AS degrees are important. Even "some college" looks better than just high school on job applications.

[JohnnyHeck]

Because you did not follow the IGECT plan for your AA, not all of your credits will transfer to a Big 3 senior institution. E.g. Your Eng 02 and Elementary Algebra will be considered remedial and will not transfer. Regardless of the fact that you are really a strong writer, you have only one transferable Eng. Comp class. As for math Gen Ed you have nothing. What major are you considering? Based on my experience with CA CC courses transferring East, I would spend the couple of bucks for an initial eval at any one of the Big 3, to find out how they see it as of now. You've got 6 months from this application date to enroll and not have to reapply. For math, no matter what degree you plan you couldn't go wrong with ALEKS Intermediate Algebra and then College Algebra. ALEKS -- Assessment and Learning, K-12, Higher Education, Automated Tutor, Math Both of these courses will fit into almost any degree plan at the Big 3 somewhere.

[Christopher]

Yeah I know about Math. Back in 2003, it was E. Algebra that was only required to graduate from C.C. Now, it's Intermediate for CC and College Algebra for University as it's always been for University. My Elementary Algebra no longer counts for credit, but my 5 Units at Intermediate Algebra will count towards elective and meeting the new AA requirement (if I wanted another A.A.) I actually have that planned out now as I'd take those at the C.C. or at least the Intermediate Algebra probably College Algebra too. I already know which instructor to go with and we have a great tutoring center here and I have plenty of Title 1 teachers to help me tutor bwhaha (I work in an elementary school.) English is not an issue - I can take English 1B or 1C at the CC with his English Comp II and English Comp II-Literature. Right now my Eng M02 applies for credit still but as an elective if I was transfer to CSUN. I had a free assessment done already at one college. University of La Verne. They said all I would need for GE is the English class (although they allow testing out for that), College Algebra, and science lab. Everything else transfers over towards the 120 Units. And of course I'd need the 40+ upper level courses in the major and some "fill-ins" to reach the 120. But, they were only offering Liberal Studies via hybrid at our local community college as the only option at this time. Of course for the big three we’re talking about here on the forum it can be different.

My degree would be either "Early Childhood Education (AKA Child Development)" at COSC or "Liberal Arts"at Excl. I'm open to other areas except business. I have an AA is in Libral Arts (with an emphasis on Theater Arts). If Child Development I would take the 24 lower units to certify here at the C.C. and then maybe look at Charter Oak as they have Child Studies. But, the pay for pre-school teaching is horribly low unless you get into IBI work at a school district. The reason for the ECE interest is simply because I work now as a Teachers Assistant in K-6 for our District as one of my areas so I have knowledge of the field and pretty much most of my work career has in some way been in a school district in one classification or another. I was told straight up if I get a BA/BS and past CBEST...Im automatically hired as a sub teacher at my District. Now Liberal Studies as that's a whole different thing in California as Liberal Studies means taking on certificated teaching courses like “EDU 201: Teaching to Students with Disabilities” as an example and so on. I saw the Liberal Studies option at Thomas Edison S.C. and it was so different to the Liberal Studies major at the local Universities here in California.

I had actually post my CC transcipt here: http://www.degreeforum.net/excelsior-tho...tting.html

W'ell see what happens. Sorry for any spelling/grammar errors. I'm typing fast and not really proof reading.