Considering Excelsior now, degree advice appreciated

[collegechick]

Hello my fellow students!  Happy new year!

I gave up on my bachelors two years ago and now am re-evaluating a return.  My goal is to get the quickest degree and have all my credits applied.  I was accepted at TESU and they accepted all my transfer credits, except my FEMA certs.  (I have an Associates Degree, studied at the Colorado Institute of Art and another CC.)  I was working towards a BA in Liberal Arts.  Now, I've looked into Excelsior and Charter Oak.  Admissions @ Excelsior told me I would not need another math to pursue a BS in Liberal Arts.  Hands down I'd prefer a BS over a BA.  However, they seem to require more UL than TESU?  TESU said I needed only 15 UL to graduate.  Here's a list of all my credits.


FVT 150: Development of Film Expression - 3 credits

FVT 160: Video Equipment & Tech - 3 credits
FVT 254: Digital Editing - 3 credits
GAT 120: Adobe Photoshop - 3 credits
GAT 106: Adobe Illustrator - 3 credits
PSY 101: Gen Psychology - 3 credits
PSY 102: Gen Psychology II - 3 credits
SPE 115: Speech Comm - 3 credits
SPE 125: Interpersonal Comm - 3 credits
ENG 121: Eng Comp - 3 credits
ENG 122: Eng Comp II - 3 credits
HUM 122: Survey of Humanities II - 3 credits
HUM 123: Survey of Humanities III - 3 credits
ART 111: Art History - 3 credits
CIS 136: Power Point - 4 credits
CIS 125: MS Word - 4 credits
CIS 117: Web Page Essentials - 4 credits
MAT 135: Intro to Statistics - 3 credits
AST 102: Astronomy 
AST 103: Lab - 4 credits
GEO 105: World Regional Geography - 3 credits
THE 111: Acting I - 3 credits

Art Institute
MM1360: Inside Multimedia - 3 credits
XD1301: Fund of Design - 3 credits
XD1310: Fund of Drawing - 3 credits
XD2302: Computer Paint - 3 credits
XD3303: Fund of Business - 3 credits

ACE
Ethics and the CPCU Code of Professional Conduct - 2 credits
Cyber Security for Business Professionals - 2 credits
Cyber Security for Everyone - 2 credits

***Also completed 6 FEMA certifications ten years ago - not sure if they can even be applied in anymore categories for any of the three schools?  I did not include these in the total credits below. Advice welcome.

TOTAL: 94 credits

What are my choices for UL courses, not using Saylor?  I find that platform to be confusingly fragmented, with info coming from everywhere on the web.  Looking to study from a solid source to study exactly what I need to know to pass.  Thank you all for your help.

[dfrecore]

TESU requires 18cr UL for all of their degrees except the BSBA (only 15cr UL required) but EC & COSC require 30cr of UL for all of their degrees. So it's not BS vs BA, but TESU vs. EC/COSC on that front.

Also, I wouldn't worry too much about BS vs. BA. There is not a huge difference, and many schools, even Ivy Leagues, may only give BA's. A BA from Harvard is not going to be given less shrift than a BS from EC or any other school.

[bjcheung77]

Stick with TESU - it'll be cheaper/easier/faster and the main thing is "better" as you will not need to waste time studying for UL exams, those UExcels or TECEPS would be harder than taking these courses that I recommend below. Furthermore, you need to find the available time and manage it so you can complete this accordingly. Stick with the choices below... and decide which one would be best for you.

For Study.com and StraighterLine, these are the recommended courses from me.
The reasons I would go for them is because of the ability to pass is easier/faster.
Study.com quizzes are 33%, final exam 66% of the grade, you need at least 56% on final to pass.
Straighterline exams/midterm are ~70% of the grade, you just need a few more % for the final.

Study - English 305: Advanced Technical Writing >> TESU ENG-306 : Intermediate Technical Writing
Study - History 306: The American Civil War Era >> TESU HIS-450 : The American Civil War Era
Study - History 308: Causes and Effects of the Vietnam War >> TESU HIS-351 : A History of Vietnam War
Straighterline: Business 105 Business Communications >> TESU COM-300 Business Communications (also a Lib Arts Comm course)
Straighterline: Business 120 Organizational Behavior >> TESU MAN-311 Organizational Behavior (also a Lib Arts Psych course)

For the price, Shmoop English/Literature courses are the cheapest, if you can handle them.
The 5 that are UL according to previous transfers mentioned on the board are:
These are non proctored, please create a pdf/word doc & use open book resources for tests.

*Holocaust Literature (ENG-301) - This is a hard course to pass
*Highly recommend ENG 306 - Technical Writing as it's much easier
Literature in the Media (LIT-430)
Modernist Literature (LIT-399)
Shakespeare's Plays (LIT-320)
Women's Literature (LIT-323)

So, if you want to use Shmoop, try to finish those 5 courses plus any additional electives you need.
In total, for Shmoop it would only cost you a whopping $88/month, if you can finish in a month.
Study.com - Try to finish in a month as well for those courses, as the HIS courses have overlap.
In total for Study.com, it should only be $270 for three courses in that one month.
StraighterLine, it's $100 membership and $59/course, you can finish these also in a month.
My suggestion, do the capstone while you're doing these courses, so you can finish everything at once (3 months).
If you find it hard to complete these courses, first do SL, then Study.com, finish with the capstone by itself.

[collegechick]

---

Stick with TESU - it'll be cheaper/easier/faster and the main thing is "better" as you will not need to waste time studying for UL exams, those UExcels or TECEPS would be harder than taking these courses that I recommend below.  Furthermore, you need to find the available time and manage it so you can complete this accordingly.  Stick with the choices below... and decide which one would be best for you.

For Study.com and StraighterLine, these are the recommended courses from me.
The reasons I would go for them is because of the ability to pass is easier/faster.
Study.com quizzes are 33%, final exam 66% of the grade, you need at least 56% on final to pass.
Straighterline exams/midterm are ~70% of the grade, you just need a few more % for the final.

Study - English 305: Advanced Technical Writing >> TESU ENG-306 : Intermediate Technical Writing
Study - History 306: The American Civil War Era >> TESU HIS-450 : The American Civil War Era
Study - History 308: Causes and Effects of the Vietnam War >> TESU HIS-351 : A History of Vietnam War
Straighterline: Business 105 Business Communications >> TESU COM-300 Business Communications (also a Lib Arts Comm course)
Straighterline: Business 120 Organizational Behavior >> TESU MAN-311 Organizational Behavior (also a Lib Arts Psych course)

For the price, Shmoop English/Literature courses are the cheapest, if you can handle them.
The 5 that are UL according to previous transfers mentioned on the board are:
These are non proctored, please create a pdf/word doc & use open book resources for tests.

*Holocaust Literature (ENG-301) - This is a hard course to pass
*Highly recommend ENG 306 - Technical Writing as it's much easier
Literature in the Media (LIT-430)
Modernist Literature (LIT-399)
Shakespeare's Plays (LIT-320)
Women's Literature (LIT-323)

So, if you want to use Shmoop, try to finish those 5 courses plus any additional electives you need.
In total, for Shmoop it would only cost you a whopping $88/month, if you can finish in a month.
Study.com - Try to finish in a month as well for those courses, as the HIS courses have overlap.
In total for Study.com, it should only be $270 for three courses in that one month.
StraighterLine, it's $100 membership and $59/course, you can finish these also in a month.
My suggestion, do the capstone while you're doing these courses, so you can finish everything at once (3 months).
If you find it hard to complete these courses, first do SL, then Study.com, finish with the capstone by itself.

With Study, Shmoop, Straighterline will I be given one source to study from where they'll pull the test questions from?  I failed Analyzing and Interpreting Lit from CLEP by 2 points, two years ago.  None of the questions on the exam were ANYTHING I studied!!  Very frustrating!!  Looking for the most straight forward testing service as possible.  I just spoke with Straighterline and they don't offer any UL courses.

[bjcheung77]

A BA or BS in Liberal Arts is just that, a multidisciplinary degree that doesn't really focus on one specific area of study. It's a General Studies degree - taking concentrations or minors at most, in a subject. These degrees are basically "check the box" ones, they do allow entry into selective Masters programs though. Ask yourself, what Masters are you going for? I wouldn't waste too much time deciding specific courses you really want to take. You can do that at the Masters level, or a post graduate certificate/diploma in your desired specialty for resume building, etc.

The weakest link at an institution is the front end staff, many schools have staff members who are totally unaware of what is required or not. StraighterLine is not a college, they provide courses at the lower level only as all their courses are recommended by ACE as lower level. However, that being said - for example, TESU/COSC will accept Organizational Behavior as UL (in their transfer equivalency charts).

The same goes for Study.com, their transfer tab shows a few courses available at the UL for TESU. The ones I listed at SL/Study.com are the only "Liberal Arts" courses, the remainder are UL Business courses that won't apply to your BALS degree. Shmoop doesn't have a list to go by, I just have a spreadsheet matrix of courses that were compiled by reading and updating them from this forum.

If you must choose something else other than the recommended, here's my list of resources I use for exams.
Charter Oak Master list: https://www.charteroak.edu/catalog/curre...m-list.pdf
CSU Global CBE: https://csuglobal.edu/admissions/transfe...t-exam-cbe

TESU DSST: https://www.tesu.edu/academics/catalog/DSST.cfm
TESU TECEP: https://www2.tesu.edu/listalltecep.php
Excelsior UExcel: https://www.excelsior.edu/exams/choose-your-exam
Excelsior Exam (Lengthy): https://documents.excelsior.edu/document...m-catalog/
Excelsior Basics: http://www.excelsior.edu/documents/78666...4c8ec0d27f