Second Bachelor's in Computer Science or BSBA at TESC

[TrailRunr]

I'm choosing between a 2nd bachelor's in CS or BSBA/CIS at TESC. I don't have my evaluation yet. I initially applied as BSBA/CIS. The goal is a checkbox for future government IT employment, so I'm already leaning towards changing to CS since some govt agencies are very specific. I have substantial industry experience in IT, so I'm not necessarily looking to learn anything new. I have no plans to apply to grad school for MIS or CS. Priority order is CS instead of CIS/MIS, then cheap, then quick, then learn something useful in CS. I'm willing to switch to CIS if I underestimated the effort of CS.

I have all of the 1st year calculus and discrete math completed long ago. I'm not interested in taking another math class, including linear algebra.
I am missing marketing, managerial accounting, strategic management, and business communications for CIS, but I would rather not go down that road even though I've heard I can test some (or all?) of it.
I think I have all of the GE cleared from my previous BA with the exception of public speaking. I'm going to DSST out of this.
I have lots of community college credit that are in programming, data structures, and CIS. This will sadly be all LL.
With regards to the 18 UL CS units. I hope I can DSST for CIS-301 (MIS) and CIS-344 (Fundamentals of cybersecurity) and apply them to CS. That would leave me with 9 UL left other than the required capstone.
I already have more then 24 credits earned after my first BA degree conferred date.

Since I have a few LL computer courses from a 4-year university and their extension arm, how do I convince TESC it should be UL instead of LL. All of those 4-year LL computer science courses require calculus and previous programming experience. One of them was in LISP. Is it a matter of matching UL TESC courses or something else?

My tuition reimbursement at work will pay for $3k in classes a year, but they will not pay anything towards credit by exam. I can have $3k in reimbursement for one class or many classes. It's to my advantage to list just one class (the easiest one) on flat fee tuition for variable credits, so I don't have to worry about paying back dropped/failed courses.

Finally, I'm thinking about going back to the local 4-year school's extension arm to take UL courses cheaply and online. Those courses are classified as professional/postbac rather than UL, which I think should be UL, but only if the content is UL like "relational database design" rather than "Oracle DBA" or "First Course in JAVA". The lack of customer service at TESC worries me a little, since it sounds like I might have to take the courses without knowing if it will be accepted as UL in CS.

Any comments on my plans are very appreciated.

[davewill]

They won't take the professional level courses as transfer credit (I tried). They will tell you to use PLA to get credit for them...no guarantee. You might as well take them at TESC than do that.

[dfrecore]

Unfortunately, for the BSBA CIS, it is a Business degree and requires courses you don't want to take (marketing, managerial accounting, strategic management, and business communications). There is no way around these courses. You can take them in various ways that are not testing out since your company won't pay: Straighterline, Jumpcourse, Study.com, TorCollegeCredits, Propero, Ed4Credit, etc. Saylor also offers some, and they are only $25 to test out of if you don't mind paying for that yourself.

For the UL requirements, you can take the 2 DSST's along with CSU-Global's Systems Analysis & Design AND Cloud Computing & Big Data, and the Network Technology TECEP. All testing out. TESC also offers the courses directly, they're about $1500/course. So you could only take 2 per year if you wanted to go that route. Obviously, this would not be the quickest route.

For the CS degree, you also have to take a course you don't want to take: Calculus II. It is a requirement for that degree.

I would wait to see where TESC places your courses, there's no way to know what they will put as UL if you took a course from a 4-year college. You may luck out and get some put in as UL, it all depends on if TESC offers the course themselves and considers it an UL course.

Once you get the eval, you can do the different degree scenarios and see what they require for each of the degrees before you make your decision.

[TrailRunr]

Looking at the TESC math classes and the content of my previous calculus courses, it appears I have Calculus I, II, and III. I'm not worried about the math part.

I've heard the networking TECEP does not apply to CS, so I'm not doing it unless I'm meeting residency for pay-per-credit or changing to CIS.

Looks like I need other sources of UL CS online classes.

CSU Global exams are cheap enough for me to self-fund. I'm willing to do those.

[davewill]

....
I've heard the networking TECEP does not apply to CS, so I'm not doing it unless I'm meeting residency for pay-per-credit or changing to CIS.

Correct.

When I asked about a few courses I wanted to apply to CS including the Network Tech TECEP (CMP-354) for CS, here's what academic advising sent.

David,

CMP-354, ELD-311 and ELD-400 may NOT be applied to Computer Science electives. CIS-351 may be applied.

Here's a list of possible Computer Science electives. Please be careful not to duplicate courses that you've already taken and be aware that you need AT LEAST 15 credits of upper level (300/400) courses in the entire Area of Study.

COS-116
COS-213
COS-330
COS-352
COS-451
CIS-301
CIS-351
CIS-311

Should you have more questions, please contact our office again via new email to academicadvising@tesc.edu with your degree program in the subject line. Thank you.

As you can see, you almost have to take every 300/400 class available to fill out the requirement using TESC courses, assuming you opt for Discrete Math rather than Linear Algebra for the CS math requirement.

[TrailRunr]

That list is very useful.

Sound like for UL in CS, it's choose 5 out of the following 6 TESC courses:
COS-330 computer architecture
COS-352 operating systems
COS-451 artificial intelligence
CIS-301 management information systems *can DSST MIS, so it's really 4 of the remaining 5
CIS-351 software engineering
CIS-311 database management

So the CS electives lists UNIX. I have a ton of work experience in Unix, which brings up the possibility of PLA CS upper division. The PLA database has CAP-300 (unix system admin) and CAP-332/333/345 which all are shell programming. I think I can grab all of these with previous experience / knowledge. I have a collection of vendor certs, vendor course certificates, extension/professional courses, conference attendance letters, and my own code. Do any of you guys think this might be a good route to get rid of one or more CS UL?

[davewill]

As soon as you go PLA, you can choose not only from the course database, but from courses at other schools. PLA can speed things up quite a bit, I did 15 units that way, and perhaps could have even done a couple more courses if I hadn't done them as TESC online classes.

[TrailRunr]

Will the following work for UL CS (not talking about BSBA-CIS)?

1) TEEX Cybersecurity for IT pros (2 cr) or DSST Cybersecurity (I have the entire TEEX security sequence already)
2) CSU-G CBE or TESC CIS-320 System Analysis and Design
3) CSU-G CBE Cloud Computing and Big Data

And:

Does the Kaplan course really substitute PLA-100 and PLA-200 (has there been a definitive and final answer on this?)? Taking this 2 course sequence is $1.5k I would rather spend on something else.

[dfrecore]

Will the following work for UL CS (not talking about BSBA-CIS)?

1) TEEX Cybersecurity for IT pros (2 cr) or DSST Cybersecurity (I have the entire TEEX security sequence already)
2) CSU-G CBE or TESC CIS-320 System Analysis and Design
3) CSU-G CBE Cloud Computing and Big Data

And:

Does the Kaplan course really substitute PLA-100 and PLA-200 (has there been a definitive and final answer on this?)? Taking this 2 course sequence is $1.5k I would rather spend on something else.

The Kaplan course counts as PLA-100/200 at TESC (that's what it's listed as on my eval). But, taking it at TESC is only $549. Then, you pay $379 for up to 12 credits to be evaluated, and then another $215 for up to 6 credits to be evaluated (and this $215 is for each additional 6cr). PLA-100 and PLA-200

Not sure how the courses you listed fit into the CS plan, I only know their course numbers at TESC:
1) TEEX Cybersecurity for IT pros (2 cr) - CAP-385
DSST Cybersecurity - CIS-344
2) CSU-G CBE or TESC CIS-320 System Analysis and Design - CIS-320
3) CSU-G CBE Cloud Computing and Big Data - CIS-499

[TrailRunr]

Like some other folks today, I got my completed eval. Some comments:

All of the three TEEX cybersecurity courses are worthless for BA CS. MIS DSST does count in the AOS towards BA CS as UL.

It appears 2nd bacc from an RA school do not have to complete any GE other than ones marked "DEGREE REQUIREMENT" which is marked for ENC-101 and ENC-102 on my eval in all caps. Looks like this means I can cancel my Public Speaking DSST. It also means I wasted money on the CLEP Analyzing and Interpreting Lit which fit one of the two GE I did not meet. CLEP A&I is 3 sh, not 6 sh unless you took it before Oct 31, 2015. I won't need the Instant Cert subscription anymore.

Getting 2.67 SH (4 quarter credits) for each class is good enough to meet a requirement. They will put the exception in the eval once it's official. You'll have to make up the missing credits though.

It appears you have to redo LIB-495 even if you did it for your previous BA TESC/TESU degree.

The 24 new sem credits have to be inside the area of study. The retake of LIB-495 counts as 3 of the new credits. That leaves 7 classes (21 SH) in the AOS if they are all 3 sem credits. This means don't take the last 21 SH credits towards the area of study until your last degree of any kind (including AA even if 2nd BA).

Here is the boilerplate for second bac in the eval:

Student Remarks:

SECOND BACCALAUREATE DEGREE (PLEASE READ DEGREE RQMT INFO BELOW)

Students who wish to earn a second baccalaureate degree must complete
a minimum of 24 additional credits in the area of study/core beyond
the date the most recent degree was completed.

Courses completed beyond the date all prior degrees were completed
will be labeled as "NEW". Capstone courses can be considered as 3
NEW credits under this policy.

The University will not award a third baccalaureate degree.

Graduates of TESU who are returning for a second degree should note
that the capstone courses LIB-495 (for the TESU BA degrees) and
APS-401 (for certain BSAST degrees) are degree-specific and therefore
will have to be retaken and will count towards the required NEW
credit.

Based on University policy, all general education requirements, other
than those labeled as "DEGREE REQUIREMENT" will be satisfied based on
the completion of a first bachelor's degree from a
regionally-accredited US institution. Adjustments to the evaluation
will be made to reflect this once all transcripts have been received.

Our records indicate that you earned a Bachelor of Arts in xxx from yyy on zzz

Our records indicate that you have earned an AA in xxx from yyy on zzz