Where to start? Starting from zero.

[sweetcrabhoney]

Hi.

After getting my nail tech license done recently I'm ready to work on my degree. I'm going to go for Thomas Edison's Humanities Bachelor's degree with the intent of getting a TESL certificate after completely the degree. The goal is to have the bachelor's in 5 years. By then all my kids will be old enough and we can move wherever without issue. I'm not in any kind of rush.

I can only spend up to $8,000 on my degree. Based on what I've read on the forum and the Wiki it's possible. I'm hoping it will work -- only time will tell.

So I have not enrolled in Thomas Edison yet -- I'd rather finish a few courses first and then enroll. I don't think they will give me credit for beauty school anyway or even for being a notary public and I don't have any college credits that I know of either.

So here's my plan :

  Less than 1 minute ago">degree plan 2017.xls (Size: 9.5 KB / Downloads: 1)

I'm sure it's not as detailed or pretty as others but I'm really not sure if I've got it "right" or not. I actually followed a similar guideline to the Wiki for the same degree/school. I haven't even done the cost total for the plan yet -- crossing my fingers it ends up being on budget. The only thing missing from my plan is the language classes and that's mostly because we haven't decided which country to aim for yet. Top choices are China, Japan , Thailand , Spain , and Brazil.

I'm thinking of starting with Shmoop after seeing the results from the lit courses. But I'm wondering if it'd be better if I started with the CLEP tests instead.

I'm not working currently so money is tight ... But I still want to do something to advance my education while I wait for this baby to pop out and I can work again.

Any advice would be highly appreciated ...Please and thank you.

[dfrecore]

If money is tight, I would suggest you start with cheap/free courses first:

1) Apply for the Study.com scholarship, if you get it, that's 6 free courses. Ask us on here first which ones you should take after their required Personal Finance course (counts as a Free Elective)

2) ALEKS - Intermediate Algebra - expires 2/28, so you could finish by then and get those credits - if you finish before 2/28, you might want to consider continuing on with College Algebra and then Precalc, and Stats - but only 1 math course is required for the BALS

3) The Institute - Insurance Ethics - FREE

4) TEEX - Cybersecurity courses - FREE (2cr each, total of 6cr)

5) NFA - Q0118 & Q0318 - FREE

6) Saylor courses $25/exam - I suggest Comparative Politics (there's a thread on here about how to study for it), and any other courses from their ACE or NCCRS approved courses that interest you

7) Shmoop Lit courses. Make sure you don't take so many that they won't fit into the plan. But those are a good inexpensive option.

8) At this point, you can do whatever you'd like. If you get a SL membership, you can take 3+ courses in a month and get more bang for your buck. There are courses where the ebook is included, which will save you money. Study.com is 2 courses in a month ($199/mo) and then $70 after that, so you also come out ahead doing it this way. And, 6cr CLEP exams will also do more for you because you pay the same amount for those.

I think you could get this degree in way less than 5 years. If you were to wait that long, TESU would certainly change their requirements, so I wouldn't count on everything going according to plan at that point in time. But it's still good to get started, and start racking up credits.

A degree plan is here for you if you're interested. Costs are included ($100/course average, but you can get it down to less than that).


  Less than 1 minute ago">TESU 2016 BALS.xlsx (Size: 43.35 KB / Downloads: 9)

[dfrecore]

Questions about your plan (not being critical, just giving feedback and asking questions):

1) Why would you take CLEP College Algebra when there are cheaper ways to get this (ALEKS, Saylor)? And, you can find an easier math course if you wanted (DSST has Math for Liberal Arts for instance).

2) Why would you choose Ed4Credit when it's twice as much as SL or Study.com? Especially for LL courses.

3) Why take LL TECEP exams?

4) You say that you want to take traditional courses, but at TESU they are $1500/course. That would put you WELL over the $8000 limit you have set for yourself.

5) What language courses do you want to take? You can learn many languages online for free, and get college credit for some of them. But you would have to be pretty fluent to get those credits (ACTFL for instance, or CLEP). It could take years before you could get fluent enough to get the credits, in the meanwhile you could be finished with your degree before then.

Look at my degree plan and see if it helps a little.

[ndelco]

If you want to go for the TESL after graduating, I would go for the BA English instead of Humanities. With Shmoop's new offerings, you can do almost the entire degree now through testing out. There is just one course (Non-Western Lit) that is currently hard to find for a good price. With either degree you will need to do the $1500 capstone, but the English degree will look better when you apply for a job with the BA and TESL.

I will be going for the TESL when I am finished also. Had I known in July that Shmoop was going to add all of those English courses, I would not have signed up for Study.com for a year. Now I am locked into the General Management degree because the courses are already paid for. I would much rather have the English degree, not only for when I start looking for teaching jobs, but also because business courses are really lame and boring. The English degree just wasn't an option 6 months ago, especially because I don't have access to CLEP exams. I don't know if you've looked at any job postings for English teachers, but many of them prefer a language degree. I still may go for the English degree once I finish this one, but I'll have to talk my wife into that one thanks to the capstone haha.

Good luck on your journey! And congrats on the baby!!

And I just want to add - You don't need to wait until the new baby is 5 to move! It's a great adventure. We packed up and moved to Latin America with a 5-year-old, 2-year-old and bun in the oven. It actually wasn't difficult at all...well except lugging ~200 suitcases through the airport. :willynilly:

[socsci]

My list of best places to study so far:

Straighterline is an excellent choice to get a lot of GenEd credits done. I found the system to be straightforward, and everything ran smoothly for me. I would suggest doing Religion, Cultural Anthropology and Intro to Communciations first. They are easy courses to complete and both the religion and anthropology textbooks are interesting to read.
With straighterline a little preparation is needed before you sign up. Spend some time finding books for the courses you want to take before you sign up.

Aleks - is the best place to get math credits.
Shmoop - I have just started the English courses and am on my third one in one week. Shmoop is a bargain, I am going to try and complete all the lit courses and one or two history courses there. I haven't looked at the math, but they possibly might be good too.
Sophia - I did a few courses at Sophia and I really like their system, unfortunately they are just too expensive to recommend.

Plan of attack: Make an account at ACE, start out with the free courses you can find first, complete math at ALEKs, prepare for SL and you could get through 10 courses there/or get started at Shmoop. Once you start getting your credits onto the ACE transcript it is great motivation to keep going.

I notice you are thinking of teaching abroad, and would like to offer some advice about this, as I have experience working in sports in a few different countries.
I'm not trying to put a downer on your plans by saying this, but more to offer what it is like out there in the expat teaching world.

There are basically two types of teaching position open to foreigners and they have different requirements, teaching in international/local schools and teaching ESL in various establishments (language schools, business classes etc)
International schooling can be thought of as divided into different levels. The top schools look for the best applicants and they will usually require teachers to be licensed in their home countries. These schools offer the highest salaries and lots of perks.
As you drop down to other private schools, the salaries and perks change, and the requirements are quite often a degree in the subject you wish to teach or an education degree. Schools further down the list (smaller private schools) would have less requirements but would not pay anywhere near enough to support a family.

What do international schools look for: qualified/licensed teaching couples first as it is easier (read less costly) to bring a teaching couple into a country to work. There are not many schools that will consider families with many dependents, as they must provide schooling and housing, medical insurance, flights etc.. for the whole family. The better schools around the world will provide for whole families, but usually only for teaching couples. Single teacher families have way more difficulty getting work with dependents.

Teaching ESL in most countries will not provide enough money to support a family. Wages are quite low and although it is cheaper to live, the cost of schooling a child in another country is extremely high, medical bills are also extremely high in many places.

To give you an example from where I live in South Asia:
International school teacher between $2500-$5000 salary a month with free schooling for up to 2 children, free housing, medical insurance, flights and moving allowance.
Language school teacher (EF, British Council etc) between $800-$1500 a month with shared housing (no good for kids) flights for teacher only, medical for teacher only.
A decent school (not top international school) would cost around $500 a month in total for one child, housing another $200, food/entertainment $200-500 depending on tastes, transport etc. can be expensive if you need a car.



This is going to sound bad...and I really wish it wasn't this way, but this is a reality in many countries, the color of your skin matters when it comes to teaching jobs, so it is good to do some research about the countries you are thinking of going to. In good international schools this won't be a problem, but getting into those jobs is going to need a good education/subject degree and a teaching license from home.

There are lots of excellent English teachers around the world fighting for the same jobs, there are however not as many math and science teachers, and those subjects can sometimes open up more options.

Just something to think about when you are planning your degree. What you want to achieve can be done, so don't take my advice the wrong way please, but it will require a little more planning when you are taking kids along for the ride.

I'm in a mixed marriage and have been living abroad for over 15 years now, in various countries, and we have a daughter. The dream is possible but it can be a tough journey just starting out Doing it the right way leads to an awesome life, getting it wrong means a miserable time for your family.

Edited to add: It is also necessary to check visa requirements for teachers in the countries of interest. In my current country for example, an English teacher (ESL or school) needs to have a degree in English, or an education degree. A subject teacher must have a degree in their subject, or an education degree. All teachers must have 5 years experience at the level they want to teach at (primary, secondary, ESL).

[sweetcrabhoney]

If money is tight, I would suggest you start with cheap/free courses first:

1) Apply for the Study.com scholarship, if you get it, that's 6 free courses. Ask us on here first which ones you should take after their required Personal Finance course (counts as a Free Elective)

2) ALEKS - Intermediate Algebra - expires 2/28, so you could finish by then and get those credits - if you finish before 2/28, you might want to consider continuing on with College Algebra and then Precalc, and Stats - but only 1 math course is required for the BALS

3) The Institute - Insurance Ethics - FREE

4) TEEX - Cybersecurity courses - FREE (2cr each, total of 6cr)

5) NFA - Q0118 & Q0318 - FREE

6) Saylor courses $25/exam - I suggest Comparative Politics (there's a thread on here about how to study for it), and any other courses from their ACE or NCCRS approved courses that interest you

7) Shmoop Lit courses. Make sure you don't take so many that they won't fit into the plan. But those are a good inexpensive option.

8) At this point, you can do whatever you'd like. If you get a SL membership, you can take 3+ courses in a month and get more bang for your buck. There are courses where the ebook is included, which will save you money. Study.com is 2 courses in a month ($199/mo) and then $70 after that, so you also come out ahead doing it this way. And, 6cr CLEP exams will also do more for you because you pay the same amount for those.

I think you could get this degree in way less than 5 years. If you were to wait that long, TESU would certainly change their requirements, so I wouldn't count on everything going according to plan at that point in time. But it's still good to get started, and start racking up credits.

A degree plan is here for you if you're interested. Costs are included ($100/course average, but you can get it down to less than that).

TESU 2016 BALS.xlsx

Thank you so very much. I really appreciate all the information about the free courses and the degree plan file that I hadn't discovered yet. I'll be spending the weekend going over these things and modifying my plan to fit into it better.

Thank you again.

[sweetcrabhoney]

Questions about your plan (not being critical, just giving feedback and asking questions):

1) Why would you take CLEP College Algebra when there are cheaper ways to get this (ALEKS, Saylor)? And, you can find an easier math course if you wanted (DSST has Math for Liberal Arts for instance).

2) Why would you choose Ed4Credit when it's twice as much as SL or Study.com? Especially for LL courses.

3) Why take LL TECEP exams?

4) You say that you want to take traditional courses, but at TESU they are $1500/course. That would put you WELL over the $8000 limit you have set for yourself.

5) What language courses do you want to take? You can learn many languages online for free, and get college credit for some of them. But you would have to be pretty fluent to get those credits (ACTFL for instance, or CLEP). It could take years before you could get fluent enough to get the credits, in the meanwhile you could be finished with your degree before then.

Look at my degree plan and see if it helps a little.

1.Mostly math test curiosity and I wasn't sure if I'd be able to do ALEKS within the time frame or not. I also haven't heard much about DSST so wasn't sure I could still even do it or not.

2. I haven't compared Straighterline and Ed4credit. It just seemed more user friendly to me. I think the computer requirements were something my husband said we could do ; can't remember.

3. Test curiosity

4. I found the course numbers on the TESU website however I don't intend on taking them "there" I'm hoping to find a local college to take them at instead. I still wanted to place the numbers so that I would remember them.

5. I've been hunting for some free language lessons online and slowly pre-studying them but haven't 100% picked out which language to dedicate my time to just yet.

Thanks.

[sweetcrabhoney]

Thank you for all advice and points to refer to.

I wasn't sure at first if the degree I'm hoping for would allow me to even use the free courses that you all mentioned. I'll be spending the weekend trying to get those things done. I can't do ALEKS until husband gives me the money to pay for it ; maybe next week I can start.

I did consider an English degree -- however after writing full time for over 10 years (and getting nothing from it! ) I can't see myself getting that kind of degree. I'd prefer a degree that entertains me vs one that reminds me of those horrible years of struggle and depression. That's another reason why I don't desire a business degree either. If I could find an affordable math degree program I'd take that in a heart beat but I don't think that would really aid me in the career pathway I'm hoping to find. The only one I found that "might" qualify was on WGU . It's like a back up plan kind of thing.

I'm trying to figure out the ACT transcript thing -- I don't know if I need to submit my beauty school transcript there .

As a black women of course I'm scared to even consider working aboard. My husband isn't a teacher instead he's in finance and he's Mexican . The location we choose would depend on his career pathway more so than my own actually. I'm not thinking it's going to be easy as pie to get the degree , take the exams and just become a great teacher in another country. IF only it was that easy! I'm already in a field that is mostly for an Asian culture (nail tech) so I'm use to the judgement already.

Husband is voting for South America since he knows Spanish and he's afraid to be on a plane for so many hours and I'm voting for Asia since I already know a bit of Chinese and Tagalog . I have already begun looking at job qualifications and postings on sites like TEFL.com - English Language Teaching Jobs and Dave's ESL Cafe. So far only a handful has required a teacher already be licensed in their home state. My intent is not to be a California state board teacher ; not something I've ever wanted to do.

The jobs I've looked at said they preferred either English degree or Humanities or subject based degrees.

I've looked over a lot of the companies business websites and I've seen a wide range of races ... who knows what will happen in the next few years but it gives me hope at least.

I'm aiming for five years so that my husband doesn't have to stress about the cost throughout the process. His career bounces up and down all the time since his field he's mostly a contract worker. I also don't want to work myself into craziness. I still intend on doing nails , attending every nail show I can afford and going wild with the competitions while taking courses

My goal is to just keep moving forward until I get where our family needs to be five years from now.

Thanks again for all the advice and guidance. I really appreciate it all.

[videogamesrock]

Please let us know your experience with the free courses. It's a great start.

[dfrecore]

I'm trying to figure out the ACT transcript thing -- I don't know if I need to submit my beauty school transcript there.

To use ACE, you need to set up a free account. Then, you log into your account, click on Course Search, and look for your courses. I'm going to guess that there won't be any - I can't imagine that a beauty school has a lot of college-level courses that would carry over to a degree program, and even if they did, they wouldn't pay the $3000 per course to get those added. It just doesn't make a lot of sense for them to do this.