Beginners Guide To Getting Cheap/Fast College Credit

[KayV]

For TESU, you may take the ALEKS classes in any order. The lowest-level ALEKS course that TESU takes is Intermediate Algebra, so if your math skills are rusty, you might as well start with that.

TESU will take Intermediate Algebra, College Algebra, Precalculus OR Trigonometry (not both), and any one of the stats courses. Precalculus and Trigonometry have some overlap, but Trig has many fewer concepts to get through. TESU will not accept Beginning Algebra, but if you might want to begin with it anyway if you need the refresher. Once you move on to Intermediate Algebra, ALEKS seems to recognize that you have already mastered some of the previous-level concepts.

Excelsior accepts ALEKS too, but in different ways. First of all, they want math classes to be done in sequential order, so you should take Beginning Algebra before Intermediate and so on.

If you are math-phobic and completing a liberal arts (=not business or technology) degree, you just need 2 or more math credits and can fulfill that with ALEKS Beginning Algebra.

Excelsior accepts a total of 9 hours under the level of MAT-150 Calculus. I have seen older posts stating that people got non-duplicating credit for Beginning Algebra, College Algebra, and Trigonometry/ Precalculus, but confirm with your advisor that those would still work. Since Statistics counts as MAT-210, you could add that as well if you are trying to get lots of credits from your ALEKS subscription.

If you are pursuing a business degree, you need "Precalculus or above" AND Statistics (except the BPS, which requires College Algebra OR Statistics and a math elective).

Excelsior technology degrees generally require 12 or more hours of math above the level of College Algebra, which usually includes Calculus, Differential Equations, etc. You could use ALEKS credits for Arts and Sciences electives though.

Charter Oak accepts up to 18 hours of ALEKS math courses, the most of the Big Three:

Beginning Algebra
Intermediate Algebra
College Algebra
Trigonometry (or Pre-Calculus)
Intro to Statistics
Business Statistics (or Statistics for the Behavioral Sciences)

However, while they will accept Beginning and Intermediate Algebra for six hours of general ed credits, you must also take College Algebra or higher to fulfill the quantitative literacy requirement. I have seen conflicting reports about whether COSC accepts Intermediate Algebra for quantitative literacy and also about whether they want the classes to be taken sequentially, so as always, check with your advisor.