Excelsior Degree Plan - questions on UL credit sources

[EducationSeeker]

One thing to remember: it's not about looking backwards at what you've completed and how those fit into the plan, it's about looking forward at what it will cost to complete the plan!  That's much more important.

That being said, with a BALS, if those credits count, you may be better off wherever you get more credits.  But, since I don't know how courses come into EC and what will work for UL there, I'm not going to be able to help there.

The UExcel exams will be the easiest to figure out where they'll apply, since they're EC's own exams.  That being said, they're supposed to be harder than some of the other ones, you have to go to a Pearson VUE testing center to take them (and pay $60 per exam for fees), and I think they're more expensive ($145ish).

DSST's are $85, and then testing center fees will vary.

Study.com is $199/mo and includes 2 exams.  They have a TON of UL options, but I have zero clue about how EC will bring them in.  They used to follow ACE guidelines for that, I don't know if that's changed.

Saylor is free to take the course, and then $25/exam. No UL that I know of.

TECEP's are $225 for the UL courses, and there is no proctor fee (it's included if I remember correctly)

COSC is the cheapest, but that's when comparing apples-to-apples - when you take into account credits already earned, the math changes.

If you posted the courses your wife has taken, and then the 3 evals, that would probably help.

WGU is normally fast to do evals, and they take NA credit - but they don't have a BALS/BSLS.  So she'd have to go business degree.

I am going to list the ECE, COSC, and TECEP credit evaluations in following posts along with attaching a sample degree plan.

I am wondering if there any nearly free or free sources of UL credits that Excelsior accepts?  The academic counselor mentioned that ACE/NCCRS courses typically are considered lower level credit.  This seems to contradict the process I thought they used of automatically taking the ACE/NCCRS recommendation for UL/LL credit.  Not having a standardized credit granting policy is extremely frustrating for students trying to accurately figure out costs.  Has anyone had experience with getting UL Saylor or Study.com courses approved? This makes the process of taking only limited Study.com or UExcel exams cost about $1000-1500 compared to a lot cheaper price on 

Although having a Pearson test center at a local university helps, it also is nice to not have to go the University to take a CLEP, DSST, or UExcel exams for UL credit.

It looks like DSST is one of the cheapest sources for UL credit?  After looking on the DSST site, these are the UL exams I found:

Money and Banking 3 cr.  
History of the Soviet Union, 3 Cr
Introduction to Law Enforcement, 3 cr
Substance Abuse, 3 cr
Fundamentals of Cyber Security, 3 cr

Is Fundamentals of Cyber Security hard for non-IT Professionals?

Thanks,

Education Seeker