Knoxville College and Aspen University Articulation Agreement

Knoxville College (lost accreditation due to financial mismanagement, but is well on the road to reaccreditation) and Aspen University entered into a five year long (initial) articulation agreement. According to the agreement, Aspen and KC will accept each other's courses and degrees. Also, KC students who complete 5 Aspen courses during their junior and senior years will, upon completion of their KC degree, be awarded a Bachelor of General Studies degree from Aspen.

The way the Bachelor of General Studies is set up, among the other requirements, 30 credit hours of liberal arts electives and 54 credit hours of general electives are required. Those credits combined are enough to have a concentration in a subject area. If I enroll at Knoxville College as a biology major, and complete the requirements in the articulation agreement, I'm thinking that when Aspen accepts my KC courses as their own that those courses automatically become earned at an accredited college. Am I correct in thinking this? I'm going to contact each school on Monday, but I just want to run this by some people who know more about accreditation than I do.

The reason I'm asking is because I'm going to be paying for the PA program prerequisite courses out of my pocket, without federal financial aid. Knoxville College is now a "work college", and as long as students participate in the work program they only have to pay for their living expenses and books. This is very affordable for me. In researching physician assistant schools (and especially the one I want to apply to) many don't mandate that prerequisite courses be taken only at RA schools, they just require them to be taken at colleges with recognized accreditation - which Aspen University has. Hopefully, by the time I get finished with the biology program, Knoxville College will be reaccredited. And, just to add the cherry on top, I already have a bachelors degree from a RA university.

So, would taking advantage of this articulation agreement be an "alternate pathway" into PA school? I'm only thinking of going this route because I don't want to go into debt for the prerequisites. I'm 95% sure I'll have to take out student loans for the actual PA program, so I'd rather wait until I absolutely have to get them.

Thanks in advance for any and all helpful insight.

~ HoneyBrown ~

 

So, you only need prereqs? Go to your local CC and take the classes. You shouldn't have to borrow anything.

Side note- I assure you, RA is a requirement. Assuming "it isn't written on the website therefor it's not a requirement" is flawed logic. *you could ask btw, as opposed to earning a whole new NA degree and then doing the transfer-prayer.
PA school is not only super competitive, but I'd suggest your prereqs be done at a B&M. Of course kick-a$$ grades are a given.

 

Most if not all PA schools require their prereqs to have labs even if they dont list them. This was one of my discouraging reasons of not pursing that degree option. So are you sure the school your looking at doesnt require labs ?

 

DL sciences are not without labs. Maybe they used to be, but many DL sciences offer labs. Besides the 3 credit intros, I have not come across a NONLAB General BIO/CHEM/PHYSICS in a while- at least not in the year or so that I've been looking.

Labs can be sims /software or hands on in-home where you photograph yourself doing the lab and photgraph the reults to attach to lab reports. I bought a nice digital microscope last year for that purpose It snaps photos through my eye piece and connects to my lap top via USB so the photos go directly into my lab report and then are uploaded into my school's drop box. I love technology.

 

I'm sorry, I wasn't clear enough. I need the science prerequisites. I'll be paying for the courses out-of-pocket so I need them cheap. I already have a B.S. degree, so I don't qualify for federal or state grants any longer, and I don't want to take out loans for the prereq's. I'd rather save that eligibility for the actual PA program.

 

Knoxville is pursuing reaccreditation, but with ACICS rather than SACS. So even if it is successfully reaccredited, it will be accredited as an NA school, not as RA.

RA may not be strictly mandated. However, if admissions are competitive, then applicants with science degrees from RA schools may be favored over those who fulfilled the science prerequisites at NA schools. This is particularly likely if the PA school is itself RA.

Taking prerequisite courses at KC might take longer than you would expect. Note that KC is a small institution: for 2009, KC reported a total enrollment of 122 students, of which only 92 were reported as "currently enrolled". There were just 2 students enrolled in the "Biology" program (doesn't get much smaller than that), and only 8 others in "Science and Mathematics".

Since their science/math enrollments are very low, it's quite possible that the kinds of courses that PA schools typically look for (anatomy, physiology, microbiology, organic chemistry, etc) may not be offered very frequently. KC lists such courses in its catalog, but given their low science/math enrollment, it's highly unlikely that every course is offered every year. it would be a good idea to check with the faculty to see how regularly these courses are actually offered in practice.

 

If going to my local CC or a state-supported B&M college was an option, I wouldn't be here posting. I need a tuition payment plan, and unfortunately, NONE of the public colleges in my state are allowed to offer them - by mandate of the board of regents. I didn't overlook the CCs or public B&M colleges in my state. They are not options for me, at this time, because I'm not willing to take out loans for the prereqs. However, I will take out loans to attend PA school, if need be.

You missed the line in my OP where I plainly stated that I would be contacting the PA schools I'm interested in, on this coming Monday, to ask about what they consider to be an "accredited" college. So, yes, I am going to be asking, instead of relying on the "transfer-prayer", thank you very much Mr./Ms. Smarty Pants, LOL. Specifically, in the case of the PA school at my state's health sciences university, I will be asking if they mean RA only, or if they mean any CHEA-approved college.

Knoxville College is a B&M 4 year college. It lost its RA accreditation due to financial failure, not the quality of its academics, and the school is well on the way to reaccreditation, because it's methodically fixing the problems that caused its accreditation to be yanked by SACS. The science courses with labs would be taken there, on campus. The five courses I'd need to take through Aspen U. to fulfill the requirements of the articulation agreement would be non-science courses.

I just posted here to get some initial feedback because I was excited about the possibility of having a super affordable way to get my prereqs done. A lot of schools will accept coursework from NA colleges, if the courses are substantively the same as courses from RA schools, so I'm not out in left field for thinking that SOME PA schools might be more open to courses or degrees from NA schools.

The KC/AU idea may well be an indirect, "over the river and through the woods", route to PA school, but I'm the one paying for this. All that matters is if it will work or not - and THAT was the question I was asking. I also never said, or hinted, that this was the only route to PA school I was considering. All this other stuff that's being dragged in, unnecessarily, is clouding the issue.

 

The prereqs will have labs. Knoxville College is a 135 year old B&M school. It had sorry leadership who didn't do their jobs, which resulted in a financial meltdown, which caused SACS to rescind accreditation in the late 1990s, I think. Since then, Knoxville College has fired people and made a lot of changes, and has made great strides on the road to reaccreditation. They teamed up with Aspen U. so their students could get an accredited degree, and a route to graduate school, until they are reaccredited. In exchange, Aspen gets to use the campus facilities at KC, among other things.

 

Sorry thought we were talking distance learning and not a BM school..

 

Thanks for the info. Google is usually my friend, and to all my friends and family I'm the "info queen", but when I was trying to search for info on Knoxville College, I didn't come up with much. I knew it had a very small enrollment, and was pursuing reaccreditation, but I didn't come up on the info you presented. So, thanks for letting me know this stuff!

I don't have a problem with ACICS accreditation. I have a semester's worth of undergrad credits from an ACICS school, and I never had any problems having them accepted by RA schools during my transfers, and prior applications to grad school. However, your info about the frequency of course offerings is sobering. It's looking like I would be better off finding another way. I'm pushing 40 and can't take forever to get this done, LOL.

I admit that I'm disappointed to learn that KC has abandoned pursuing RA. All the articles I've read, even recent ones, made it seem as if they were going to try to get their SACS accreditation back. I wonder why they gave up? Do you have any idea why?

 

My mistake. We're actually talking about both. I meant to include that Aspen U. is a 100% distance learning school. The pairing of the two schools is mutually beneficial. Knoxville College students get accredited degrees, and Aspen University gets some kind of B&M presence. The articulation agreement spells out the details, but that wasn't the part I was concerned about, so I didn't do more than a quick once over of that section.

 

I would expect that RA courses would be required for admission to a PA program.

Too bad you don't live in California - PA certification is by state exam after completing a PA program, often through a community college. A PA who treated me attended this school:
http://www.rcc.edu/academicPrograms/physicianAssistant/programInfo.cfm

 

too muddy. Besides, accreditation will be based on the EXACT date you took the class, not what happens in the future. I have a degree from an NA school (1990) that is now RA (since 1994), but that degree is *absolutely 100%* considered NA. I've used it on no less than 14 college applications, it hasn't slid by yet.

 

Your saying 14 schools went back and checked the schools RA accreditation date?

 

Yes. That's exactly what I'm saying. I have a list.

 

I will say that I now think it's a bad idea to try to get the science prereqs from a DETC accredited school because virtual lab use hasn't gone mainstream. When it does, I think things will change. I've decided to stick to RA accredited senior colleges, because I want to leave my options open for medical school or grad school.

 

Advice taken. I've decided to stick to RA senior colleges so my courses can't be questioned, and also to leave open the option for alternatives to PA school. As stated before, the public schools in my state are not options. So, I'm going to have to relocate. Good thing I'm single with no children.