portfolio credit better than credit by exam?

Discussion in 'General Distance Learning Discussions' started by excel, Oct 12, 2004.

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  1. excel

    excel Member

    I may wanna try for portfolio credit at Excelsior.

    This can take many weeks, right?

    If I succeed in getting the credit, does it show up just as if I'd taken the class at Excelsior? Or what difference(s) if it's similar but not the same?

    I thought it may look better to grad schools (and even employers), what do you think? I mean compared to if I have ALL my credits done by exam.

    Another negative I see is the cost, am I right, I pay the same fee that people pay to take the course at Excelsior? (Exam fee is much less.)

    Don't have to prep for the exam but do have to assemble the portfolio.

    Other pros or cons?

    Thanks.
     
  2. Unless something has changed, Excelsior does not accept portfolios directly (i.e. do the portfolios). What you would need to do is have another institution such as COSC do the portfolio review and grant credit which Excelsior would accept as transfer credit.

    Therefore, I think on your Excelsior transcript it would come up as COSC credit, not "native" Excelsior credit.

    You wouldn't have to pay Excelsior for anything as you're already enrolled, but you'd need to pay per credit for the portfolio analysis plus the transcript to be sent to Excelsior.

    Cheers,
    Mark
     
  3. A couple of other thoughts here:

    1) I doubt it really matters to the huge majority of grad schools if credits are done via exam or not. I'm taking this approach and anyone I've spoken/written to doesn't care, as long as my GPA is high enough, GMAT is good and Excelsior's RA (which it is). Even for an AACSB MBA program, there should be no problem accepting my pre-reqs in Stats, Economics, etc. as exam-generated credit, as long as the grade was a B or higher.

    2) Unless you are just entering the workforce the fact that your college credits were gained via examination rather than a formal class is irrelevant. After all, some courses have 100% of the grade based upon examination (50% final, 25% midterm, other 25% via quizzes, as an example). Even if you are just coming into your first post-school job it's still not particularly relevant (just as your GPA isn't relevant unless it's really high or really low).

    3) Unless the portfolio credit you're working towards is really specialized and there is no CLEP/DANTES/ECE/TECEP exam available to you, it's quicker and cheaper to just take the exam - after all, if you have the knowledge by the time you prepare your portfolio you could brush up your knowledge and be done with the exam. Right now I have 108 credits (with 3 more pending a grade) with a 4.0 GPA done in about 10 months. Others have done it much more quickly...so it's definitely doable.

    Hopefully others will provide their feedback as well...

    Cheers,
    Mark
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Oct 13, 2004
  4. deej

    deej New Member

    Ditto what guitarmark said. I contemplated finishing my degree at COSC via portfolio, but decided it would be MUCH faster and cheaper to just use ECEs and DSSTs to finish it.

    Also, unless I'm mistaken, portfolio classes aren't given grades. If you already have a good GPA that's not an issue, but if (like me) you're trying to raise your GPA, it could be a problem.
     

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