HI All, I'm sure this has been asked before, but I can't seem to find the basic info I need. My situation: -Have approx 48 undergrad credits -42 year old employed, successful female -Looking to finish degree to give me more and better job opportunities What I'm looking for: -DL learning program that's accredited and RESPECTED -Low to mid-level cost -OK if school requires up to 2-3 weeks on campus each year -BA/BS in Business, English, or somethin' like that -Want to go on to MA or MBA -Have ordered John Bear's book but would like some personal experience info THANKS FOR ANY AND ALL SUGGESTIONS!!! (PS No UOP, DeVry, etc. spammers - PLEASE!)
Welcome to DI.com Welcome to the board. You might want to start with the Big 3: Excelsior, Charter Oaks State College and Thomas Edison State College. All three are Regionally Accredited (RA). All three are reasonably priced. You might do a search here at DegreeInfo to find some specific information on these schools and/or take a look over at www.DegreeForum.com for more information on these schools. Congrats on your decision to finish your degree. You came to the right place. I started by buying Dr. Bears books as well. Best of luck
You didn't mention how much time you have to get this done or how you feel about standardized testing. If you have lots of time and are so inclined -- then going to local state university as a full time resident student can be alot of fun for people our age. Many folks will say "I can't do that, I have to work" but reality is, the kids in trad. programs work too. Many work 40 hours a week or more, have family responsibilities, get their studying done, and still find time to party. But, if you do want/need a DL program then your options are pretty wide too. Many B&M universities now offer degree completion programs by DL or short residency and they are as respected as the resident programs at the institution. Excelsior, Charter Oak, and Thomas Edison come up alot here. Your challenge at 48 hours undergrad going in is that you will need upper level coursework now and will likely have to take that coursework from somewhere. So, if you were to ask "where can I take some upper level coursework fairly cheap by DL", you'd probably hear LSU and BYU. Interestingly enough, both of these universities also offer degree completion programsand both are pretty well respected universities. http://ce.byu.edu/bgs http://is.lsu.edu (for courses) http://www.uno.edu (for the degree) It's a Bachelor of General Studies degree but sufficient to get you into a good MA program. UNO (Univ of New Orleans) also has a DL MFA in Writing... If you figure that you need to complete roughly 72 hours toward a BA/BS/BGS etc.. and cheap DL tuition is about $150 per hour. You're looking at about $10,800 tuition only taking DL coursework. You can reduce that significantly by using the local community college and some CLEP/DANTES exams to round that 48 up to 60 hours or so... What you have to decide now is not where you want to get your degree from but more specifically by what method and how much you have (or can get) to invest in that education. If you're prepared to test out of a degree then Excelsior may well be the cheapest and fastest road for you. They'll take a high enough score on the GRE Lit. exam as meeting most of that English major and the upper level requirement. If you have to take the coursework then your options are to do a DL program with one of the primarily coursework schools == or go to the local B&M == or combine the two. Do consider though -- you have 48 hours now. Depending on what courses they're in, you have over 3/4 of an AA/AS done. The Big Three are worth looking at for that.
Thanks! Now Graduate Shool Info Thanks so much to both of you for the info! One other caveat....I'm most interested in getting into a "Good Name" graduate school and paying a little more. If I have a really good GPA do you think it matters a whole lot which DL undergraduate school I choose? As long as it's accredited of course. Stated another way - if X graduate school would accept a Cal State graduate - would they accept a TESC graduate equally? Thanks!
There are two degreeinfo contributors who have kindly set up webpages that might be helpful to you. Here they are: http://collegedegrees.tripod.com http://www.geocities.com/liu_jonathan/distance.html Good luck, Jack
You may be interested in Indiana University's Bachelor of General Studies degree program which can be completed entirely online: http://scs.indiana.edu/undergraddegrees/undergraddegrees.html The key is simply ensuring that you take whatever prerequisites you will need for the particular graduate program you are interested in. With my IU BGS, I was admitted to the number 3 ranked (by USNews) Masters program in my field.
Re: Thanks! Now Graduate Shool Info My experience would be yes. Both are State Universities, and fully accredited by one of the 6 Regional accreditation (RA) boards. I was accepted to every MBA school to which I applied. I chose Amberton based on class selection, RA and cost. You won't go wrong at any RA school, just get one that meets your needs, is affordable and flexible.
When you say "good name" graduate school here you really need to be more specific. Are we talking Harvard, Yale, Princeton, MIT, etc.. or UMass, Fl State, UNC, Cal State, etc... It does depend a bit on a the "quality" of the grad school. The most selective are going to be hard to get into no matter where your degree is from. * A high GPA should always be a goal. * Great (not good) test scores on the GRE/MAT/GMAT/LSAT will be a plus. * The ability to show the grad school that you can do work at that level (having a few sr/grad courses done) * Being able to get more than the generic recomendation letters. * at our age, showing that we can contribute meaningfully to the academic world. Get some publication and a specialization if you want to head towards the English MA -- get some management experience if heading for the MBA. Either way, spend a bunch of time on your writing skills. It's the admissions essay that often makes all the difference in the world.
Cal State-Dominguez Hills http://www.csudh.edu/extendeded/acaprog.htm Check out their various external bachelor's degrees.
another good resource Another good resource is the somewhat funnily named but excellent site www.bain4weeks.com, with much useful information. As regards the ultility of a degree from one of the "big three" (e.g., Charter Oak [www.cosc.edu], Thomas Edison [www.tesc.edu] or Excelsior [www.excelsior.edu] for entry into graduate programs, I think the site from each of these schools has a page indicating where their graduates have been accepted for graduate degrees. The only caveat is that I understand that some schools, notably Cal State Dominguez Hills for *thier* DL MA program, require grads from these RA colleges to send not only their college transcript but a transcript from each "credit source" in their program. Matt
This isn't all that uncommon. I think a majority of grad applications will require transcripts from "all undergraduate work undertaken". Undergraduate transfer applications require the same kinda thing. This is because it's easy to "hide" poor performance by simply not mentioning that you ever attended other state university. It's also possible, at least at Excelsior, to withhold courses (and their grade) from an Excelsior transcript as long as the course was taken somewhere other than Excelsior.
Re: Thanks! Now Graduate Shool Info Welcome Mac, Perhaps you can use me as an example - I got my BS in General Business from Excelsior and am now pursuing my MBA at Indiana University, which is a very well-regarded school. In my personal statement I even emphasized that I completed my degree solely via testing in a little over a year. I'd think that if anything would raise red flags to an admission officer that'd be it! In the end what they cared about was: - GPA from accredited college/university - GMAT - Work experience My choice was to get my undergrad done as quickly and cheaply as possible - and then go on to a "good name" graduate school. After all, once you're done, you'll probably emphasize more where you got your MBA than your BS/BA. Again, it all depends on your overall goals and what utility you expect to get. The fact that I have my undergrad done means more to me than what's on it at this stage of my life (late 30's). Also, I do very well with testing (as well as have a low attention span) so the CLEP/DANTES/ECE/TECEP route worked for me. Your mileage may vary... Cheers, Mark
Mac: take a look at DePaul University's School for New Learning BA program. You can transfer in the credits you already have completed, take all of your classes online, and graduate with a BA from a respected school. www.snlonline.net It's a great program that will prepare you well for graduate school. I couldn't be happier with the education I earned at DePaul.
