Applying to TESC, Which of these is the better report to send for Credit Evaluation?

Hello!

I've been lurking in this forum for the past couple of days and couldn't be more grateful for this absolutely invaluable community. I'm a 20 year-old from Bangalore, India and due to certain circumstances am unable to complete my undergraduate degree in a local B&M. I've shopped around a bit looking for the best distance learning options and finally settled on either TESC or COSC, mostly because they seem to have more generous transfer credit policies.

I've received course-by-course evaluations from both ECE and Educational Perspectives (both NACES members). Since TESC accepts foreign credit evaluations evaluations from both, I'd like to get a sense of which report might offer me more potential transfer credits at TESC.

My ECE Evaluation
My EP Evaluation

Key points about the evaluations:

• ECE awards 68.5 total credits vs 62.5 for EP
• EP awards a GPA of 3.66 (all 'A' and 'B') while ECE awards a GPA of 3.06 (Mostly 'A' and 'B' with 7.5 credits awarded 'C') [I understand that transferred GPA does not show up on the final transcript, but I'm a bit worried about transferability of the 'C's]
• EP offers 0 credits for courses like 'Holistic Education' and 'Internship' while ECE grants a total of 5.25 credits for the same [I've heard these kinds of General Education courses are typically tossed out by universities but unsure as to what extent that is true]
• Both evaluations have a strange mixture of quarter-credits & half-credits and depending on whether the colleges round these up, down or take them as is would affect the total credits transferred [If anyone has experience transferring half and quarter credits to any of the Big Three, I'd be grateful to hear how it went!]
• ECE states that all my courses are equivalent to lower level courses, while EP does not explicitly say so. [Though I suspect since all these courses were completed in the first two years, this is likely true of all the courses]

Key points about my tentative degree plan:

• I'm looking at either a B.A. Communications or B.A. Liberal Studies from TESC [Prefer the first but open to the latter if it has significantly better options for credit transfer and testing out]
• I'd like to test out the remainder of the degree entirely through DSST/CLEP. [I understand that only DSST offers upper level courses and that I'll have to do at least 3-6 credits via Capstone]
• Obviously, I'd like to keep the total cost to an absolute minimum (which is largely why I want to test out), but I'm willing to spend in the region of $7000-8000.

So given the preceding information, which report might offer me more potential transfer credits at TESC? ECE or EP?

I know it may seem like a minor consideration given the narrow difference in total credits awarded, but I'd greatly appreciate it if anybody could help me out with this. I don't know what the precise forum rules are, but I'm not averse to paying somebody who's had experience transferring credit to TESC to help advise me over the phone.

Thanks!

 

The ECE evaluation at least gives the full 3 credits for some courses. Having a bunch of partial credits in your degree plan will make things complicated. Both evaluations give a lot of partial credits. TESC does accept Cs. TESC doesn't care about the UL and LL credit recommendations of others. They will compare the courses to what's in their PLA database.

When I transferred quarter hour courses to TESC, they were the equivalent of 2.67 credit hours. TESC gave me credit for them, but I had to make up the difference somewhere else. The courses that are less than 2.5 credits will probably be bunched together to try to fulfill general education and free elective requirements since those are flexible. But if you need a specific course such as English Comp, I'm not sure if TESC will consider the requirement fulfilled if you have significantly less than 3 credits.

 

So is it reasonable to assume that TESC won't round the partial credits up or down to whole numbers?

In that case, based upon what you've told me I think sending the ECE report is the better option. Thanks for your help! :smile:

 

Charter Oak can be considerably cheaper than TESC, but they will require you to take a cornerstone and capstone.....is apply to both and see where your at.

 

No, TESC will not round up or down. When I had a 4 quarter hour course, I was given exactly 2.67 semester hours. I couldn't tell if COSC rounded my credits up or down because their initial evaluation is not as detailed.

Even though I'm still a little skeptical about this, TESC is possibly the cheapest option out of the Big 3 now with the Per Credit Hour Tuition Plan. You can take TECEPs (TESC's in-house credit by exam) to fulfill the residency requirements at $36 per credit hour. If you were going to take tests anyway to complete your degree, this doesn't really add anything on to the total cost of the degree. Your money would just be going to TESC instead of the College Board (CLEP), Prometric (DSST), or Excelsior (Uexcel ECEP formerly Uexcel and ECE).

For the report that says all of your credits are LL, COSC will more than likely only give you LL credit. There's no telling what they will give for the other report, but TESC is the most liberal in giving UL credit out of the Big 3. TESC does give UL credit for two CLEPs, but they are both for business. TESC also requires less UL credits than the other two.

I still recommend applying to all of the Big 3 if you can afford it.

 

I have a specific example of how TESC might treat your credits. When I first applied to TESC, I chose Criminal Justice as my program. The degree required 3 credit hours for Intro to Criminal Justice. My quarter hour course that I transferred was only worth 2.67 credit hours. TESC put in my evaluation that I fulfilled the requirement for Intro to Criminal Justice, but they moved the extra 0.33 credits to another part of the degree plan. I had to use something else to complete those leftover credits so that my degree would have the minimum of 120 credits. I don't know if TESC would do the same if you only have 1.5 credits for a requirement. 2.67 is almost 3 credits, so it's not a big deal to waive the 3 credit requirement.

 

When I first saw the option for Per Credit Hour Tuition I dismissed it right away because of the residency requirements. Are you sure that TECEP's under the Per Credit Hour plan are only 36$ per credit? I see them listed as 36$ under the Enrolled Options plan but no price is listed for them under the Per Credit Hour Plan.

In fact, digging around a little on degreeforum, it seems that TESC charged 87$ per credit for TECEP's as recently as 2010.

However, if indeed they are cheap as you suspect, it represents a massive savings opportunity for anybody earning a degree through TESC. Something to the tune of about $1800 over the Enrolled Options Plan.

Bummer. Among the two, COSC only accepts ECE.

This is interesting. I hope they treat the courses I've got partial credits on in a similar way, but then again most of mine will probably go towards fulfilling general ed or free elective requirements anyway.

 

TESC lowered the price of TECEPs to $33 per credit hour about a year or two ago. They are now $36 per credit hour for non-New Jersey students. A member of another forum and myself emailed TESC for clarification. They said TECEPs are always $36 per credit hour...unless you're under the Comprehensive Tuition Plan which automatically covers TECEPs under a flat rate. Of course, TESC advisors are known for giving misinformation, but this is the only answer we've gotten so far.