As is often the case with something cool/interesting, I came across this by accident, while looking for something else. Hodges University in Florida (RA-Southern Association) is offering a program where you pay a set fee for a 6-month period ($2500 undergrad, $3000 graduate), and you earn as many credits as you can in that time frame. If you're motivated and committed, that can come out to an incredible bargain for a RA school as far as value for credit hours. Hodges certainly isn't a household name, it's a relatively new school (founded 1990), and the programs available with Upower are limited compared to the school's total number of online offerings, but it's something for people in the education hunt to consider. Upower | Self Paced Learning | Hodges University
Their Upower programs have been discussed on the other forum for the past year or so, and I think there have been a few threads made here in the past few months.
This sort of "Golden Corral" model of education pricing may not work for everyone, but for self-starters on a deadline it seems like it could be a good approach.
Which other Forum? I just joined this site and gathering info for a selfpaced affordable degree. Minimize debt.
TESU used to have a similar program back when it was TESC; for one yearly fee, you could accumulate unlimited TESC course credit, portfolio credit, exam credit, transfer credit, etc. I don't know if it's still available.
TESU had and still has a flat fee under its Comprehensive Tuition Plan, but the limit has been 36 credits per year for as long as I've known about the school (2010). I believe it's gone from just under $8k to over $8300 per year for out-of-state students. It's a good deal for non-residents, but not as cheap as most of the competency-based programs. TESU is also not self-paced; they operate on 12-week terms that start monthly. This forum is better for graduate programs and foreign schools. The other forum is faster at discovering new options for testing out of courses, NCCRS and ACE credits, and competency-based programs. Someone first posted about Hodges' competency-based programs back in August 2014. They also specialize in minimizing debt, but mostly using the Big 3 (Thomas Edison State University, Charter Oak State College, and Excelsior College). http://www.degreeforum.net/forum.php
