I am preping for a couple DSSTs and I didnt know if anyone here had any experience with them. Rise and Fall of the Soviet Union Public Speaking Management of Information Systems The MIS has prep material on Instacert, but the other two do not. Does anyone have any good study links??? thanks ahead of time! Lou
I took the Soviet Union test and passed with an "A" according to Excelsior. I read several histories of the Soviet Union to prepare. The test is difficult, but the free DSST study guide from the website is good preparation if you read at least a few of the books from its reading list. At the same time, the history of the Soviet Union is interesting and eventful which helps. There's a revolution, a civil war, Stalin, Lenin, two world wars, gulags, Khrushchev and the Cold War, so it's exciting and more fun to prepare for than most exams... if you enjoy history.
Looks like you have quite a few computer certs. Take a look at the study guide you found for MIS but I think you'll find the exam easy. Most of the DSST exams require something like 50% to pass. Here are the official DSST fact sheets and a few sample questions: http://www.getcollegecredit.com/materials.htm Here is what Lawrie Miller says about it from his BA degree in 4 weeks site (http://bain4weeks.com/3rdYearBus.html) "Management Information Systems, I thought surprisingly easy for an upper division exam. You can ready yourself for this exam with any foundation level MIS primer."
The one that has caught my eye is the public speaking. It seems that it would be tough to do because it requires a speach, but being in DL there is no class to talk to. Anyone have any suggestions? Thanks Lou
anthonym Good comments! That was pretty much my experience. RF Soviet Union exam was fairly tough but not too bad if you prepare. I liked DANTES more than CLEPS because they were not timed. This was a big difference for me as you always have time to go back and rethink tough questions. Good luck! Dan
Free Soviet Union History study resources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Soviet_Union http://www.sussex.ac.uk/Units/russian/bookmar2.htm Free online Public Speaking courses: http://www.school-for-champions.com/speaking.htm http://wps.ablongman.com/ab_public_speaking_2 Free MIS resources: http://www-users.cs.york.ac.uk/~kimble/teaching/mis/mis_links.html http://www.intelligentedu.com/cat3.html
A couple more Soviet history sites. http://www.soviethistory.org/index.php http://www.econ.uiuc.edu/~koenker/sov-hist.html
lspahn; I actually did that one (speech), and passed it. It was a while ago (1995), so it may well have changed. In any chase, there was a written portion to the exam on principles of public speaking, and then I was led to a private room and given an impromptu subject for a 5 – 7 minute speech. I was given a couple of minutes to organize my thoughts, and then “fire away” into a tape recorder. They mailed the tape to a professor on retainer who taught the subject at a B&M college, and the speech itself was graded by the same criteria his/her students would be subject to. As stated above, it may very well have changed since then, but I wanted to share the experience.
public speaking, very good and detailed http://www.standarddeviants.com/pls/brain/goldhil.show_product?p_product_id=314 I haven't seen these two dvd sets below, but I have seen others from this company. The quality and material is almost always excellent. http://www.teach12.com/store/course.asp?id=827&d=Rise+and+Fall+of+Soviet+Communism%3A+A+History+of+20th%2DCentury+Russia&pc=History%20-%20Modern http://www.teach12.com/store/course.asp?id=8380&d=History+of+Russia%3A+From+Peter+the+Great+to+Gorbachev&pc=History%20-%20Modern
FYI I got my result from last month and I passed..YEAH...Anyway here is a heads up for others.. The test material states that the test starts with the Russian Revolution, But i had ALOT of question relating the the Russo-Japanese war in 1906 and pre revolution politics concerning the Czar dating back to the 1890s. Make sure you review this!!! Good Luck!
Good job! I specifically avoided this test because of how difficult I heard it was. I suppose if one has an interest in History, it would be fun to study for! Rhonda
It was my first DSST and I though it was harder than some others. I only got a 51, but I really feel like i was underprepared because of the 30 or so years of history i didnt study heavily. It wasnt as difficult as the humanities clep though... It is upper level credit though, thats always cool! Lou
With all of your IT certificates the MIS test will be a breeze. I didn't study anything and almost scored a 70. Brandon
Not alot of IT questions in Russian history...And I suck at remebering names. Although I was a bit surprised after doing very well 5 CLEP tests, but It doesnt matter. I am at COSC so it is a Pass/Fail test...A pass is a pass....
But for someone like me, a heavy but relatiavely non-technical PC user, how hard? How much prep do you think? I plan (planned?)to take it in March.
I took the CLEP Computer Test and COSC wont take them both. Also, COSC considers the DSST MIS test as lower level credit too. If you have a strong pc knowledge, I would recommend the CLEP. It was very very easy. Alot of stuff like whta is a modem, or speadsheet. Nothing highly technical at all.
I agree with Lou... although I thought the MIS test was not very technical either. There is a practice test on the dsst web page. Did you take a look at it? Excelsior accepts both tests. Brandon