I screwed up. Any more online Spanish course offerings this summer/fall?

Discussion in 'General Distance Learning Discussions' started by ooo, Jul 21, 2012.

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  1. ooo

    ooo New Member

    I'm in need of a 3rd year, 2nd semester Spanish course.

    A few of you found some nice options for me a few months ago, but... "life happened."
    I couldn't get transcripts from all my schools and department approvals in time for the Univ. of Oregon summer Spanish course. Other courses were either very expensive, very full, or I missed the deadline (stupid of me, I know). I also didn't see a course that seemed to be right at my life. Advanced Spanish Literature is... too advanced. Other offerings weren't advanced enough.

    I'm hoping to find a few more options for August intersession or Fall semester courses.

    I've been studying a lot and hope to finally be able to get this done. I have 170+ credit hours, tons of debt, and no Bachelor's degree. It's been too long, and I'm not done.

    I am hoping for an online Advanced Spanish course that doesn't require proctored exams.

    I've always had issues with completing courses with proctors for a few reasons. The first is finding anyone willing to proctor it for me in a small town. The second is scheduling/health issues. I'm not looking for an easy class or an easy exam-- just ideally not proctored exams. I don't mind the school requiring oral verification of my Spanish abilities by phone, or some webcam requirements that show us taking the exam to the professor, or other ways to "validate" the exam and knowledge. It's part finding a willing/acceptable proctor, but mostly some personal issues that make proctored exams a pain and an obstacle I haven't been able to overcome in past classes.

    I'm embarrassed to post this asking about online Spanish classes again, but.. I can't seem to find a good match and get this done. Have you ever felt "stuck"? It sounds so easy: find online Spanish class, get approval, take class, graduate. Somehow... well,... here I sit, degree-less. I'm nervous I'll fail the Spanish class and never finish.

    I've found a few that are offering online Spanish this semester that I'm looking at, but I would appreciate any other course options. Univ. of Arkansas sounded good, until I saw their proctor form list of acceptable proctors: superintendent of public schools, university dean, and other top staff. They won't accept teachers or bosses or high school guidance counselors or anyone I could potentially get. I don't know those kind of people around here. My town doesn't have a testing center that I can find, so UArk might be out. I'm looking at U. of Oregon and BYU. Are there any others I should look at?

    Is there some course offering directory across multiple schools that I could search?
     
  2. TonyM

    TonyM Member

    You can try the big independent study programs like LSU or UARK, which are paper-based and have no schedule. They send you the study guide and you have 9 months or a year to finish. I think you will always have proctors, however. Usually a librarian will suffice.
     
  3. ooo

    ooo New Member

    Thanks, I'll look at LSU.

    UArk's proctor form lists a bunch of people like high school superintendents as acceptable proctor's or city head librarians. Maybe the form was to intimidate people instead of being a comprehensive list of acceptable proctors. Do they allow "normal" high school or university librarians now?
     
  4. ooo

    ooo New Member

    LSU has a 5th semester class-- not a 6th semester. So close. I'm glad to know they offer a lot of classes.

    The LSU site did have an interesting proctor listing that had a school testing center about an hour or so away. If I could find another school that offers a 6th semester that would also approve that testing center, that would be cool.
     
  5. TonyM

    TonyM Member

    There are a lot of these programs, and each has it's own proctor policies but probably all will let you test at a nearby university testing center. Some more are Ohio, ND, MO, BYU, TX Tech, UT, Texas State, U of Iowa, Indiana and Iowa State. There are a lot more. The key search term is "independent study". Usually there are only two tests per term, so it probably doesn't matter too much if the proctor is out of the way.

    Here's a good list of classes:

    http://www.dantescatalogs.com/DISCCourses.aspx?ISCCode=11.26.00&MajorSubjectArea=PC
     
  6. ooo

    ooo New Member

    Hm... I'm searching "spanish advanced independent study course." I'm getting a lot of classes that aren't actually independent study, or advanced Spanish, or are high school classes from BYU's high school offerings.

    Should I try another search phrase? Somehow I need to get results to show advanced classes, not the tons of Spanish 1 Intro stuff. "Advanced spanish college online class" didn't seem to get me useful results either.

    I found a potential proctor location at some community college an hour each way from here. I could swing a 2 hour trip for a final exam. One class I saw had 6 exams. There's no way. I would never, ever be able to finish that class. I find proctored exams so frustrating. It's hard to find testing centers, and hard for us older students to do this. They trust us enough to write papers ourselves... but not enough to take exams. Even my "main" school that I've taken most of the 170 credit hours at allows online exams. Most of the online exams are so difficult that if you had not performed well and studied countless hours all semester, you would fail the online exam. Oh well, I'll keep looking... one final exam proctored would at least be more of a chance than 6 proctored exams.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jul 21, 2012
  7. ooo

    ooo New Member

    Wow! That'll help. There's a few advanced Spanish classes on there. I'll check 'em out.
     
  8. mbaonline

    mbaonline New Member

    If at first you don't succeed...


    Feeling stuck is very common, especially with fear of failure thrown in. I have this problem when I'm faced with multiple choices, no clear answer and uncertainty.

    Did you look at this? Independent Learning, UW Madison Continuing Studies It looks like this is like a correspondence course and you have a year to complete it. Can't tell if it has proctored exams, but they should be helpful if you call them.

    How about a tutor? Or a language group that meets informally to practice Spanish? That might get your feet wet and get you into the groove before you take the class. Or take 2nd year over again via an online class (for no credit or auditing it) to get warmed up.

    Regarding proctors, cross that bridge when you get there. You may not personally "know" a superintendent, but every school district has one, and I bet if you called and nicely asked the sup's secretary, you might get lucky. Or ask a local teacher if they know the sup - I have two girlfriends who are teachers who both personally know the sup in a mid-sized school district. Educators (some of the time) are in the profession because they like to help people. (I paid a $40 Aplia fee for a needy student last quarter and was hopeful but not certain that I would be repaid....and I was.)

    Are you in a rural area without test centers?

    You didn't screw up. Hang in there. You can do this.
     

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