A little rusty at this.. some help?

[burbuja0512]

Hi all,

First of all, sorry for not popping up more often, but luckily, post-MBA life has been very busy!

Getting to the point... my 20 year old has been working on college for the past couple of years. He's done some CLEP/DSST work and more recently, been slogging along in community college.

While he is brilliant, he is not academically motivated and has asked me to just pick a major so he could finish things up. He does eventually want to get a masters degree, but as he is totally clueless about career choices, we shouldn't take this into account for the undergrad. The last thing I want is for him to rack up the credits (and $$) without a degree.

So, my question is, what are your suggestions? He has about a year's worth total of liberal arts LL classes. He would probably want to take any more challenging courses in-person or online rather than a CLEP, so we don't necessarily need a test-only degree.

He is not into math or IT. Anything else might be good and I'm open to any suggestions. I really appreciate any and all ideas.

[UptonSinclair]

If my child were in a similar situation, I would suggest an Associates degree for now and a Bachelor's degree down the road when they have made a career choice. This avoids having to do a second Bachelor's degree in the future. There are more aid options open for someone without a Bachelor's degree.

[dfrecore]

While I LOVE the idea of planning other people's lives for them, unfortunately, it rarely works out well. People are SO uncooperative when the goals set out for them are not their own.

I would suggest that he gets a job, preferably a really crappy one, so he can find out for himself that this is not a great life plan, and then start to figure out some better options. There's nothing quite so motivating as finding out what you DON'T want to do, to get you moving in another direction.

Also, there are all kinds of "career search" or "major search" courses at community colleges. Have him take one of those to see what direction it shows him going in. I wish I would have paid attention to what my career search said when I was a senior in high school (accounting). It would have saved me years of heartache and pain, not to mention dollars.

I agree with getting an AA in general studies, as well as taking classes that sound interesting. This is a time of searching, and the best way to do that college-wise is to take different classes without having to go towards a specific degree. I think that can be limiting to people who don't know what they want to do.

[cookderosa]

If my child were in a similar situation, I would suggest an Associates degree for now and a Bachelor's degree down the road when they have made a career choice. This avoids having to do a second Bachelor's degree in the future. There are more aid options open for someone without a Bachelor's degree.

This is what we're doing for one of mine right now. If you're thinking liberal arts-ish, then of course an AA would be a logical pick. This specific son of mine (who probably will not pursue a bachelor's) is going to earn his associates in business. It's a better fit.

Having my own kids who are not really academically motivated, I always hear other people say things like "well, if they can get their gen eds then they can do anything" or "then do a degree in liberal arts and build on that" I'm sure I might have even said that- but in real life, that's a disaster. Getting through 20 classes that are uninteresting is torture. Getting through 40 is unimaginable. It's the equivalent to me picking a major for you based on my interests and skills lol.

If you post his classes, I'm sure any number of folks can help you cobble together a degree plan. I think one question you should really put on your son is: business or not business (the gen ed and electives differ a bit between the two) and start from there.

[cookderosa]

I would suggest that he gets a job, preferably a really crappy one, so he can find out for himself that this is not a great life plan, and then start to figure out some better options. There's nothing quite so motivating as finding out what you DON'T want to do, to get you moving in another direction.

This can backfire on you. My (then 20) son took a warehouse job and I thought "great! He can pay off his car and see how hard it is to work 40 hours...etc." he came home and told me he was going to earn $24/hour. He just finished his first year and "loves" this job. He has way too much money for a kid his age and is in no way interested in returning to school. The problem du jour is helping him plan to move up in this company or into a less-physically demanding position, but the point is that even though we have all of this in our brain, at the end of the day, our kids make their own choices. My son's choice -imo- isn't the best, but it's also not immoral, unethical, irresponsible- in fact, he works for a great company. It's not what "I" saw for him, but how many of us are doing what our parents thought was in our best interests as a young person? Not me.

[burbuja0512]

Wow! SO nice to be back and thanks for all the great comments. Here are a few responses:

- I do really like the associates degree idea and feel like it's better than nothing. However, the only thing that motivates him (kind of) academically is the desire to spend a few years out of the country teaching English. He has read that most countries that pay well have the requirement of "any bachelors" to get the position.

- I also agree that in theory, it's not good to plan his life...but he's been wanting me to do that for two years now and I"m seeing that he really doesn't care and truly appreciates the assistance. He did have a job for several years and is quite a hard worker. But as Jen mentions, even at $9 dollars/hour, it made him a worse student as he was less motivated to focus on school when "he didn't need to listen to me" to get money. Now that he doesn't have a job, it's just easier from him to concentrate.


For classes, he has some basic liberal arts from community college along with a small handful of DSST. I don't remember how many, but maximum 3 DSST - need to confirm ASAP. All of his stuff adds up to about 18 credits from all sources.

I have been scouring the COSC and TESC sites and believe that Human Resources from COSC might be a good choice? He would have a fair amount of online classes, but it's hopefully a degree that would be more useful to a kid that might not get a masters.

In order to save money, I'm looking at SL and some of the other resources that weren't around just a few years ago when I was CLEPping. This could take a while and I want to keep the cost down. I also plan on studying with him.. not easy since I travel quite a bit for work, but I can do it and it will be fun.

Thoughts on the possible degree choice? I literally know nothing about HR, but he's very good with people and it could be an interesting career choice. I'm very open to other suggestions.

[dfrecore]

Well, if he really is open to your guidance, then have at it!

Regarding an HR degree, I will say that as someone who has worked in HR (and am getting the degree myself from TESC), most companies I've seen don't require an HR degree for an HR job - they just require a business degree. I am getting that because it was actually easier for me to do that then the General Management degree (I already had the classes). So a general business degree is probably just as good as an HR degree, if that is easier to get.

I would encourage anyone working on a degree at his age to take some classes at a regular school, and some online, as I think there is a benefit to both. A lot of business classes are taught by people who have actually worked in business and have some valuable insight to share. And some classes are just more interesting being there face-to-face. So I would pick out a couple here and there and take them on campus, with the rest online however you choose.

Good luck!!

[KayV]

It sounds like you are looking for the easiest-to-accomplish associate degree for him, one that will potentially give him room for advancement to a bachelor degree one day. Given that, does he have any potential stumbling blocks we need to work around? For example, COSC requires College Algebra or higher math, a lab science, and public speaking (or a waiver). If he has trouble with any of those, it might be better to choose TESC or Excelsior. Which credits does he already have?

[dfrecore]

This can backfire on you. My (then 20) son took a warehouse job and I thought "great! He can pay off his car and see how hard it is to work 40 hours...etc." he came home and told me he was going to earn $24/hour. He just finished his first year and "loves" this job. He has way too much money for a kid his age and is in no way interested in returning to school. The problem du jour is helping him plan to move up in this company or into a less-physically demanding position, but the point is that even though we have all of this in our brain, at the end of the day, our kids make their own choices. My son's choice -imo- isn't the best, but it's also not immoral, unethical, irresponsible- in fact, he works for a great company. It's not what "I" saw for him, but how many of us are doing what our parents thought was in our best interests as a young person? Not me.

Well, as much as I love a good degree, if my kid came home with a $24/hr job and loved work, I would totally be ok with that. $48k/yr for a 20-year old is nothing to sneeze at!! And with no student loan debt behind him, he's well on his way to a great life. In a couple of years, as his friends start to graduate from college and come out making less than him but with $30k in loans to pay off, he will look like the most brilliant kid in the world! LOL!

I'm not saying that I wouldn't encourage him to continue on with his studies though, with the goal that someday he could run the warehouse (Operations Management degree comes to mind), but it's ok if it takes him a while to figure that out. Not everyone knows what they want to do when they're 18 (I certainly didn't). Having a few years of working under my belt showed me the way though.

[cookderosa]

Scarlett, what are your thoughts on classes vs tests? We are using study dot com this semester- you can buy a year for $1000 using homeschool buyers co op coupon.