Best option for College Algebra (weak in Math) and English 102/Comp II

[KayV]

Straighterline or the TECEP in English Comp II should work. You could take Technical Writing for the humanities.
I think we have hijacked Erinp88's thread, so back to finishing a bachelor's in nursing.

[dfrecore]

Ok, so I have to ask - why are you getting your degree at a state college rather than at one of the Big 3? Just curious, it seems like you've already ruled out COSC and TESU based on your experience with EC.

If you went into TESU or COSC with an RN, and your Gen Eds mostly completed, you could finish a degree with either of them for about $5000 (maybe even less depending on how many courses you need to take), and way less than 18 months. TESU doesn't require anything special for math for the BALS degree, and so you could probably finish Intermediate Algebra through ALEKS before 12/31 with some help from your hubby. You could also try the College Math CLEP or another math course altogether if you wanted. Not sure what COSC requires.

Also, I'm not sure what experience you had with EC, but they do have a less expensive way to test out of a degree than the amount you said. A lot less, probably close to being on par with TESU or COSC, via testing out and using the POAG membership.

Anyway, most of the people on here can help you get a degree, if it's not a RN-to-BSN degree (which it doesn't sound like you're wanting), so if you wanted more info on doing this, we can help.

[erinp88]

Here's the thing, I lack a great deal of hospital experience to make Excelsior look like a legit College if that makes sense. I should have not have gone this route for my initial ADN. It's not respected in my area and I've been passed over for several jobs because of my lack of clinical experience, both from school and real life as an LPN.

Ferris State also has two accreditations nlnac and ccne, where most of the competency based programs are ccne only. I'm not opposed to doing a clinical experience as a bsn student either. In fact, I desperately need it! A state degree would kind of hide my initial rn licensure if that makes sense. Also, I may seek further education as a nurse practitioner and there are some concerns with some of the programs not transferring into that field, whereas a state college would guarantee placement if my GPA was adequate. That piece I haven't fully investigated, but have seen ramblings in nurse forums that is an issue for people who want to work as a mid-level provider.

IF I even get interviewed for this job, I don't have the 4000 working hours needed for my occupational authorization to teach because of having kids and working part time. I did find a loophole that they will authorize me based on my RN licensure and the hours used to obtain that. Well, my weekend of clinical competency as horrible as it was, does not come close to the amount of clinical hours traditional ADN students used. My hope is I can spin my LPN hours if they get picky about verification.

It just wasn't the right route for me to go. For LPN's rocking it out in acute care and even long term care, yes, absolutely it makes sense. For me, I had a few years of long term care and working as a paraprofessional at a vocational high school. I taught entry level health care and very basic skills. I tried to get into bridge programs locally and they were all full, so that EC was my easy/not so easy fix. I could not get hired to save my life in 2009/2010 between the economy and EC degree. The job postings literally listed they wanted candidates with x hours of clinical time or bsn's only - I was screwed!

Hopefully my rambling makes sense.. I haven't ruled out anything yet and if I by chance get this job, I will look to them to see what they would prefer, which will probably be a CTE teaching degree from
Ferris and I'll have to double major and in that case, I would lean more toward competency based BSN. But logically a BSN from a state college may protect me from heart break again.

[dfrecore]

I guess I'm still not understanding what degree you want, and why you want it. Your initial post said you needed "a degree" (nothing specific) and that you wanted it to teach at a votech high school. Now you've kind of changed it to a BSN with the possibility of becoming a NP. Those are all pretty far off from each other. So I guess you need to figure out what you want to do before you invest a lot of time and money on anything.

To your original question, you can certainly use ALEKS to get back to basics and fill in the holes with your math foundation, and possibly get college credit at the same time. It's only $20/mo and worth a shot. You can also use Khan Academy for free in the same way. I personally like Khan Academy as it is video-based, while ALEKS is all text-based. But Khan offers no credit.

When I first started a few years ago, I used ALEKS and started with 6th grade math, and worked my way up through College Algebra. I wish I would have continued on and finished Stats at that time, but it just didn't click and I figured I'd have all the time in the world to finish. Ha!

I took the English Comp II TECEP (after taking English Comp I in CC 20 years ago), and I found it very easy. I got the handbook from my library for free and put sticky-notes on the sections that the study guide said I needed. Literally 5 minutes of prep time, and that was all. I took the test cold and passed. Not a great score, but then I didn't really put any effort into it.

Good luck whatever you decide to do.

[erinp88]

Sorry if there was any confusion! Ultimately I want and need my BSN. My previous colleagues feel a BSN would ultimately be the most beneficial to me career wise. I have those few gen ed classes and wanted to check with this forum on how to complete them quickly and efficiently with my low math skills.

I'm now consulting with WGU students because they seem to be doing this transition program the quickest. So far they are kind of in agreement I may need to suck it up and do the state route based on my work experience and EC degree. If I can get a straight BSN and not worry about a bachelors in CTE, I can work on getting my teaching certificate relatively quickly. So confusing and I thank you in reading!

[videogamesrock]

I used ALEKS with the help of a tutor. I took the test and then it showed me my weak areas. We practiced the concepts for about a week and passed. I then moved on to the next level and passed relatively quickly based on my previous tutoring. I finished all 24 credits from ALEKS.

[rowan555]

Thank you. I have a speech class from a CC, just need english comp 2 and a humanities to finish off my gen eds.

My son took comp 2 at Straighterline and it wasn't that bad at all - he's a struggling writer but got through it in about a week. WGU has a partnership with SL where if you take 4 courses via SL you get $200 your tuition at WGU.