Can someone confirm whether or not the current Penn Foster courses are proctored?

[OST]

Is any portion of the below Penn and Foster courses proctored? The only proctor I can use is ProctorU, so if any of these courses require proctoring, I won't be enrolling in them.

• Financial Management
  
• Strategic Business Management (BUS425)
  
• International Business (BUS430)
  

The Strategic Business Management and International Business courses don't show up as individual courses. I know other people here have taken them, so can you please share how you took these courses individually?

[koenigtv]

To take individual courses with Penn Foster you just have to call them and register. One odd annoyance with individual courses is that you have to use different usernames and will be assigned a different student ID number for each class. Minor but annoying.

The finance class does not have a proctor. You take all the tests online and can also retake an exam if you don't score well. The exams are in the study guide and you submit your answers online. This gives you a chance to review all the questions before the tests. The final exam is done in a word.doc and then uploaded to the instructor. The final is a mix of multiple choice, true/false and word problems that have to be calculated with work shown. It took about 2 days to get my final exam score. Word of warning, the study guide link on PF's webpage didn't work for the 3 weeks it took me to complete the class. I sent numerous emails asking them to fix it and finally had to call and get the proper link from customer support.

Strategic business management exams are all online and not procotored. Again you can retake an exam if you don't score well. There is no final exam but you will complete a final project (a case study of a company). The study guide and book will give you all the info you need to easily understand and complete the final project. There is also a class participation grade for this class. There will be 3 or 4 questions and you just post your answer on the webpage. Also there are 3 required chat sessions with the instructor but it seems if you just log in for the chat it seems to qualify as participation. Another point about the chat session is that it's not a group interaction and you really don't have a chance to ask any questions directly related to the class. The instructor posts a recent business article and you chat back and forth about it. It's not clear how the participation affects your grade and it will take a minimum of 3 weeks to complete the class if you attend the the chat sessions because they are only once per week. Otherwise you can finish the class in a week if you are motivated.

I haven't taken BUS430 so can't comment on that. You can call and ask PF. Although when i called to ask them if the Finance final was procotored they said yes, but it wasn't. What else can I tell you - when you register for the class they will DHL the book to you and you should get it within 2 days. Highly recommend that you don't start any classes without the book or study guide. Also the formulas used in the finance book are not exactly the same as you will find with some online resources so make it easy on yourself and use the formulas in the finance book. They will also send you a business/finance calculator when you order the finance class. The study guide for finance was not shipped with the book but for the strategic management class it was. Both are online but like I said the finance study guide wasn't accessible and I had to call to get access.


Good luck.

[OST]

To take individual courses with Penn Foster you just have to call them and register. One odd annoyance with individual courses is that you have to use different usernames and will be assigned a different student ID number for each class. Minor but annoying.

The finance class does not have a proctor. You take all the tests online and can also retake an exam if you don't score well. The exams are in the study guide and you submit your answers online. This gives you a chance to review all the questions before the tests. The final exam is done in a word.doc and then uploaded to the instructor. The final is a mix of multiple choice, true/false and word problems that have to be calculated with work shown. It took about 2 days to get my final exam score. Word of warning, the study guide link on PF's webpage didn't work for the 3 weeks it took me to complete the class. I sent numerous emails asking them to fix it and finally had to call and get the proper link from customer support.

Strategic business management exams are all online and not procotored. Again you can retake an exam if you don't score well. There is no final exam but you will complete a final project (a case study of a company). The study guide and book will give you all the info you need to easily understand and complete the final project. There is also a class participation grade for this class. There will be 3 or 4 questions and you just post your answer on the webpage. Also there are 3 required chat sessions with the instructor but it seems if you just log in for the chat it seems to qualify as participation. Another point about the chat session is that it's not a group interaction and you really don't have a chance to ask any questions directly related to the class. The instructor posts a recent business article and you chat back and forth about it. It's not clear how the participation affects your grade and it will take a minimum of 3 weeks to complete the class if you attend the the chat sessions because they are only once per week. Otherwise you can finish the class in a week if you are motivated.

I haven't taken BUS430 so can't comment on that. You can call and ask PF. Although when i called to ask them if the Finance final was procotored they said yes, but it wasn't. What else can I tell you - when you register for the class they will DHL the book to you and you should get it within 2 days. Highly recommend that you don't start any classes without the book or study guide. Also the formulas used in the finance book are not exactly the same as you will find with some online resources so make it easy on yourself and use the formulas in the finance book. They will also send you a business/finance calculator when you order the finance class. The study guide for finance was not shipped with the book but for the strategic management class it was. Both are online but like I said the finance study guide wasn't accessible and I had to call to get access.


Good luck.

I found this very helpful, and I can live with these annoyances after dealing with even bigger ones at some other places. Thanks for posting all these details!