Documenting My Son's WGU Experience

[rowan555]

Since I've gained so much from this forum, I figured I should give back a bit by sharing my 17 year old's WGU experience. He completed the courses in my signature below, and he is now enrolled in WGU, beginning June 1, with 35 credits to complete his business degree in human resources management. He completed just about every transferable course, but for those of you wanting to truly maximize your transfer credits, the following additional courses can be transferred in -
Integrated Natural Science Applications (can be completed with a 3 credit science and 1 credit lab or with any associates degree)
Critical Thinking and Logic (if you have an associates degree this is cleared)
Employment Law (Study.com will be adding this as a 3 credit course this year)
Change Management (I honestly haven't found this available via any online course/exam options)

His enrollment counselor told him he can likely complete his degree in one term; however, if the capstone takes more time than expected, he can take just the capstone in a second term and pay just under $1,000 for that. His tuition for this first term is $2835 with the $200 Straighterline discount. He completed a scholarship phone interview today, but it's unlikely he will qualify for any of them - most of the scholarships are $500 per year.

Orientation opens up on the 15th of the month prior to your start date, as long as tuition has been paid in full. Once he completes the 2 to 4 hour orientation, he will have access to his courses, although he will not be formally enrolled in any and will not be able to take any tests or submit assignments until he has been enrolled in the course and it's his start date of June 1. His mentor will be calling him next week to craft his course order and choose the first course he wants to enroll in.

His plan is to do Orientation on Monday and immediately begin knocking out Integrated Natural Science Applications and Critical Thinking. The first entails 3 written assignments - an essay, a powerpoint presentation, and a lab report. The latter has a proctored assessment. I've also encouraged him to spend an hour or so a day during the next two weeks doing the lessons for the Spreadsheets class since he has almost no Excel experience and I've read the course is pretty challenging.

I'll post here a few times a week to update on his progress, in the hopes that anyone considering WGU can get an idea of what's involved with attempting to complete a degree in one term. It's not talked about as much here, so hopefully this will add some useful information.

[Thorne]

Best of luck to him!

If I've done my math correctly, I should have between 30 and 36 hours once enrolled, so this should be very enlightening.

[rebel100]

Best of luck!

Thanks for the review, looking forward to the updates.

[rowan555]

Wyatt just received word that he was awarded a $2,000 Straighterline scholarship - he'll likely only actually receive $500 since it's $500 per term, but I am floored that he received any sort of scholarship at all. Feeling very excited right now! We need to find out if he would be eligible for the $500 on a second term if all he does that term is his capstone - that would be fantastic.

[rowan555]

Orientation opened up for him the morning of the 15th, as stated it would. It took him about 4 hours to complete and he said it was dreadfully frustrating and had math and writing assignments which were unexpected. As soon as he completed orientation, he was able to click "degree plan" and see a list of all courses he needs for his degree - and all are viewable. He doesn't have Office on his new computer, and he's waiting to hear from his student mentor for the first time to find out when his WGU Office key will be available to him. He had hoped to begin the Spreadsheets course, but he needs Excel to do so. He completed two modules of the Critical Thinking course and plans to work on that and Employment Law for the remainder of the week.

[Diplok]

Rowan555....congratulations to your son. I start @ WGU in HR Management on 07/01.

[jsd]

he said it was dreadfully frustrating and had math and writing assignments which were unexpected.

wow, either they've drastically changed the orientation since Jan/Feb, or the College of Business has a very different setup than the College of IT for their orientation. Mine just showed me where to find basic things like student services and such around the website, and had me setup my email signature. There was no real work or assignments (or information that I couldn't have easily figured out on my own).

At any rate, congrats to your son and good luck!

[rowan555]

wow, either they've drastically changed the orientation since Jan/Feb, or the College of Business has a very different setup than the College of IT for their orientation. Mine just showed me where to find basic things like student services and such around the website, and had me setup my email signature. There was no real work or assignments (or information that I couldn't have easily figured out on my own).

At any rate, congrats to your son and good luck!

Right! That's what he and I both expected - that it would be just an overview of the program and how to navigate things. I figured it would take about an hour and then he could jump right into the coursework - he spent nearly 4 hours on it and was frustrated when he was done, so he took a considerable break before beginning the critical thinking material.

His enrollment counselor led him to believe it will be nearly impossible to complete all 35 credits including the Capstone in one term - he's been spending 5+ hours a day this week working on critical thinking and employment law. He's determined to prove her wrong

[rowan555]

Rowan555....congratulations to your son. I start @ WGU in HR Management on 07/01.

Fantastic! He originally planned to begin 7/1, but he wants to finish up in one term and realized that trying to get his portfolio and capstone graded at the end of December might be problematic, so he made the push to start 6/1. How many crdits are you transferring in? Please feel free to use this thread to share your own experience as well - what a great resource for anyone considering the program in the future!

[Diplok]

I just had my transcript evaluated. Out of 47 credits on my transcript they only accepted 22. I am not complaining, most of those credits are for a different major. I am excited to start. My goal is to get this done in 12 months (2 terms). I know it won't be easy but I'm going to do whatever it takes to stick to that timeframe.