Excelsior BSLA plan advice and looking for UL courses with least amount of writing

[oldguy4associate]

Hello all, How do my lower level credits look for BSLA at Excelsior?

RBC is community college and English II needs to be completed.

Did I read this forum correctly when someone said any UL courses from SDC or Coopersmith will satisfy requirements for BSLA?

Can anyone recommend SDC UL, or Coopersmith, etc, courses that are more exam based than writing based? Is there a way to tell which have written assignments before taking the course like you can with Sophia?

Thanks to browniebo, I copied your spreadsheet format. And thank you to BJ, Dfrecore and Rachel. I never thought I'd earn a degree and here I am having met the requirements for Pierpont's BOG in basically two months.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1...sp=sharing

*Edited title because SDC UL have written assignments

[rachel83az]

All UL courses at SDC have at least one assignment, usually 2 or 3.

Coopersmith is entirely exams, but they use ProctorU. If you've never used ProctorU before, I'd recommend trying a single Coopersmith course first before going all-in. ProctorU is fine for some people but is unworkable for many others.

[oldguy4associate]

All UL courses at SDC have at least one assignment, usually 2 or 3.

Coopersmith is entirely exams, but they use ProctorU. If you've never used ProctorU before, I'd recommend trying a single Coopersmith course first before going all-in. ProctorU is fine for some people but is unworkable for many others.

Thanks for the heads up. I used Proctortrack for my CLEPs and had some issues with them. I think I'm willing to put up with some aggravation in lieu of writing papers.

[bjcheung77]

For Coopersmith, you should review this thread: https://www.degreeforum.net/mybb/Thread-...#pid387003
You may want to review https://lawshelf.com/ and their equivalency with Excelsior: https://lawshelf.com/assets/pdf/Excelsior.pdf
Last but not least, I would check out some other ACE/NCCRS providers in case you find something more cost effective, easy, fast to complete.

For example, if you have free electives you want to take and Excelsior accepts this, for $19.99 and 3 credits, it's a good deal, in addition to that, you can also check out the CSM Learn course and various inexpensive options: https://www.degreeforum.net/mybb/Thread-...ACE-credit

[oldguy4associate]

For Coopersmith, you should review this thread: https://www.degreeforum.net/mybb/Thread-...#pid387003
You may want to review https://lawshelf.com/ and their equivalency with Excelsior: https://lawshelf.com/assets/pdf/Excelsior.pdf
Last but not least, I would check out some other ACE/NCCRS providers in case you find something more cost effective, easy, fast to complete.

For example, if you have free electives you want to take and Excelsior accepts this, for $19.99 and 3 credits, it's a good deal, in addition to that, you can also check out the CSM Learn course and various inexpensive options: https://www.degreeforum.net/mybb/Thread-...ACE-credit

Thank you for the links BJ there are a few courses that look interesting at lawshelf.

Is it safe to say all UL courses satisfy the BSLA UL requirements? Pretty sure thats what I keep reading around the forum.

[bjcheung77]

Thank you for the links BJ there are a few courses that look interesting at lawshelf.

Is it safe to say all UL courses satisfy the BSLA UL requirements? Pretty sure thats what I keep reading around the forum.

No, there are certain number of UL you need, depending on the degree, you have X upper level requirements that are Arts/Sciences and X number in Applied Professional.  Your best bet right now is to take more Arts/Sciences that interest you.  Here's the webpage for general education requirements for Excelsior: https://www.excelsior.edu/policy/general...uirements/

[oldguy4associate]

Thank you for the links BJ there are a few courses that look interesting at lawshelf.

Is it safe to say all UL courses satisfy the BSLA UL requirements? Pretty sure thats what I keep reading around the forum.

No, there are certain number of UL you need, depending on the degree, you have X upper level requirements that are Arts/Sciences and X number in Applied Professional.  Your best bet right now is to take more Arts/Sciences that interest you.  Here's the webpage for general education requirements for Excelsior: https://www.excelsior.edu/policy/general...uirements/

I'm not seeing/understanding the UL requirements in the link provided, but nobody ever accused me of being smart either. I did find another post where you explain it perfectly. https://www.degreeforum.net/mybb/Thread-...its?page=2

[dfrecore]

Ok, it's a bit difficult because of how you've done your spreadsheet, so I'll do my best.

- Art History 2 (Sophia) is on here twice
- IT Career Exploration (Sophia) is only 1cr

Then, when I do a spreadsheet, I put everything in the correct place - so if you have 10 humanities courses, I put them all in Humanities, even if there's more than required, because that's how EU does it.

So I show that you have all of your categories covered (Written English, even if not yet complete, Humanities/Ethics, Social Science/History, Natural Science/Math). The only thing you need is 18cr UL in the Arts & Sciences (the things I just listed) plus the Capstone to get your A&S UL covered.

That leaves Free Electives - you need 7cr LL of those, plus 6cr of UL, then Info Lit and the UL Cornerstone course. I personally would take Sophia's Intro to IT and Developing Effective Teams for 4 of those credits, and then 1 additional course.

It's also unclear about what EU will accept in terms of CLEP exams, and so I'm not certain that I would rely 100% on the 6cr Social Sciences and History CLEP for credits. EU now penalizes you for extra evaluations ($300 for anything after the 1st one) and I for one am going to make 100% sure that there are no issues before I apply there - so I'm taking a couple of extra courses from either Study.com or Sophia to make sure that I have everything I could possibly need. SDC and Sophia both show what EU accepts and in what areas, so you are much safer there than you are with CLEP exams.

[oldguy4associate]

Ok, it's a bit difficult because of how you've done your spreadsheet, so I'll do my best.

- Art History 2 (Sophia) is on here twice
- IT Career Exploration (Sophia) is only 1cr

Then, when I do a spreadsheet, I put everything in the correct place - so if you have 10 humanities courses, I put them all in Humanities, even if there's more than required, because that's how EU does it.  

So I show that you have all of your categories covered (Written English, even if not yet complete, Humanities/Ethics, Social Science/History, Natural Science/Math).  The only thing you need is 18cr UL in the Arts & Sciences (the things I just listed) plus the Capstone to get your A&S  UL covered.

That leaves Free Electives - you need 7cr LL of those, plus 6cr of UL, then Info Lit and the UL Cornerstone course.  I personally would take Sophia's Intro to IT and Developing Effective Teams for 4 of those credits, and then 1 additional course.

It's also unclear about what EU will accept in terms of CLEP exams, and so I'm not certain that I would rely 100% on the 6cr Social Sciences and History CLEP for credits.  EU now penalizes you for extra evaluations ($300 for anything after the 1st one) and I for one am going to make 100% sure that there are no issues before I apply there - so I'm taking a couple of extra courses from either Study.com or Sophia to make sure that I have everything I could possibly need.  SDC and Sophia both show what EU accepts and in what areas, so you are much safer there than you are with CLEP exams.

I used browniebo's format and filled in my own completed courses as I went along. Apologies for the cobbled together appearance. I do have Intro to IT, not Career Exploration. After editing out the double Art History, I now have 3 credits completely unaccounted for. I'm going to knock out 10 more Sophia's and update the spreadsheet. Thank you for taking the time to evaluate my situation.