FEMA feels like cheating

[chiquitacobbe]

You should take classes or exams for those credits. Those 27 free electives will haunt you and undermine the esteem in which you hold your degree. I think you should do the rest of your degree first, and revisit the free electives last.

Why do you feel they will come back and haunt us? just curious. I know the FEMA credits are all accepted in some majors but I'm just curious as to your comment.

[Riley2012]

If you read the material and learn it or pass it without reviewing material, it's not cheating. Using Ctrl find is. I'm just wondering where it says that they are okay with that? Please help "ease" our conscience.

Don't get me wrong because I used FEMA to fill my electives. Turned out I only needed 15 free electives, which took 17 test. Search did not work well for me and some of the courses will not let you download the material now. So I had to put some real effort into "earning" 15 Credits in 4 hours max ...

My 2 Cents..

[marianne202]

I think it is like anything else, you get out what you put in! I did the full FEMA PDS and I never once did control+F, I didn't even know that was an option until I read this post! LOL! I also did a few of the classes through FEMA / Texas A & M extension. I did do some light reading or just used my prior knowledge to pass these exams. I also didn't transfer these for credit. I did them for my personal satisfaction and to submit to my employer for professional development. I will have them put on an ACE transcript now and have that sent to my employer now, because transcripted work is important since I'm an instructor. If you feel like you are cheating then you are cheating yourself out of the knowledge to be gained by doing these courses. If on the other hand you actually work through the material or have prior knowledge you are not cheating anything. Once it is on your transcript, accepted into your degree, it is there to stay. If down the road some school or agency decides not to certify or approve these credits it won't dilute or tarnish your degree. At the time you were awarded credit for those they were held in an approved standing and were credit bearing. Nothing will change that! They can't retro back and remove credits after your degree has been awarded, unless they can prove fraud. Good luck with your studies...whether you decide to include FEMA credit or not!

[rebel100]

I think it is like anything else, you get out what you put in! I did the full FEMA PDS and I never once did control+F, I didn't even know that was an option until I read this post! LOL! I also did a few of the classes through FEMA / Texas A & M extension. I did do some light reading or just used my prior knowledge to pass these exams. I also didn't transfer these for credit. I did them for my personal satisfaction and to submit to my employer for professional development. I will have them put on an ACE transcript now and have that sent to my employer now, because transcripted work is important since I'm an instructor. If you feel like you are cheating then you are cheating yourself out of the knowledge to be gained by doing these courses. If on the other hand you actually work through the material or have prior knowledge you are not cheating anything. Once it is on your transcript, accepted into your degree, it is there to stay. If down the road some school or agency decides not to certify or approve these credits it won't dilute or tarnish your degree. At the time you were awarded credit for those they were held in an approved standing and were credit bearing. Nothing will change that! They can't retro back and remove credits after your degree has been awarded, unless they can prove fraud. Good luck with your studies...whether you decide to include FEMA credit or not!

Can't put these on ACE as far as I know...FEMA will send a transcript just about anywhere you like free of charge though.

[Westerner]

I'd rather take CLEPs and DANTES (and have the resources) but since FEMAs save time and that's something I'm short on... :/

[cookderosa]

Why do you feel they will come back and haunt us? just curious. I know the FEMA credits are all accepted in some majors but I'm just curious as to your comment.

It's specific to the poster. If the poster feels that he cheated the system, the poster will always look at his degree with contempt. The poster will feel that his degree is second-class and since most of us only earn a bachelor's degree once, that will forever be part of his resume.

I suggested he revisit the FEMA question after accumulating all other credits, to give him time to gather perspective. He may (or may not) still feel that way later. But, in any case, let your conscious be your guide.

[ronaldemail1]

To complete a Bachelor Degree you need to take certain amount of courses. According to each persons experience some courses
will seem to be impossible, others complicated but doable and a few courses will be extremely easy.
Each Bachelor Degree in the US has been created with a purpose. It is up to you to decide which one suits you and the combination
of courses that you will take.

Usually elective courses are the easiest (I know there is the exception, but very few take the complicated ones).
The FEMA courses are allowed to fill in within the electives usually and in certain career paths as core or career courses.
Still they are not different from an easy course or even a complicated one that you will take at a regular college.
Will you remember them in a year, or 10 or 20 years from now. You never know.
I am sure that I am not the only one that has taken a course years ago but that is not able to take again, still I passed
that course and the knowledge is not used on a daily basis. For example I remember zero from Calculus 1 and 2,
Discrete Math and Digital Circuits and they were core courses. My sister who had better grades and was in the honor
roll does not remember the last 2 years of courses from her college. Why, because she took so many credits to finish
early that she literally crammed without understanding anything.

The situation is different for every person. College proves that you are a reliable person that can finish things.
But how you are on a daily basis in your profession is proved by you. The degree only allows you to access the
position, still you need to prove yourself a worthy employee and the knowledge and skills for that are not taught
in any specific course.

[mrs.b]

The FEMAs I took felt a lot like PLAs (well, with a painless test to assess knowledge instead of the drawn-out hassle of writing a paper to the specifications of a mentor). I took those from the management series and hazardous material handling (in a manufacturing facility, we must spend a lot of time keeping MSDS records and converting to SDS). I knew the majority of the information before opening the file, so reading through the study booklets took little time and was mostly a review that highlighted only a few bits of new information. I do not view PLAs as cheating, so they did not feel that way to me.

If it feels wrong to you, you'll feel the degree is cheapened if you use the credits. A lot of other options have been suggested; maybe one of those would help avoid a clash of conscience?

[ryoder]

I got 3 credits for Shotokan Karate in college. It felt like cheating a little bit because I had so much fun in the class and I learned something truly important to me. The ability to defend myself. Of course it had nothing to do with my education, however it was a lot of work.
It felt a little dirty taking the CLEP info sys and comp applications and MIS DSST because I am a pro but it is what it is. If a doctor took microbiology he might feel like was cheating too.