Help! Advice needed about ACE and TESC

[NJpta]

So I was recently informed about TESC, ACE, and CLEP from a friend. I have 26 credits from Burlington County College. I want to apply to Union County College for their Physical therapy assistant program. In order to apply for the program I need to have Algebra completed or in progress by October 31 2013 to apply for the January 2014 program. The problem is Intermediate Algebra is the pre-req for Algebra so I would have to take int. alg in fall and algebra in spring which means I couldn't apply until Spring 2015. A friend told me I should try to take the CLEP. I looked into it, however, it's been 16 years since I was in high school and I only took Algebra 1 not 2 and I really don't remember it. So then I was told about ALEKS and ACE credits which I think would be better for me.

Here's where I need the help. He told me that I should take ALEKS get the ACE credits transferred to TESC, once they are there you can transfer them to any college. I'm not sure that is true though. UCC is not listed as a member on the ACE website and I called UCC to check but haven't heard back. If I transfer those credits from TESC to UCC they would still show up as ACE credit right and may not be accepted?

[sanantone]

Yes, you need to make sure that Union County College will accept ACE credits. If they do, then you won't need a TESC transcript. ACE credits won't magically become regionally accredited and TESC credits if they're on a TESC transcript. Besides, the only way to really get a TESC transcript is to enroll, and that costs $3,000. TESC and other schools offer credit banking services, but those aren't official transcripts, and they will still denote where the credits came from. There are several colleges with self-paced, independent study courses: Louisiana State University, Adams State University, Brigham Young, etc. There are also a few community colleges with online courses that probably won't make you take intermediate algebra before college algebra.

[cookderosa]

I agree with sanantone. Your friend's suggestion is terrible. Besides probably not working, it's going to cost you valuable time and money. I don't know if your college accepts ACE, many don't, but it's worth finding out. Sometimes finding out is harder than you think, so you might want to go in person to the advising center and print off some ACE info from their website. Some colleges consider ACE credit "military" credit. (it's not, but anyway....) So, you might have to school them a bit. If you find out for sure that they don't accept ACE, you're choices are to complete the entire math sequence or CLEP.
If it were me, I might instead find a school that offers TWO fall terms. These are 8 week sessions instead of 16, that way you are only taking 1 semester to complete both intermediate and college. You also need to be sure your compass or asset scores allow you to enroll in intermediate (not lower) so that would be an option. You say Union County, which if that's North Carolina/South Carolina you can do the 2 classes in 1 term through Central Piedmont CC. Good luck1

[mrs.b]

Or, you could always use ALEKS to study up, then sit the CLEP exam. The timeline will be entirely at your pace, and if your school accepts CLEP, you're all set. No need to worry about acceptance of ACE credits, or shelling out obscene sums of cash to try credit laundering (that usually does not work).

For additional options beyond those mentioned by sanantone:
University of Texas - Austin offers a self-paced College Algebra course
University North Dakota does as well, but the price is a bit steep
...actually, a ton of options came up. Google "college algebra self paced" and explore.

[NJpta]

Thanks for all the info! I was talking about UCC in NJ. I think I have figured it out! I am going to take Intermediate Alg. And Alg through Aleks to study for the CLEP. If I do not pass the clep, BCC will accept ACE credit for Inter. Alg and then I can take Algebra at BCC in the fall and that credit will transfer to UCC. Hopefully I just pass the CLEP.