Help planning last few TESU BSBA CIS requirements as cheap as possible

[camjenks]

I'm trying to finish up TESU BSBA CIS by the end of December. The courses I have left are the Oral Communication requirement, Business Communication, Statistics, and Programming Language (and ethics if they don't accept my 2 credits from The Institutes AICP-0121).

I had planned to do these all through Straighterline, and it comes out to about $420.00. Up until now, I've done almost everything through CLEP (free through modern states) and Study.com (free with the guardian scholarship). I just wanted to get some feedback on these courses and what other options are out there. I'm keeping a close eye on the programming from onlinedegree.com, but I'm not sure yet. I'm also a little apprehensive because I'm not sure how the straighterline courses are, and I'm hoping i can get through a course every 2 weeks.

Any suggestions for other courses that may be faster/cheaper?

(TBH, a part of me was hoping that DSST would start being free through modern states by the time I got here, but that was a pipe dream. I should just appreciate what they've done for me!)


Thanks everyone!

[MNomadic]

Do you have any experience with any programming languages already or starting from scratch, there?

[camjenks]

Do you have any experience with any programming languages already or starting from scratch, there?

I'm a systems administrator, so I script with Bash and sometimes Powershell. I understand things like loops and variables, but I imagine any legitimate programming course will go much deeper.

[dfrecore]

OnlineDegree has the Python Programming course for free.

TESU has LL TECEP exams for $75, so that will be cheaper for your Oral Comm requirement than DSST (assuming a testing center fee), Study.com or SL.

I guess the real question though, is whether you want to go faster, or cheaper. Most of the time, these don't go together - you get one or the other.

[mysonx3]

If cheap is the main objective, Saylor has it. Free for the course, $25 for proctoring. Could also be the fastest option if you already know your stuff because you can skip the class and just take the test. ALEKS is also an option that should be cheap/fast for you. I don't have first hand experience with either.

[Merlin]

I'm trying to finish up TESU BSBA CIS by the end of December. The courses I have left are the Oral Communication requirement, Business Communication, Statistics, and Programming Language (and ethics if they don't accept my 2 credits from The Institutes AICP-0121).

Is there a particular reason why you think they might not accept the Institutes ethics course? I know they accepted it on my transcript and used it to fulfill my Ethics GenEd requirement. That was only last month. Yes, its only 2 credits, but you can easily make that up in GenEd electives. The cornerstone course fills in that gap nicely.

I had planned to do these all through Straighterline, and it comes out to about $420.00. Up until now, I've done almost everything through CLEP (free through modern states) and Study.com (free with the guardian scholarship). I just wanted to get some feedback on these courses and what other options are out there. I'm keeping a close eye on the programming from onlinedegree.com, but I'm not sure yet. I'm also a little apprehensive because I'm not sure how the straighterline courses are, and I'm hoping i can get through a course every 2 weeks.

Any suggestions for other courses that may be faster/cheaper?
[...]

Except for the statistics course, which I took via ALEKS, I took all the rest of those courses via Study.com. I found SDC to be faster (and therefore cheaper) for me than Straighterline. Though I completed a total of six courses with SL, including their C++ course. Most of them took me two weeks or so, on average, to complete. C++ only took part of a weekend, but mainly because I had prior experience as a C++ programmer going in.

If you like studying out of a textbook like a traditional college course, then SL is a great option, but I found that I prefer the way SDC provides instruction. Much less material and more straightforward in presentation. That is, with the notable exception of the C vs. C++ course... I felt that Straighterline's C++ course was superior to the C Programming course from SDC. Mostly due to the way the course material was presented and the type and number of assignments. In my opinion, the C course gets way too esoteric for no good reason and doesn't provide enough opportunities to use and reinforce the lessons via assignments. So you may struggle to complete the final assignment if you don't take the time to practice on your own.

Many others have given good suggestions for alternate options. I don't know if the OnlineDegree.com course will come in as Python programming or as "Introduction to Programming", but if it does come in as Python programming, that is probably the cheapest option for the computer languages option.

[armstrongsubero]

I agree with Merlin, I'm waiting to take the final exam for the SL C++ course now and its better than the C programming from SDC.

SDC contacted me via email asking for suggestions, so this may change, and they said they will add the changes I suggested.

Python is easier than C or C++ for a beginner. I looked at the SDC Java course, it seems very nice, so thats another option if you dont like Python.

[jsd]

if you dont like Python.

Whaaaaat

[camjenks]

I'm trying to finish up TESU BSBA CIS by the end of December. The courses I have left are the Oral Communication requirement, Business Communication, Statistics, and Programming Language (and ethics if they don't accept my 2 credits from The Institutes AICP-0121).

Is there a particular reason why you think they might not accept the Institutes ethics course? I know they accepted it on my transcript and used it to fulfill my Ethics GenEd requirement. That was only last month. Yes, its only 2 credits, but you can easily make that up in GenEd electives. The cornerstone course fills in that gap nicely.

I had planned to do these all through Straighterline, and it comes out to about $420.00. Up until now, I've done almost everything through CLEP (free through modern states) and Study.com (free with the guardian scholarship). I just wanted to get some feedback on these courses and what other options are out there. I'm keeping a close eye on the programming from onlinedegree.com, but I'm not sure yet. I'm also a little apprehensive because I'm not sure how the straighterline courses are, and I'm hoping i can get through a course every 2 weeks.

Any suggestions for other courses that may be faster/cheaper?
[...]

Except for the statistics course, which I took via ALEKS, I took all the rest of those courses via Study.com. I found SDC to be faster (and therefore cheaper) for me than Straighterline. Though I completed a total of six courses with SL, including their C++ course. Most of them took me two weeks or so, on average, to complete. C++ only took part of a weekend, but mainly because I had prior experience as a C++ programmer going in.

If you like studying out of a textbook like a traditional college course, then SL is a great option, but I found that I prefer the way SDC provides instruction. Much less material and more straightforward in presentation. That is, with the notable exception of the C vs. C++ course... I felt that Straighterline's C++ course was superior to the C Programming course from SDC. Mostly due to the way the course material was presented and the type and number of assignments. In my opinion, the C course gets way too esoteric for no good reason and doesn't provide enough opportunities to use and reinforce the lessons via assignments. So you may struggle to complete the final assignment if you don't take the time to practice on your own.

Many others have given good suggestions for alternate options. I don't know if the OnlineDegree.com course will come in as Python programming or as "Introduction to Programming", but if it does come in as Python programming, that is probably the cheapest option for the computer languages option.

Which Statistics course did you take through ALEKS (I'm seeing Introduction to Statistics, Business Statistics, and Statistics for Behavioral Science)? I'm trying to figure out how to do that and it looks like it's just a $20/month subscription, so that would be a lot cheaper than SL.

Also, for anyone following this, I just got a response from TESU registrar and they approved onlinedegree.com's programming course as COS-111 for the programming language requirement (for me). I'll definitely be doing that instead of SL's C++ course because python is better for me than C++ and onlinedegree.com is much cheaper. I was holding out for a python course and it looks like onlinedegree.com came through.

That leaves me with just the 2 communication courses (oral and business). Maybe I can do them through study.com (cheaper than SL for just 2 courses) or Davar or something. I've heard the DSST public speaking has a low pass rate.

[davewill]

Also, for anyone following this, I just got a response from TESU registrar and they approved onlinedegree.com's programming course as COS-111 for the programming language requirement (for me). I'll definitely be doing that instead of SL's C++ course because python is better for me than C++ and onlinedegree.com is much cheaper. I was holding out for a python course and it looks like onlinedegree.com came through.

That leaves me with just the 2 communication courses (oral and business). Maybe I can do them through study.com (cheaper than SL for just 2 courses) or Davar or something. I've heard the DSST public speaking has a low pass rate.

If the OD programming course (Python?) came in as COS-111, then it would fulfill the specific Introduction to Programming course requirement, which would be awesome. Most of the other ones have just counted as a CS elective. Where in your academic eval did they put it exactly?