Help planning my degree

[booklovingirl]

Hi Everyone, 

So glad to find this site. Hope you're able to help me too. 

I want to finally get my degree. I've been working in finance/accounting for almost 30 years. Started doing bookkeeping right out of high school (graduated at 16), I have been the financial manager for a non-profit in Los Angeles for the last 15 years, managing funds, grants, audits, etc.  I do non profit tax returns as well. But I never got a degree -- in fact I have no formal credits even towards it. 

The thing that's most important to me is speed. I'd like to get a degree as fast as possible -- but a relevant one, i.e. accounting or business, not just general studies. 

Below is my basic data, I would appreciate any advice on this. 

Thanks in advance!

Your Location: California, United States. 
Your Age: 46.
What kind of degree do you want?: Business/accounting/finance.
Current Regional Accredited Credits: None

Any certifications or military experience? I am mid a Google Data Analysis certification on Coursera but not done yet. 
I could probably take and pass the Microsoft Excel Expert exam but haven't done that yet.

[rachel83az]

Questions:

Does budget matter? Do you prefer papers or exams?

UMPI is fast and cheap. But you need to write quite a few papers for your classes. UMPI has a BABA in Accounting (and others).

TESU costs more and may take slightly longer (still less than a year). But you can take exams for most of the classes. TESU has BSBA in Accounting or Finance (among others).

[booklovingirl]

Questions:

Does budget matter? Do you prefer papers or exams?

UMPI is fast and cheap. But you need to write quite a few papers for your classes. UMPI has a BABA in Accounting (and others).

TESU costs more and may take slightly longer (still less than a year). But you can take exams for most of the classes. TESU has BSBA in Accounting or Finance (among others).

Hi! Thanks for asking. Budget does matter. But I think I would prefer exams as much as possible. I hadn't heard about UMPI before. Does UMPI take credits from Sophia, etc? Do they require a capstone/cornerstone like TESU?

[ss20ts]

Hi! Thanks for asking. Budget does matter. But I think I would prefer exams as much as possible.  I hadn't heard about UMPI before. Does UMPI take credits from Sophia, etc? Do they require a capstone/cornerstone like TESU?

UMPI accepts courses from Sophia, Study.com, and InstantCert. Those are the most commonly used. None of the business degrees at UMPI have a Capstone or Cornerstone course. You are required to complete a minimum of 30 credits at UMPI along with the majority of your UL courses. Most courses do have a fair amount of writing. It's a competency based education (CBE) program which typically utilizes papers/projects over exams. UMPI has a BA in Accounting, BA in Business Administration with a number of concentrations available and a BLS with several minors available.  

https://online.umpi.edu/

[rachel83az]

Hi! Thanks for asking. Budget does matter. But I think I would prefer exams as much as possible.  I hadn't heard about UMPI before. Does UMPI take credits from Sophia, etc? Do they require a capstone/cornerstone like TESU?

If you would prefer exams as much as possible, you can get a BSBA from TESU for about $6500-$8000 (depending on how you choose to do things). UMPI costs $1400 per term (a term is two months). After transferring in courses from SDC/Sophia/InstantCert, it seems to take most students on this forum two or three terms to get a degree. Occasionally, 4 terms. Total cost: around $3300-$5000 (depending on how long everything takes you).

[booklovingirl]

This is very helpful. Is there a way to figure out which courses I should take from Sophia vs SDC vs Instant Cert for TESU?
And similarly for UMPI? In other words, I wouldn't want to spend the time to take an accounting course on Sophia if I have to take the same UMPI course later...

[rachel83az]

For UMPI: https://www.degreeforum.net/mybb/Thread-...-for-3-222 That's for a Management degree, but the Accounting concentration would largely be the same.

For TESU, there's:
https://degreeforum.miraheze.org/wiki/Sa...ts_Roadmap
and
https://degreeforum.miraheze.org/wiki/Sa...egree_Plan
or
https://degreeforum.miraheze.org/wiki/Sa...egree_Plan

For TESU, to meet the 30 RA credit requirement, you could also use XAMK credits: https://degreeforum.miraheze.org/wiki/XAMK You can see current class offerings here: https://www.xamk.fi/en/openstudies/ TESU's BSBA has 15 credits of electives where you could put XAMK courses. If you combine this with an easy 16-credit term to avoid the residency waiver, this would get you to the necessary 30 RA credits needed for a TESU degree.

For you, I would probably suggest: 
Capstone
Cornerstone
PLA-100
CIS-107 ePack (requires very little study)
ACC-102 ePack
MAN-210 ePack

The ePack courses are exams that cost as much as regular classes and that count toward residency. CIS-107, ACC-102, and MAN-210 are all required courses for a BSBA at TESU. If you're familiar with accounting already, ACC-102 will probably be a piece of cake. You can use Study.com to study it while you have a subscription there. I am not completely sure about MAN-210, but it is a LL class and should also be a relatively easy exam. PLA-100 is a 1-credit course that takes 5-10 hours to complete. The cornerstone can be mostly completed in the first week. This leave you to concentrate on just the capstone.

[bjcheung77]

Since you're just starting off, I would recommend taking 30, 45 or more credits with Sophia.org while you're coming up with the decision of degree/school of your choice. 
You should: Invest in a second monitor and work on courses that transfer into both TESU/UMPI. 
- Review this link: https://degreeforum.miraheze.org/wiki/So...lency_List 
- Take a look at this thread to see what courses you want to take: https://www.degreeforum.net/mybb/Thread-...-for-3-222

[booklovingirl]

This is awesome! I'm going to go through all the links, thank you so much.

bjcheung77 -- why do you say two monitors? I've seen you recommend this to others as well. I use two monitors routinely at work but I am not clear on what exactly you are recommending in terms of studying? Watching two videos at once on different platforms?

[rachel83az]

Sophia is open-book. So you can have the PDF open on one monitor while you take the Milestones (exams) on the other monitor.