My Pierpont BOG AAS degree plan + credit banking possibilities

[Robson]

As Pierpont announces the end to their nearly-free BOG AAS program, I've decided to initiate graduation, which I'd been holding off initially (for student email discounts).

(Note: As I started writing this post, I saw that some of my transfer credits have disappeared from the ROAR dashboard! Has anyone else had this issue? I've emailed the transfer teams, as well as the apparent new head of the BOG AAS program, David Beighley.)

BOG AAS PLAN
Non-ACE credits
- Chemistry LL 8
- Mathematics LL 8
- English LL 8
- Physics LL 4 
Total: 28 LL credits

ACE credits
(Sophia)
- College algebra 3 LL
- Business law 3 LL
- Ancient Greek philosophers 3 LL
- Statistics 3 LL
- Developing effective teams 1 LL
- Essentials of managing conflict 1 LL
- Nutrition 3 LL
- Principles of Finance 3 LL
- Visual communications 3 LL
- Business communications 3 LL
- Sociology 3 LL 
- Health, fitness, and wellness 3 LL
Total: 32 LL credits

(Coursera)
- Google IT support 15 LL
- Google Project Management 3 LL 6 UL
- Real World Cloud Product Management 6 UL
Total: 30 credits - 18 LL + 12 UL

Total: 90 credits - 78 LL + 12 UL

(This is assuming my credits get fixed! Hopefully I'll be able to apply for the IT AOS in time.)

As the deadline to apply for graduation is October 4th, I'm also wondering if I can add in some more classes to the transcript, as a credit bank. Does Pierpont allow for post-admissions transfers?


Some fun credit banking ideas:
For a Washington State CPA (24 accounting credits including up to 9 LL; 24 business admin credits of any level)
(Accounting)
* Sophia
1. Financial accounting 3 LL
2. Managerial accounting 3 LL

(Business Admin)
* Sophia 
1. Business law (3 LL; included above)
2. Intro finance (3 LL; included above)
3. Business communications (3 LL; included above)
4. Intro business 3 LL
5. Business ethics 3 LL
6. Management principles 3 LL
* Coursera
7. Google project management (3 - 9 credits; included above)
8. Meta Facebook Marketing 3 LL 

Total: 6/9 accounting LL credits; 24/24 business admin credits.
Additional credits: 12 - 18


For completing med school prerequisites
Behavioral sciences
- Sophia Intro Psych (3 LL)
- Sophia Lifespan Development (3 LL)

Min. 1 year biology with lab, with cellular and molecular biology
- Sophia Human Biology with Lab (4 LL)
- Sophia Microbiology with Lab (4 LL)
- Sophia Anatomy and Physiology with Lab I & II (8 LL)
- Saylor Intro molecular and cellular biology (3 LL)

Min. 2 years chemistry with lab, including inorganic, organic, and biochemistry
- Sophia chemistry with lab (4 LL)
- No ochem, biochem options

Min. 1 year physics, preferably calculus-based with lab (min 6 LL)
- Saylor Mechanics (3 LL)
- Saylor Electromagnetism (3 LL)
- No lab or calculus-based options

Min. 1 year mathematics, including calculus and statistics (preferably biostatistics)
- Sophia Statistics (3 LL; included above)
- Sophia Calculus (3 LL)

Min. 1 year writing, preferably with second language
- Business communications (3 LL; included above)
- Visual communications (3 LL; included above)
- Sophia Spanish I & II (6 LL)

Total: All, except 12 credits of ochem w lab, biochem w lab
Additional credits: 44


For entry into GATech OMS CS/Analytics/CyberSec
(Computer Science): Coursera
- SAS Programmer (4 LL Intro Programming)
- SAS Adv Programmer (3 UL SWE)
- Sophia Intro Java (3 LL programming languages)

IBM
- IBM Full Stack (18 credits of CS electives), including:
* 3 LL Cloud Computing
* 3 LL Web Dev
* 3 LL Server Dev
* 3 UL Cloud Apps
* 3 UL Python for Data Science
* 3 UL SQL Applications

- IBM Data Science (31 credits), including: 
* 1 LL Intro stats
* 1 LL Intro programming
* 2 LL Intro database and SQL
* 3 LL Intro SQL programming
* 3 LL Intro data science
* 3 LL Data sciences
* 3 LL Data analytics
* 3 LL Data visualisation
* 3 LL Intro Python programming
* 3 LL Python for data science
* 3 LL Data mining
* 3 UL Advanced topics in data science


(Analytics): Coursera
- Google Data (12 LL)
- Google Advanced Data (9 LL)
- Google BI (6 LL)
- MS Power BI (5 LL)

IBM
- IBM Data Analytics with Excel and R (9 courses; 24 credits), including:

* Intro data analytics (3 LL; repeated course x 2) 
* Intro database and SQL (3 LL)
* R programming fundamentals (3 LL)
* Advanced in data analytics (3 UL; repeated course x 2)
* Data visualisation (3 UL)
* Intermediate data visualisation (3 UL)

- IBM Data Analyst (3 courses if done with above two IBM certificates; 20 credits), including:
* Intro data analytics (3 LL; repeated course from above)
* Intro SQL programming (3 LL; repeated x 2, course from above - note that the repeated courses are 3 and 2 credits individually)
* Intro Python programming (3 LL; repeated x 2, course from above)
* Intro Statistics in Python (2 LL)
* Advanced topics in data analytics (3 UL)


(Cybersecurity): Coursera
- Google Cloud Data Analytics (4 LL CS electives; 6 UL Cloud electives)
- Google Cybersecurity (9 LL)
- Google Cloud Cybersecurity (6 LL, 3 UL)
- IBM Cybersecurity (8 LL, 2 UL)
- Microsoft Cybersecurity (9 UL)

Additional credits: 152


For meeting other grad school program prerequisites
MA Economics - Sophia Micro and Macro (6 LL)
MA History - Sophia US History I & II (6 LL)
MDiv - Sophia Religion (3 LL)

Additional credits: 15

Total additional possible credits from Sophia, Saylor, and Coursera: 229

[jg_nuy]

The short answer is yes but it can be a struggle to get the credits added with the proper designation and it may affect the October 4 date if something is submitted close to that date.

[bjcheung77]

Just apply and graduate, don't bother with the credit banking... I would do that at UMPI or the next institution for your Bachelors instead.

[allvia]

I agree with bjcheung77, apply and graduate. Any discount you're getting because you have a student edu email isn't worth missing out graduating because you thought you had it (the timing) all figured out. Plus schools don't usually shut a student's email down for at least another term (in some cases far longer).

[Robson]

Just apply and graduate, don't bother with the credit banking... I would do that at UMPI or the next institution for your Bachelors instead.

I plan on doing so! But it seems like lots of people are having difficulty with getting a response from Pierpont. I might bypass an AAS altogether and just go for a UMPI BA. We'll see...

[wow]

As a heads up, Sophia science courses will almost certainly not be accepted as prerequisites for medical school. I took Human Biology and it is in no way comparable to a semester of first or second semester bio. It's more akin to a basic Anatomy and Physiology course geared toward healthcare paraprofessionals or people who are just looking to fulfill a science requirement for their degree but are not interested in pursuing it further than that.

Certain courses on Sofia meet the needs of certain health care paraprofessionals and may even be accepted by some nursing programs, but not med school.

[Robson]

As a heads up, Sophia science courses will almost certainly not be accepted as prerequisites for medical school. I took Human Biology and it is in no way comparable to a semester of first or second semester bio. It's more akin to a basic Anatomy and Physiology course geared toward healthcare paraprofessionals or people who are just looking to fulfill a science requirement for their degree but are not interested in pursuing it further than that.

Certain courses on Sofia meet the needs of certain health care paraprofessionals and may even be accepted by some nursing programs, but not med school.

Maybe Caribbean medical schools!   

Side-tangent: but I just discovered the edX-TESU partnership that transcribes free credits for EdX MicroBachelors courses in an Individual Learning Account (assuming you pay for the courses, of course). Unfortunately in their transcript they won't also cover other sources besides the MicroBachelors, but I've read on here that enrolling in a TECEP allows for credit banking just as well. Considering the fact that Pierpont isn't responding to many emails, I might consider the TECEP route for credit banking, just to have all my alt credits listed in one place.

Some interesting credits include (couldn't find specific course names for most of them):
- Harvard University University Chemistry - 6 UL chemistry credits
- Harvard University Intro Neuroscience - 3 UL biology credits
- IBM Full Stack App Dev - 3 LL Associate Capstone - for associate's degree students
- NYU CS Fundamentals - 3 LL CS credits
- NYU Cybersecurity Fundamentals - 6 LL Intro Cybersecurity and Defensive Security
- NYU Programming and Data Structures - 6 LL C++ Programming and Data Structures
- SNHU Business Analytics Foundations - 6 LL Intro Programming and Principles Statistics (second-year course)
- LSE Statistics Fundamentals - 3 LL Principles Statistics (second-year course), 3 UL statistics credits
- LSE Math and Statistics Fundamentals - 6 LL Calculus I and II, 3 LL Principles Statistics (second-year course)

I've bolded some of the courses that I've found to be pretty hard to find to get done via alt credits. Notably, this would patch up a number of gaps I had in my (theoretical) UMPI cybersecurity transfer program, especially for a second-year LL Intro Stats course, a potential 3 LL Intro to CS course, a data structures course, and Calculus I and II to fit UMPI's 4-credit calc course. 

Not sure how the Verizon and financial aid systems at EdX are running now, but I also know that some schools and companies offer free EdX...

[wow]

They are pretty interesting credits. Not to doubt the wisdom of tesu or anything, but I'm actually a little bewildered by the transcription of the Harvard chemistry micro bachelor's as upper level chemistry rather than introductory or general chemistry. When I looked over the description of the Harvard chemistry course, it looked like it covers similar topics to what is covered in general chemistry. I guess tesu didn't want to put it as general chemistry since there are no labs, but I still don't understand why they are giving it upper level status. Of course, I haven't taken the class, so maybe there's something I'm missing in the course description that becomes evident in the course itself.

In any case, and wandering away from the topic of credit banking so feel free to ignore me, I find it extremely weird that tesu will transcribe these classes but not let you use them for credit toward a tesu degree unless it's in computer science. So, for example, you can't use the biology or chemistry courses toward a biology or liberal studies natural sciences degree at TESU. Since I am apparently now enrolled in tesu, I plan to ask my advisor if they really truly will not accept those microbachelor's credits for anything other than computer science, but I'm not hopeful.

The Verizon offer is still going but it doesn't cover any of the microbachelor's courses that I looked at, or even any ACE credit recommendation courses for that matter.

Curious, though, what would your purpose be in credit banking? A credit bank transcript can't be used to apply to US schools of higher education. They would want to see the original transcripts. (For the micro bachelor's, the tesu transcript is the original transcript, but not for any of the other credits you mentioned.)

[homeschoolmom1]

I think you might be mistaken that TESU does not accept these for a degree other than CS.

That is only the case for the EDX Microbachelor of Information Literacy. That one can only be used in the CS degree, but not in any other one.

I bet that, let's say you take one of the statistics fundamentals microbachelors from LSE through edx, it will fulfill the statistics requirement for a Business degree.

[wow]

I think you might be mistaken that TESU does not accept these for a degree other than CS.

That is only the case for the EDX Microbachelor of Information Literacy. That one can only be used in the CS degree, but not in any other one.

I bet that, let's say you take one of the statistics fundamentals microbachelors from LSE through edx, it will fulfill the statistics requirement for a Business degree.

The microbachelor's page on the tesu website says that they will only accept micro bachelor's credits toward the computer science degree. I don't see any reason to doubt what tesu says unless somebody on this forum has successfully used microbachelors credits toward another degree since tesu announced that policy. I believe that policy was announced last year or maybe in 2022.