NEW: Excelsior Students Must Now Complete 15 Credits In-House

[pilot]

I just spoke with an advisor at Excelsior College who informed me that starting March 31st, 2025, all Excelsior students will be required to complete at least 15 credits directly through Excelsior.
Here are the details:
- Mandatory Courses: Complete the Cornerstone, Capstone, and Information Literacy courses (7 credits total).
- Additional Courses /Credits: Complete 3 Additional Courses worth 9 credits.  Since Excelsior doesn't offer 1- or 2-credit courses, this really means completing a total of 16 credits in total.
- Partner Institutions: Partner students from institutions like Sophia receive a discount of $50 per credit hour.
- Cost: With the current rate of $460 per credit hour, (After the 50$ Partner discount) it will cost $7,360 to complete the degree at Excelsior (460 x 16 = 7,360).
Important Note: If accepted before March 31st and you have credits through a partner like Sophia, you will be grandfathered under the 7 credits policy However, ensure you do not state in your application that you are a partner student, or you will be required to complete the 15 credits,
Does anyone else know or have more info. about this change?

[ss20ts]

Ouch! That is spendy.

[bjcheung77]

Everyone on the fence about Excelsior, you should do it now before it's too late! Otherwise, you're most likely going to switch over to TESU if you have plenty of transfer credits, or UMPI for pretty much the same reason. I would keep your ears, eyes, and mind open to other programs offered...

[origamishuttle]

Excelsior is already requiring 15 credits for many/most students due to their alternative credit policy. Unless you basically have enough RA credit to graduate already, EU is no longer a "Big 3" school.

[Ares]

The one thing that makes them appealing they are taking away. Do they not realize they are competing against UMPI? Once UMPI expands its degree options Excelsior is going to be less and less attractive.

Excelsior seems to rely on people not knowing they can transfer in most of their credits and/or giving up fighting to get them approved likely from Military personnel and such.

[bjcheung77]

Actually, it really depends on the end goal and if the person has tuition assistance or reimbursement, having 105 credits for transfer isn't all that bad, as long as you can keep the costs low and have a RA degree (or two), they still allow a very competitive transfer policy (on par with TESU). For those with tuition assistance or reimbursement, you're not really affected.

If you have your classes pat down and resourcefully planned to transfer into the program, just one evaluation would be enough. The extra credits for residency, you can use it for the associates capstone and a second degree capstone (BLSA & BSBA capstones), that would be 9 credits already. Then one more class for your liking, plus the cornerstone and info lit.

[pilot]

Actually, it really depends on the end goal and if the person has tuition assistance or reimbursement, having 105 credits for transfer isn't all that bad, as long as you can keep the costs low and have a RA degree (or two), they still allow a very competitive transfer policy (on par with TESU).  For those with tuition assistance or reimbursement, you're not really affected.

If you have your classes pat down and resourcefully planned to transfer into the program, just one evaluation would be enough.  The extra credits for residency, you can use it for the associates capstone and a second degree capstone (BLSA & BSBA capstones), that would be 9 credits already.  Then one more class for your liking, plus the cornerstone and info lit.

Can you please elaborate on the two degrees at once? Not sure I understood.. but it sounds really interesting!

[bjcheung77]

Basically, use the required classes (15 credit residency) to complete the capstones of the BSBA, BSLA, Associates Capstone, Cornerstone, Info Lit, and one extra class. It's the same thing for TESU, you transfer in all the other credits required for the degree using alternative credits. I've created a few threads a few years ago, documenting how this is done for TESU, with Excelsior, it's using the same methods.

Courses vs Residency Waiver #1: https://www.degreeforum.net/mybb/Thread-...ng-Courses
16 Credits vs Residency Waiver #2: https://www.degreeforum.net/mybb/Thread-...Waiver-Fee
ACTFL/Foreign Credits: https://www.degreeforum.net/mybb/Thread-...r-to-Big-3
Transfer Policy: https://www.degreeforum.net/mybb/Thread-...-Explained

[bjcheung77]

In addition to what was provided above... For those looking at 15 credits residency or more and have tuition assistance or reimbursement, you may want to investigate an Associates that requires an Associates capstone as part of the 15 credits. In fact, I would also look at another Bachelors as well, to max the transfer credit and ROI/Value, you can get a second Associates or Bachelors if you resourcefully plan those 15 credits.

Last but not least, again, for those with assistance or reimbursement, even those on the Pell Grant, you have up to 6 years to use up the grant for undergrad studies. There is the options for Bachelors to Masters and taking the Masters courses for the pricing of undergrad studies, you can do that with TESU as an example, take 4 grad classes each year, once you've max that out, then graduate with the Bachelors with your alternative credit.

What you do is, take the classes required for the Bachelors, use alternative & RA credits towards the degree and finish off the residency requirements at TESU. The graduate classes you take will go under the other classes field and not part of the Bachelors. You can then reuse these credits for another Masters degree elsewhere as transfer credit, the reason is - some schools won't let you use these grad credits that have been applied to a previous degree.

[CM1999]

Important Note: If accepted before March 31st and you have credits through a partner like Sophia, you will be grandfathered under the 7 credits policy However, ensure you do not state in your application that you are a partner student, or you will be required to complete the 15 credits,
Does anyone else know or have more info. about this change?

I just want to make sure I understand.   If we have a bunch of credits with Straighterline we do NOT want to say that we are a partner student if we apply right now in order to be grandfathered in?     
but then we just have to pay the $300 fee for a credit eval later?  ---is that right?   

---I'm curious as to the reasoning behind this but mostly want to be sure that I ONLY want to submit info about RA credits.  ???