Picking the "best" school or degree - Which degree is RIGHT for you?

[rachel83az]

There are so many choices these days! Choosing the right school to attend cheaply is no longer a matter of throwing darts at a dartboard. This can make it confusing, especially because everyone has different priorities.

To help students choose which degree to pursue at what school, I've created the following page on the wiki: https://degreeforum.miraheze.org/wiki/Ch...University 

Let me know if there are any missing factors that should be taken into consideration.

[origamishuttle]

Great idea, really well done! Thank you!

[LevelUP]

You sort of read my mind as I was going to do a similar thread titled something like "What Type of Schools Should We Recommend on DF?"

Which Schools Are the Best to Recommend?

Should we look at cost, ease, speed, schools that accept most transfer credits such as 90 credits, schools that we can easily map transfer credits or any schools which are the most popular for DF members?

Community/4yr in State Colleges

What was discussed on previous forums is that some might want to attend schools close to them, such as in New York CUNY School of Professional Studies, which accepts 106 max credits, or in Missouri Columbia College, which accepts 90 max credits of transfer or 60 ACE type credits.

There is no easy way to map these credits, so people are on their own to find out if the school will help them see which credits will transfer into which course. 

This tool is helpful to find all the 1500+ schools that accept study.com ACE credits.
Study.com partner

Here is a list of almost all the colleges in the U.S.
List of colleges by state

Few Other Notes

I love the cost comparison and table overall.

Getting all the alt credits adds around $500-$1000 to the cost depending on the school and degree.

[rachel83az]

IMO, at least for this forum, schools should be willing to accept at least 90 ACE credits, preferably not all from one source (like CUNY does). If they don't, they need to have a really amazing degree on offer. Maybe it's astonishingly cheap to complete one of their degrees, or their degrees cannot be found anywhere else.

For Columbia College in Missouri, minimum tuition for 30 credits with them is already $11,000. That's quite a lot, compared to the standard degrees here, but someone looking for a degree in Forensic Science might be willing to pay that.

[LevelUP]

You're right 90 credits of transfer is a good standard.

CUNY is a good deal if you live in New York to receive the discount and if you can map out enough transfer credits from alt providers.

Columbia College is probably best for someone that wants to attend in-person classes or live in the state.

There are a lot of niche schools, so people will have to decide if they want to pay extra and plan out those degrees themselves.

Keeping track of the currently recommended schools, various degrees, and changing rules is already enough of a challenge!

[MrPanda]

Maybe, there could be a mention of which universities are not open to foreigners.

[rachel83az]

Maybe, there could be a mention of which universities are not open to foreigners.

Good point. I think the only one on that page that doesn't accept foreigners is WGU, but I'll have to double-check tomorrow.

[LevelUP]

Might want to add RA credit cost.

If you started from scratch, then that would add $1800 for RA credit bringing the total for COSC to $5079.

TESU would be $8204 or $5937 with flat-rate tuition.

This is why we tend to recommend UMPI for people starting from scratch.

[MrPanda]

Maybe, there could be a mention of which universities are not open to foreigners.

Good point. I think the only one on that page that doesn't accept foreigners is WGU, but I'll have to double-check tomorrow.

And some other useful information: "Toefl required?". SNHU accepts Duolingo for example.

[dfrecore]

I'd give some additional info in the Intro about why we recommend these 5 schools the most. Something like:

There are 5 main schools that are usually recommended on the forum:
- The Big 3 (Charter Oak State College, Excelsior College, and Thomas Edison State University) all allow 113/114 credits to be brought into the school, leaving just 6/7 credits to take at the school.
- Competency-based programs at Western Governors University (WGU) and University of Maine at Presque Isle (UMPI's YourPace program) allow 90cr to be brought in, leaving 30cr to take at the school in a pay-for-time-not-for-courses method.

Less frequently mentioned colleges or universities include: Southern New Hampshire University (SNHU), Peirce College, and Purdue University Global's ExcelTrack competency-based program - all of which allow 90cr of transfer.

All of these schools will take ACE credit, which is the key to making them less expensive than average.