Psych Degree Help: Excelsior? TESU? Something Else?

[MaMichelle]

Looking to complete a psychology degree that will allow me to go on for a master's degree in psychology and eventually work as a counselor or therapist. I know that in many cases a BS or BA in liberal arts will work just as well to get me into a master's program, so I'd be open to that if it's faster. I really like the study.com and Sophia formats. Coopersmith also looks pretty good, I think. I'm really bad at testing so I don't want to do any coursework that way. I'm paying my own way, so looking for the least expensive path to a degree that doesn't involve testing out of things. Please help!!!

Your Location: Utah, USA
Your Age: 42
What kind of degree do you want?: BS or BA Psychology
Current Regional Accredited Credits: 50

Utah Valley University Total Credits:  38
Colorado Christian University Total Credits: 12


UVU, SOC 101 INTRO TO SOC, 3, A-
UVU, HLTH 110 PERS HLTH & WELLNESS, 2, B
UVU, MUS 151R INDV INST VOICE SEM 1, 1, A
UVU, MUS 151R INDV INST VOICE SEM 2, 1, B-
UVU, MUSC 1050 BEG PIANO 1, 2, A-
UVU, PES 1100 TENNIS 1, 1, A
UVU, PES 1085 WEIGHT TRNG 1, 1, A-
UVU, PE-D 1500 COUNTRY WSTRN DANCE 1, 1, A
UVU, PE-D 1510 COUNTRY WSTRN DANCE 2, 1, A
UVU, DANC 1720 LATIN BALLROOM DANCE 1, 1, A
UVU, FAMS 1150 MARRIAGE RELATIONSHIP SKILLS, 3, A
UVU, SW 101 INTRO TO SOCIAL WORK, 3, A
UVU, MGMT 1250 PRIN OF LDRSHP, 3, A-
UVU, NUTR 1020 FOUND OF HUMAN NUTRITION, 3, B+
UVU, CLSS 1000 UNIV STUDENT SUCCESS, 3, B
UVU, PSY 2400 POSITIVE PSYCHOLOGY, 3, B-
UVU, PSY 1010 GENERAL PSYCHOLOGY, 2, A-

CCU, MAT-113 MATH CONCEPTS, 3, B-
CCU, INT-211A ADULT STUDIES SEMINAR 1, 3, A
CCU, INT-212A ADULT STUDIES SEMINAR 2, 3, A
CCU, PSY-202A RELATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY, 3, A-

Current ACE, CLEP, or NCCRS Credits: None

Any certifications or military experience? Licensed Massage Therapist (Graduate Myotherapy College Utah approx 800 hours), Master Aaesthetician (Graduate Mandalyn Academy Utah approx 1200 hours), Paul Mitchell Cosmetometology (approx 1600 hours)

[rachel83az]

If you don't want to test out of things, that pretty much leaves out TESU or Excelsior. Both of those rely heavily on Coopersmith. You said Coopersmith looks "okay", but it's pretty much all testing and the worst (IMO) testing because they use ProctorU. Study.com uses RPNow and it's a completely different/easier experience.

If you would be okay with Coopersmith, I am still not sure if the Excelsior Psych degree can be obtained now without taking Excelsior classes. They've gotten rid of UExcels and I think at least one of those was critical to the Excelsior Psych degree. Excelsior requires 30 UL credits, 6 of these can come from the required capstone/cornerstone classes.

For TESU, you can see a plan here: https://degreeforum.miraheze.org/wiki/Sa...egree_Plan I think you might need a couple of Coopersmith courses, but most can be done with Sophia and Study.com. TESU requires 18 UL credits, 3 of these can come from the required capstone class.

If you would prefer to do writing instead of testing, UMPI doesn't have a Psych program, but they have a bunch of degrees that are nothing but writing. https://online.umpi.edu/degrees/undergraduate/ Depending on what kind of counselor or therapist that you hope to be, perhaps you would be interested in the BA Criminal Justice? Or you could go with a Bachelor of Liberal Studies and just take whatever interested you at UMPI. Different UMPI degrees require a different amount of UL credits. You must take most UL credits at UMPI.

With Excelsior, you can (theoretically) transfer in up to 113 credits. But I'm not 100% sure that works now that UExcel exams are gone.
With TESU, you can transfer in up to 114 credits. But it's actually cheapest if you take 16 credits in a single term with them (we have suggestions to make that easier) to finish off your degree.
With UMPI, you can transfer in up to 90 credits and you must do at least 30 credits with them. Most students are able to finish in 2-3 sessions ($1400 per session).

Let us know which one interests you the most and we can help you to come up with a degree plan.

[MaMichelle]

If you don't want to test out of things, that pretty much leaves out TESU or Excelsior. Both of those rely heavily on Coopersmith. You said Coopersmith looks "okay", but it's pretty much all testing and the worst (IMO) testing because they use ProctorU. Study.com uses RPNow and it's a completely different/easier experience.

If you would be okay with Coopersmith, I am still not sure if the Excelsior Psych degree can be obtained now without taking Excelsior classes. They've gotten rid of UExcels and I think at least one of those was critical to the Excelsior Psych degree. Excelsior requires 30 UL credits, 6 of these can come from the required capstone/cornerstone classes.

For TESU, you can see a plan here: https://degreeforum.miraheze.org/wiki/Sa...egree_Plan I think you might need a couple of Coopersmith courses, but most can be done with Sophia and Study.com. TESU requires 18 UL credits, 3 of these can come from the required capstone class.

If you would prefer to do writing instead of testing, UMPI doesn't have a Psych program, but they have a bunch of degrees that are nothing but writing. https://online.umpi.edu/degrees/undergraduate/ Depending on what kind of counselor or therapist that you hope to be, perhaps you would be interested in the BA Criminal Justice? Or you could go with a Bachelor of Liberal Studies and just take whatever interested you at UMPI. Different UMPI degrees require a different amount of UL credits. You must take most UL credits at UMPI.

With Excelsior, you can (theoretically) transfer in up to 113 credits. But I'm not 100% sure that works now that UExcel exams are gone.
With TESU, you can transfer in up to 114 credits. But it's actually cheapest if you take 16 credits in a single term with them (we have suggestions to make that easier) to finish off your degree.
With UMPI, you can transfer in up to 90 credits and you must do at least 30 credits with them. Most students are able to finish in 2-3 sessions ($1400 per session).

Let us know which one interests you the most and we can help you to come up with a degree plan.

Thank you so much for your help!!

It sounds like the Bachelor of Liberal Studies at UMPI would be my least expensive option if I can use study.com/sophia/saylor to max out my transfer credits--does that seem right? It looks like lots of psychology and general ed classes on study.com would count from this list here: https://study.com/college/school/umpi.html, right? Maybe we could figure out a degree plan for that?

I feel very nervous about trying to get five classes done per session with UMPI, but doing 3 or 4 per session might be okay depending on how hard they are. I guess even if I had to take 4 sessions of 2 or 3 classes each that would still be pretty reasonable compared with CCU or UVU.

I'm feeling very overwhelmed trying to figure this out, but I really can't afford to do it the traditional way.

---

If you don't want to test out of things, that pretty much leaves out TESU or Excelsior. Both of those rely heavily on Coopersmith. You said Coopersmith looks "okay", but it's pretty much all testing and the worst (IMO) testing because they use ProctorU. Study.com uses RPNow and it's a completely different/easier experience.

If you would be okay with Coopersmith, I am still not sure if the Excelsior Psych degree can be obtained now without taking Excelsior classes. They've gotten rid of UExcels and I think at least one of those was critical to the Excelsior Psych degree. Excelsior requires 30 UL credits, 6 of these can come from the required capstone/cornerstone classes.

For TESU, you can see a plan here: https://degreeforum.miraheze.org/wiki/Sa...egree_Plan I think you might need a couple of Coopersmith courses, but most can be done with Sophia and Study.com. TESU requires 18 UL credits, 3 of these can come from the required capstone class.

If you would prefer to do writing instead of testing, UMPI doesn't have a Psych program, but they have a bunch of degrees that are nothing but writing. https://online.umpi.edu/degrees/undergraduate/ Depending on what kind of counselor or therapist that you hope to be, perhaps you would be interested in the BA Criminal Justice? Or you could go with a Bachelor of Liberal Studies and just take whatever interested you at UMPI. Different UMPI degrees require a different amount of UL credits. You must take most UL credits at UMPI.

With Excelsior, you can (theoretically) transfer in up to 113 credits. But I'm not 100% sure that works now that UExcel exams are gone.
With TESU, you can transfer in up to 114 credits. But it's actually cheapest if you take 16 credits in a single term with them (we have suggestions to make that easier) to finish off your degree.
With UMPI, you can transfer in up to 90 credits and you must do at least 30 credits with them. Most students are able to finish in 2-3 sessions ($1400 per session).

Let us know which one interests you the most and we can help you to come up with a degree plan.

Does UMPI take Saylor credits? It doesn't get any cheaper than that! Anything I can do for free would be great!

[rachel83az]

With UMPI, each course is finished with 1 paper or 1 project. That's how people are able to progress through them so quickly.

UMPI does take Saylor credits, but they can be difficult to obtain. It's not uncommon for people to take Saylor exams multiple times and still not pass, in which case it's wasted money. And, if you can work quickly, Sophia can actually be cheaper than Saylor. Sophia allows you to take unlimited courses while you're a subscriber. Your only limits are how fast you can go (most courses can be completed in just a day or two) and you're only supposed to have 2 classes open at a time. Also, grading times. But the grading time issue can be alleviated by taking 1 course with Touchstones (assignments) and 1 course without Touchstones. It's good practice for UMPI.

Saylor, on the other hand, generally requires students to study for at least a few weeks for each exam. This will definitely slow down your progress. I would say give a Saylor course a try before you decide to base your alt credits on them.

Another reason for Sophia is that we know with relative certainty how almost every single Sophia course transfers to UMPI. We also know which, if any, GEC (gen ed) requirements the Sophia courses fill: https://degreeforum.miraheze.org/wiki/UM...quivalents Not as many Saylor courses have been transferred in (for reasons outlined above), so we can't be as sure of where they'll work in a given degree, if they'll work at all. Plus, you will need 3 credits of a foreign language. Sophia is currently the cheapest/easiest way to do that, unless you're fluent (in which case, an ACTFL exam is better).

You've already found the Study.com transfer page for UMPI. From Study.com, you will need a science with a lab. Biology 101L is generally the easiest for this. Your Study.com membership will allow you to take 2 exams in a month, so you can take one other SDC class for the same price.

I think you've got your LL electives pretty well covered for UMPI. You've also got some GEC requirements filled. Make a spreadsheet listing the GEC requirements and fill them in with courses you've already completed. I'm not sure if Math Concepts will work for the BLS, but it might. I would strongly suggest taking Sophia's Algebra (super easy) just in case.

For the BLS:
SOC 101 INTRO TO SOC - GEC requirements 2B & 5A
HLTH 110 PERS HLTH & WELLNESS - Elective, I think?
MUS 151R INDV INST VOICE SEM - Elective
MUS 151R INDV INST VOICE SEM - Elective
MUSC 1050 BEG PIANO  - 2E? or elective
PES 1100 TENNIS - Elective
PES 1085 WEIGHT TRNG - Elective
PE-D 1500 COUNTRY WSTRN DANCE - 2E or elective
PE-D 1510 COUNTRY WSTRN DANCE - elective
DANC 1720 LATIN BALLROOM DANCE - 2E or elective
FAMS 1150 MARRIAGE RELATIONSHIP SKILLS - Possibly 5A
SW 101 INTRO TO SOCIAL WORK - Elective
MGMT 1250 PRIN OF LDRSHP - Elective
NUTR 1020 FOUND OF HUMAN NUTRITION - 3C
CLSS 1000 UNIV STUDENT SUCCESS - Elective
PSY 2400 POSITIVE PSYCHOLOGY - Elective
PSY 1010 GENERAL PSYCHOLOGY - 2A, 2B

MAT-113 MATH CONCEPTS - Maybe 3A & 3B, otherwise elective.
INT-211A ADULT STUDIES SEMINAR - Elective
INT-212A ADULT STUDIES SEMINAR - Elective
PSY-202A RELATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY - Elective

Which minor would you choose? You have to pick one. If you did Management, I think that your leadership & management classes would work as minor electives and not just generic electives.

[dfrecore]

I might give EU's BSL degree another look: they accept NA credit, which you have (Mandalyn Academy and Paul Mitchell are both NA). You could get all of your Free Electives done, plus you have most of your GE's done already. It's just an easier degree to get. You could do UL courses in Psych from Study.com (they have 12cr of UL including Org Behavior); an UL Ethics course; English Comp I & II; any NatSci or Math; and 2 add'l UL Arts & Sciences; and then 2 UL in business.

I'm guessing it would be faster to get than UMPI, and I'm a fan of UMPI - it's just that if you can't have a Psych degree anyway, then you go with the fastest BLS degree out there. EU might allow you to finish in less time, and similar amount of money.

[bjcheung77]

Hey OP, MaMichelle - You really need to know your state requirements to licensing... What specialty or type of counseling or therapist? We have the basic details from you, but we're missing more info that pertains to your current scenario. Each person has different situations where they would or wouldn't want to take just exams or proctoring. My suggestion is to complete the addendum to the template (last post) and give us more, there are so many variables in play, you may want to go for a CBE Bachelors and a CBE Masters right after... https://www.degreeforum.net/mybb/Thread-...Area-works