On the other forum, Maniac Craniac asked which certifications could quickly lead to a job. Someone brought up the IRS' Enrolled Agent. Certain former IRS employees can apply to become enrolled agents if they worked in that position for at least 5 years, but everyone else needs to pass a 3-part exam that is administered over 2 days. Enrolled agents can represent taxpayers before the IRS just like CPAs and attorneys. EAs are required to complete 72 hours of continuing education courses per 3 years.
Enrolled Agent Information

After doing some further research, I found out about the tax court exam. This allows non-lawyers to represent people in federal courts. This exam has a 5-10% pass rate.
http://www.ustaxcourt.gov/forms/Admissio...torney.pdf

EAs can open up practices or work for someone else preparing taxes during tax season and representing people year-round. An EA sounds inferior to an attorney or CPA, but these professionals are often more knowledgeable about tax law than the other two professions because that's all they focus on. CPAs have a very broad education that covers little about the tax code and a tax attorney could be representing you with little training on tax laws. EAs are also cheaper to hire. This profession has been around since 1884.
Hiring Protection From The IRS - Forbes

Quote:In 2012, the average accountant brought home $71,040 per year, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). CPAs with fewer than three years of experience earned anywhere from $45,413 to $61,600 per year, those with three to five years of experience made $56,963 to $77,550, while CPAs with five or more years of experience earned $69,018 to $92,675, according to the Robert Half Finance agency.

Quote: According to the BLS, tax examiners and revenue agents earned nearly 27 percent less than accountants, at an average of $56,050 per year, as of 2012. Like the CPA designation, earning the enrolled agent status can improve salaries for these tax professionals. In 2013, enrolled agents brought home an average of $75,000 per year, reports the job site Indeed. According to Robert Half, enrolled agents with one to three years of experience earned anywhere from $51,450 to $85,800, depending on the size of the accounting firm. Those at the senior level started at $61,950 at small firms and earned upward of $107,800 at large firms.

Clep3705 has talked a lot about the State of Texas mandating that the core curriculum (general education courses) from one public college be accepted in transfer by another public college. When answering someone's question on another forum about the Alamo Colleges, I found out that the State of Texas has taken it further. The first two years for certain majors are transferable from one public college to another. The first two years generally include general education credits plus lower level credits in the major.

Business
Communication
Computer Science
Criminal Justice
Educator Preparation: Grades 4-8 Certification
Educator Preparation: Early Childhood Education
Engineering
Engineering Technology
Mexican-American Studies
Music
Nursing
Associate of Arts in Teaching (A.A.T.)

Transfer Information

Credit Aligned Courses « Saylor.org – Free Online Courses Built by Professors

Any information/feedback on these yet??
Thanks.

I'm currently enrolled in Penn Foster pursuing an A.S. in Marketing. Honestly, the Marketing degree was unplanned, but since I'm already enrolled and have since begun my coursework, I figured I might as well as finish it out and transfer some credits later on. The thing I'm wondering is: should I move on to pursue a Bachelor's in Marketing, or should I avoid putting all my eggs in one basket and go for Global Business, which is tied to Marketing?

Two other areas of interest, which I feel will also complement a Marketing degree, are Psychology and Communications, which I would like to pursue at TESC when I'm old enough to actually enroll :p. I've read that these degrees are "useless" or that they're for "slackers", but I feel as though they would complete the entire package because they encompass skills that are quite vital to my current area of study. In addition, I wouldn't be pursuing those areas of study solely for jobs, but also for personal enrichment, as I've realized over the last few months how much they interest me.

Either way, I'm getting an A.S. in Marketing, but I'm trying to figure out where I should go after that. I apologize for the length.

Any thoughts are appreciated!

Hi Everyone,

I'm embarrassed to say this is my first post. I have completed 8 Straighterline Classes, 4 Cleps, 5 ECEs, 2 DSSTs, and 2 Alex courses, all because of the great advice on this forum. I'm so grateful and once I get this mess straightened out, I will be sure to post my success story.

Last week I finished my final Straighterline class and the transcript was sent to TESC. In my mind, that was it, I had completed my degree 26 years after I started it. Xmas eve, I received the email from TESC that they have my graduation application and the review committee would start evaluations on December 23rd. I knew when I looked at my academic evaluation that there would be 3 blanks not yet filled in. The two English courses (completed December 18th) and the Group 3 psychology elective. After a mix up regarding how many UL classes I needed, I took The ECE/UExcel Adulthood and Aging test on November 21st. It showed that TESC had received that transcript on December 9th but for some reason it wasn't yet transcribed.

I looked at my AE again, at the bottom it said:
12/09/13 The UEXCEL exam: Psychology of Adulthood and Aging that was completed is not a UEXCEL exam accepted by Thomas Edison

How can this be? Does anyone know if they have changed their policy? I am freaking out! I immediately wrote to the advisor I had been working with and she is out of the office until Jan 6th. Luckily, I have an email from 11/19 that I wrote, specifically stating I was taking the ECE AandA test; if for some reason they are no longer accepting it, don't you think someone should have told me not to?

Any ideas or suggestions? As an aside, my second tuition extension will expire December 31st. Thanks for reading such a long post, and thank you in advance for any advice.

First off, thanks a ton for all the info everyone here shares with the rest of the world. I really appreciate that you are willing to spend the time and effort to help out those of us who are just now finding out that education can be had for far less time and money than is traditionally known.

I've been lurking around this forum for a little while, but now I'm ready to get going. The only thing is, I think I've read too much information about the various options for finishing up a degree, so I'd like to get some guidance from anyone on this forum who might have some advice for me.

[About Me]
I have 20 years of experience with computers including Windows and Mac desktop maintenance and repair, Windows Server administration, a little bit of programming, and system engineering. For those of you with a little bit of nerdiness in you, my ultimate goal is to become something of a hybrid Linux Sys Admin and a software engineer. I am currently in a career position, and may stay with my current organization, or I may start looking around once I have a degree. About half of the positions I see (inside and outside of my current organzation) require at least a BS in IS, IT or CS *plus* years of experience, and these are the positions I am shooting for. Ultimately, I would like to have a BS IT or BS CS, but in the near term, I would just like to earn a degree so I have more mobility at work and if I decide to go somewhere else, so I'm considering a general BS (which I'm pretty sure is what COSC awards anyway, right?) and then going somewhere for a 2nd BS in IT or CS. Having said that, I'm definitely not opposed to going right for my IT or CS degree, if I can find an efficient (re: time and money) path to do so.

[My (Loose) Plans]
The only application I have submitted so far is to WGU and I am awaiting transcript evaluations. Until I came across this forum, I was planning on using StraighterLine to knock out as many WGU GenEd reqs, then enrolling in one of their BSIT programs, but after reading a ton of info here, I've decided to use IC to CLEP/DSST out of as much as I can, then use ALEKS and SL to fill in gaps where needed, but I'm also wondering if I should give serious consideration to the big 3 and/or a few other online schools.

Here's what I have:
Credits from 4 different schools: UoP, 2 community colleges, and 1 state university. I'll post the info from my transcripts in a post in this thread, in case any knowledgeable folk have time to help me figure out how far along I am at the big 3 or any of the colleges listed below (except WGU, since I have a transcript eval in progress with them right now).

[Colleges]
Here's what colleges I'm looking into (I've listed them in order of preference as of right now, but I have only gone as far as to read a few reviews online for some of these colleges). If you have experience or knowledge with any of these, please chime in. If you only know an answer or two in this huge post, please feel free to contribute also.
WGU, COSC, TESC, U of Wisconsin (FLEX), Northern Arizona U, EC, Georgia WebBSIT, UMass Online, Dakota State U, Arizona State U, Florida State U, U of Illinois, SNHU (their per credit option would be pretty expensive, but they have a competency (I think) based program that is $2,500 per year called College for America that I haven't looked very far into yet).

[Taxes]
Before I ask my questions about schools, I'd like to know if anyone has applied the costs of CLEP, DSSTs, StraighterLine or ALEKS courses and materials (books, website subscriptions, etc) to get money back on their taxes using one of the education credits? I know if I enroll in one of the big 3, WGU or any of the other colleges I'm looking at, I'll be able to use one of these credits, but one of the tax credits (Lifetime Learning Credit) is more general than the other (American Opportunity Credit).

[Questions]
Here's what I would like to specifically know about each college, please:
1. What is the IT, CS or IS program like? Do you feel like you're gaining valuable knowledge from the degree-specific course materials, or is the course geared more toward having you memorize enough to pass a test? This is probably my top criteria. I want to gain usable knowledge in whatever program I take. Quality of the online instruction is almost as important, so feel free to comment on that also, please.

2. I know the big 3 and WGU accept StraighterLine courses (I've looked over the spreadsheets that show which StraighterLine courses can satisfy requirements at each of those 4 institutions), but does anyone have any experience getting any of the other colleges I've listed to accept courses from StraighterLine? Maybe through an ACE transcript?

3. Do any of the colleges I'm looking at award credit (and satisfy requirements) for classes from UoP? I understand that UoP is accredited, but my 4 year B&M won't even consider any of those classes for elective credit, so now I check everywhere.

4. Are any of the ALEKS offerings *aside* from their math stuff ACE recommended?

5. Cost to apply? This is what I have so far. Are there any hidden costs that have to be paid in order to get my transcripts evaluated?
- COSC = $75, this includes my transcript evaluation.
- TESC = $75, pretty sure this includes transcript eval
- EC = $80, this says it includes "premilinary review", so covers transcript eval

I need some help..........please,

Gentlemen, I am about to enroll in SL Managerial Accounting for my BSBA at Thomas Edison. A fellow student and classmate told me I am going to need a new computer with a video camera, microphone, high-speed internet phone line, w/high gig download speed, etc, etc, etc.

WTF over !!!!

What gives guys ?????

What does a SL online course entail ???? I took financial accounting almost 14 years ago and barely passed; so I am already stressed out having to take this.
My finances after Xmas will not allow me to buy a new computer and all the attachment that go with it.

I want nothing more than to do my study work, do the online testing and finally kill this course requirement !!!

Again guy's......what does it take to complete SL online Managerial Accounting ??

My rant is over. Thank you.

Happy Holidays from N. Texas

BigJiminDfw

Anyone have experience with the midterm SL Biology course which covers Topics 1-7? Lots of material, lots of chapters to prepare and review. Please give any advise or recommendations. Is it just a matter of reviewing the same topic exams again? Thanks for any thoughts or tips!
Debbie

When College Board says to critically read at least one anthology do they mean all 5 volumes (I have here Norton Anthology A, B, C, D and E). This must be, just a guess, 5000 pages with extremely small print? In other words a heck of a lot of difficult reading (I say difficult because the print is so small it's a strain on my eyes and these books are not available in electronic format). From other courses and high school I'm somewhat familiar with some of the major authors and poets but looking thru these anthologies not nearly as much as what they (these books) contain. This could take a year just to read them. Is that really necessary for this exam?

https://clep.collegeboard.org/exam/ameri.../resources

When I go to my.tesc.edu and try to log in as usual, there is this screen that won't let me in.