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Excelsior Courses - hunter2115 - 10-17-2007
soltran Wrote:Gâday,I am in the "common" situation of trying to figure out which route to take with Business Policy (TECEP, CSU-Pueblo, EC course) and the EC course is of course a possibility for me. How is the course going for you? Any insights and/or information on the course is appreciated!
Sorry for the slow response but my father passed away just after I started this thread which has kept me away from studying and the forum.
My wife is considering the Project Management course so it is unlikely that I will be selling the books. There were two books required, one text book and one for Lab exercises. The Lab book I never opened at all during the course and while the syllabus stated that 10% of your final mark comes from lab exercises, it wasnât until about week 12 that we were informed that the information was incorrect and no lab exercises were required.
I found that the courses I have completed werenât too bad. English required a bit of writing but the other two courses were reasonable. Due to my father passing I have gotten a very slow start on the Strategic Management course and it seems to require quite a commitment to online participation (20% of the final grade). Each week there is a discussion topic to be addressed and a case study to be discussed.
I will forward you the details this evening. But here is a summary of the requirements:
Chapter Quizzes (weekly) 50 %
On line Participation (1 case study and 1 discussion topic weekly) 20 %
Case Project (1 due at the end of the course) 30 %
Total 100 %
I hope this helps and best of luck
Regards
Excelsior Courses - ShotoJuku - 10-17-2007
soltran Wrote:Gâday,
Sorry for the slow response but my father passed away just after I started this thread which has kept me away from studying and the forum.
[SIZE="2"]On behalf of all of your fellow IC-Forums Students, I extend our personal condolences on the passing of your Father.[/SIZE]
Excelsior Courses - yutzyj - 10-17-2007
soltran Wrote:Sorry for the slow response but my father passed away just after I started this thread which has kept me away from studying and the forum.
I'm so sorry to hear about your father. You have my condolenses.
Excelsior Courses - jec959 - 10-17-2007
My condolences on the loss of your father, i know personally how difficult this is. I found that grief comes in waves and just when you think you are done another sneaks up on you but they do lesson over time. I can also tell you that time does heal most things and to concentrate on the good memories you have.
Excelsior Courses - ImustStudy - 10-17-2007
soltran Wrote:G'day,
With the online courses I have found no need for any of the practice exams. Everything is presented in the course or with the course text. The online quizzes, mid terms and final exams have been 3 hour open book with plenty of time to score well on each. The cost of the courses, including text runs at about $1000 each which I believe is why most don't go this route.
Regards
Are the Excelsior online classes self paced so I could finish quickly? Say like in 1 week or so?? Or do I have to take the entire semester to complete them??
Excelsior Courses - soltran - 10-18-2007
Gâday,
Thanks everyone for the messages of condolences. It has been a difficult time but helped by the support of family and friends and it is no surprise to receive support from fellow Instantcert members. The community here goes far beyond supporting each others educational goals and I feel privileged to be part of such a group.
hunter2115 Wrote:I am in the "common" situation of trying to figure out which route to take with Business Policy (TECEP, CSU-Pueblo, EC course) and the EC course is of course a possibility for me. How is the course going for you? Any insights and/or information on the course is appreciated!
As I stated, I am running behind on this course because of the slow start I got. There seems to be a heavy emphasis on participation (via the online forum environment) with 20% of the final grade coming from this participation. In other classes I have taken, guidelines have been specific such as, at least 3 posts to the message board a week to get maximum grades, but in this course all that is stated is that participation makes up 20% of the final grade. There are two discussion topics each week, one of which is a case study that requires a reasonable amount of research each week to be able to discuss intelligently. Between the two discussion topics there are about 150 messages posted each week, some of which are very lengthy and requires quite a bit of reading but plenty of opportunities to participate.
The quizzes, which make up 50% of the final grade, each have 20 questions, are open book and not timed. There have been discussions about how the wording of certain questions have tripped up some people but all questions come directly from the text and a perfect score on the quizzes is very possible.
There is a major case study, which is different for each participant and assigned to the participant at the beginning of the course but not due until the end of the course. This case study is worth 30% of the final grade and while I canât comment on it much at this point, it does appear that both the text and the weekly discussions are geared toward preparing participants for completion of this case study. I feel that certain research could be started as soon as the case study is assigned but I would be reluctant to submit the final assignment until very late in the course to ensure nothing is missed from the discussion topics.
All-in-all I think that getting a C (70%) for this course wouldnât be too difficult, getting a B (80%) should also be achievable for most people with a reasonable final assignment and regular participation, getting an A (90%) may be a little more difficult and without knowing exactly how the participation is being scored it is hard to judge at this stage.
ImustStudy Wrote:Are the Excelsior online classes self paced so I could finish quickly? Say like in 1 week or so?? Or do I have to take the entire semester to complete them??
From my experience I havenât come across an Excelsior online course that can be finished quickly (not counting Information Literacy). One course, the quizzes, course content and weekly assignments werenât released until the beginning of the week they were due. In another course, the assignments, quizzes and course content were available from the time the course started but the mid-term and final exams were not available until the week before they were due. Even with courses that have everything available from the start of the course, the amount of work required is likely to preclude anyone from finishing the course within a week, even if the instructor was willing to mark assignments immediately. Most courses have a participation component worth from 10% to 20% of the final grade which would be hard to address if not addressing it at the same time as other participants.
A couple of the courses had penalties for late submission of assignments and quizzes that were no longer available after their due date while others are less strict about when the assignments and quizzes are done, as long as they are done.
If you intend signing up for a 15 week Excelsior course, expect that contributions would be required each and every week.
I hope this has been of some assistance
Regards
Excelsior Courses - hunter2115 - 10-18-2007
Than you for the excellent assessment of the course. It will certainly help those like myself in making the decision about which way to fulfill this required course.
Excelsior Courses - pearl4sucess - 10-27-2007
Thanks for you so much info Soltran.
However, I had another question for you. I have PM you for that, please respond to that, your help is greatly appreciate. I hope we all acheive our goals in this unique learning enviorment.
Thanks
pearl.