(03-18-2024, 09:05 AM)rachel83az Wrote: If you want to work for an American company, having an American degree may work in your favor. Americans can be a bit strange about "foreign" degrees, even if the other country is Canada. So that's good!

Monetarily, $20k is more than sufficient for a TESU degree. If your programs are worth university credit, you're looking at (approximately) 4-6 months of Study.com ($235/mo.), 3-6 months of Sophia.org ($99/mo., $299 for 4 months, or $599 for a year), and maybe a couple of Coursera certificates (currently $299/year). Plus TESU tuition & fees of around $4k-5k, depending on your choices. (If your Canadian studies aren't worth university credits, there would be additional tuition of $1000-$2000, depending on additional college/university.) As a bonus, if you think you might ever want to move to management, it's possible to get a BS(BA) CIS degree at TESU at the same time as a TESU BACS and you'd only spend slightly more time/money on this when planned out carefully. It's like a BOGO deal for degrees!

$20k is also more than sufficient for about 2 years at WGU: https://www.wgu.edu/financial-aid-tuition/tuition-it-degrees.html Plus approximately 2 months of Sophia, maybe 6-8 months of Study.com, and maybe a Coursera certificate or two. Coursera certificate equivalencies can be found under "The American Dream Academy" on the WGU partnership page: https://partners.wgu.edu/home Without Sophia, SDC, and Coursera, WGU would almost certainly take significantly longer than 1-1.5 years. With them, it can take 6-12 months.

But I'm not 100% sure that you could complete a WGU degree. I'm not sure if they're open to people in Alberta. IIRC, you have to be within a certain distance of Toronto in order to be accepted. But maybe if you're located in a big city? Not sure. 

There is technically also a BSIT degree from PUG available: https://www.purdueglobal.edu/degree-programs/information-technology/exceltrack-bachelor-information-technology/ But that's IT, not Computer Science. And there is a LOT of writing at PUG. Every single credit requires at least one paper or project at PUG. You can transfer in 75% of the required 180 credits, but that's still 45-50 papers that you'd have to write. Minimum. Some people have been able to complete it all in under a year, but it's still a lot of work.

(03-17-2024, 07:28 PM)bjcheung77 Wrote: @jobojoe285, Welcome to the board, that's a good introduction post with some details and questions. You really should fill in the addendum and template in order to provide us an even greater picture of your situation, with these extra pieces of information, we'll have the 'full' picture of your overall scenario. Update us with a reply, here's the link: https://www.degreeforum.net/mybb/Forum-Degree-Planning-Advice

• Option 1: Submit transcripts documenting completion of college-level coursework with a minimum of 2.75 GPA or higher. 
  
  
• Option 2: Possess a bachelors or associate degree (A.A, A.S. or A.A.S. acceptable) from an accredited post-secondary institution.
  
  
• Option 3: Submit official record of completion of a transferable IT certification, some of which may provide transfer credit  into various programs.
  
  
• Option 4: Submit high school transcripts with a minimum GPA of 3.0
  
  
• Option 5: Submit transcripts documenting completion of previous IT coursework. IT coursework must be 300 level or higher.
  

(03-18-2024, 10:12 PM)jobojoe285 Wrote: Before I go off, to confirm: I would take a look at what courses on study.com, etc. are accepted for credits from TESU or WGU (I contacted them, they said it's fine as long as I can get past their admissions; for my college, I would need to get it transferred to USA equivalent and then they would take a look to see if any credits would be awarded) then I would do a count of how many courses would net me a number of credits, do all the courses and only afterwards apply for admission at TESU, WGU, etc? So I would start university with a large chunk completed? Or am I misunderstanding?

(03-18-2024, 10:12 PM)jobojoe285 Wrote: As an example for WGU, I was looking at their partners:

For Sophia courses that can be credit transferred for BS of software engineering I would start buying and doing multiple of these Sophia courses:
https://partners.wgu.edu/transfer-pathway-agreement?uniqueId=BSSWE7110&collegeCode=IT&instId=796

For Study.com: 
https://partners.wgu.edu/transfer-pathway-agreement?uniqueId=BSSWE4424&collegeCode=IT&instId=678


Some certificates:
https://partners.wgu.edu/transfer-pathway-agreement?uniqueId=BSSWE9045&collegeCode=IT&instId=870


So basically I would take a look at every course in the bachelor program, and then I would take a look at a 3rd party course that could be exchanged for credits later on. Then I would spend a year doing all these courses and then applying for admission for the bachelor of software engineer, etc.? Then I would just do the program mandatory courses that I cannot get from 3rd party sources?

(03-19-2024, 03:16 PM)rachel83az Wrote:

(03-18-2024, 10:12 PM)jobojoe285 Wrote: Before I go off, to confirm: I would take a look at what courses on study.com, etc. are accepted for credits from TESU or WGU (I contacted them, they said it's fine as long as I can get past their admissions; for my college, I would need to get it transferred to USA equivalent and then they would take a look to see if any credits would be awarded) then I would do a count of how many courses would net me a number of credits, do all the courses and only afterwards apply for admission at TESU, WGU, etc? So I would start university with a large chunk completed? Or am I misunderstanding?

Yes, this is exactly right! Except with WGU, you must finish all available credits before you enroll. With TESU, you can enroll and keep a "running tally" of where your credits are going.

(03-18-2024, 10:12 PM)jobojoe285 Wrote: As an example for WGU, I was looking at their partners:

For Sophia courses that can be credit transferred for BS of software engineering I would start buying and doing multiple of these Sophia courses:
https://partners.wgu.edu/transfer-pathway-agreement?uniqueId=BSSWE7110&collegeCode=IT&instId=796

For Study.com: 
https://partners.wgu.edu/transfer-pathway-agreement?uniqueId=BSSWE4424&collegeCode=IT&instId=678


Some certificates:
https://partners.wgu.edu/transfer-pathway-agreement?uniqueId=BSSWE9045&collegeCode=IT&instId=870


So basically I would take a look at every course in the bachelor program, and then I would take a look at a 3rd party course that could be exchanged for credits later on. Then I would spend a year doing all these courses and then applying for admission for the bachelor of software engineer, etc.? Then I would just do the program mandatory courses that I cannot get from 3rd party sources?

Yep, exactly. For most WGU degrees, there are between 78-86 available credits that can be transferred from sources like SDC, Sophia, etc. It looks like the one you want has 84 credits that can be completed via alternate means. The plans on the wiki are kept up to date as much as possible, but definitely double-check with the WGU Partner site to confirm before taking anything (I see a couple of things that should probably be changed/updated; nothing major). They'll sometimes change things around without any real warning. It can be a bit frustrating for potential students. But it's still faster/cheaper to do things this way than to take 100% of your classes from WGU itself.

Start with Sophia. Then I would try the Coursera certificate that isn't covered by SDC/Sophia courses (Google UX Design Professional Certificate). Then try a month of Study.com for things not covered by certificates or Sophia (such as Computer Science 201 and Computer Science 307) This will let you decide if you want to finish with SDC courses or if you find the Coursera style to be faster/easier for you. If you like Coursera better, do those certificates instead of SDC. If you like SDC better, you can ignore Coursera.