Excelsior - working my last nerve!! One more thing and I'm moving to TESC.

[indivinefavor]

OMG!! Where do I start. After all of the TESC recommendations, I chose to go with Excelsior since they will accept 30 NA credits and also, because they give out grades for some DSST exams. I know, I know...plenty of people have TESC diplomas without a GPA and are doing just fine...but just for my own peace of mind...I wanted a GPA. But anywho, with the announcement that DSST is getting rid of 5 exams, I did some digging and realized that 98% of the DSST exams have now been converted to the 3-digit scoring model.

The problem is this...per Excelsior's catalog, they only have grade equivalencies for the 2-digit scoring tests. This is major for me because on 1/1/2015, they will only have 3 tests that still have the 2-digit scores and that I can get a grade assigned to it. The biggest issue I guess is that remaining 3 tests are not appealing to me (General Anthropology, Rise/Fall of Soviet Union, and one more I can't think of right now). And if Excelsior is going to start giving grades for all of the 400+ exams, then I'll have a lot more options. So I contacted Excelsior to see if they'd be giving grade equivalencies for the 3-digit scores. I kept getting these generic replies from my Academic Advisor, but in true Danielle fashion...I laid out exactly what the problem was. THE 2-DIGIT EXAMS ARE DISAPPEARING AND YOU DO NOT HAVE ANY GRADE EQUIVALENCIES FOR THE 3-DIGIT EXAMS? Simple enough question, right? Well after my fourth email (yes, I know it was a bit much, but my question was never answered..so I kept asking the same question in different ways lol)...I got a not so nice reply stating that they don't make the tests or assign grades...they only do as ACE recommends.

So I CALLED ACE...who then stated that they do not assign grades, they only approve a course and recommend a minimum passing score. Hmmm? So who's confused here...ACE or Excelsior?? I'm going to go with the latter. The lady from ACE, then said that if anyone were to assign grade equivalencies, then it would be the vendor of the exam (i.e. DSST/Prometric). Well I scoured the DSST website and what do you know??? I FOUND B-EQUIVALENT SCORES FOR ALL THE 3-DIGIT SCORES and this data sheet is effective 4/8/2014. Sooo, it's not new information? Right??? Which means...someone dropped the ball here and it wasn't me.

My main issue is that if a student asks a legitimate question, do your homework people before giving me some kind of idiotic blanket response. I understand that I'm just now working on my Bachelor's degree and that my advisor has a Master's...but does this mean that I'm incompetent?? No, I'm one of the youngest property managers in Chicago for a very large housing complex. Most of my peers are twice my age. My mother refused to let me skip in school, but I received all "post high-school" marks when I was in the 6th grade? So I'm far from stupid. I should have a Doctorate by now, but poor life choices brought me to where I'm at today.

I just feel like I was completely dismissed. And why do I have to contact ACE and contact DSST to find information you all should already have, when I have an academic advisor?? I haven't received my official evaluation as of yet...i think that's about a week out, but I'm tempted to just say BITE ME and you can keep your 30 NA Credits and just transfer over to TESC??

WOOSSAHHHHH!!!!