A bit lost and need some advice/help thanks!

[dfrecore]

What kind of degree do you want? In order for someone to help you with planning, you need to decide what degree you would get at each school.

Regarding non-traditional courses/exams like CLEP, DSST, SL - that's all explained here: http://www.degreeforum.net/showthread.php?t=26144 Read starting from the beginning, all the way to the end. Even if some of the info is outdated, it's still very good at explaining what we do here.

And, the cost of a course at TESU is $1500, the cost at COSC is $1100. The average cost of a course/exam here is about $100 (that's high, most can do it for less). So it's the difference of paying $4000 for 40 courses (120 credits) or $45,000 (COSC) or $40k (TESU if you paid for 4 years of the Comprehensive Plan). You can also test out or take a course using providers we talk about here in a matter of hours/days, as opposed to months per course at one of the schools.

WGU will give credit for certs, and so will COCS and EC. But again, it depends on the degree you want as to which will be the better choice. For IT, I'm always going to recommend WGU, they have the best selection, and BY FAR the best price.

I also always recommend that if you are in a computer-related field, to get some of the better certs. There are plenty of useless ones that won't get you much, but there are some very valuable ones as well. And again, WGU not only gives you a degree, but a bunch of certs as well (included in the price of tuition).