Speed/Ease of completion - SL vs SDC vs Penn Foster

[TopHatWombat]

Many thanks to everybody that has replied. 

Several of you have suggested the WGU MS in Accounting. I did consider that, but I do not meet the prerequisites. As one person indicated, it does require that one already have a BS in Accounting, or already be a licensed CPA. I have heard of a few folks within the profession that are in a similar position to myself, that completed a few undergrad accounting classes elsewhere, and based on that plus their IRS license, WGU provided a waiver of the normal requirements.

But, I would still need to knock out a few accounting classes, so I'd basically be back to where I am, and it would be easier, faster, and cheaper to just add on the few additional undergrad accounting classes I need and call it a day.

I found this on an older thread, posted by dfrecore, and this appears to be a really good start to a plan:

ACC-201 Intermediate Accounting I (SL's Financial Accounting) 3 SL/Study.com
ACC-202 Intermediate Accounting II 3 Study.com
ACC-303 Cost Accounting (SL's Managerial Accounting) UL 3 SL/Study.com
ACC-301 Applied Managerial Accounting UL 3 Study.com
ACC-401 Advanced Accounting UL 3 Study.com
ACC-421 Federal Income Taxation UL 3 TECEP

I've already passed the CLEP Financial Accounting. Then, based on what I actually do for a living, I am fairly certain I could pass the CSU Global ACT415S Business Taxation just by showing up. I may also just do CSU Global ACT405S, Federal Individual Taxation, although I would need to spend some time brushing up on that. Doing these two exams, instead of ACC-421 TECEP, gives me 6 credits instead of 3 (the TECEP exam covers both individual and business taxation).

The state for which I'll (hopefully) be sitting the CPA exam allows accounting IT credits, also, and there is a CSU Global exam for that. ACT425S, Information Systems for Accounting.

Based on wanting to do the least amount of work possible, there's a plan starting to form, and I think it looks like this:

(3 LL) SDC ACC-101 Financial Accounting (refresher + future course quiz acceleration)
(3 LL) SDC ACC-102 Intro to Managerial Accounting
(3 UL) SDC Intermediate Accounting I
(3 UL) SDC Intermediate Accounting II
(3 UL) SDC Applied Managerial Accounting
(3 UL) CSU Global ACT405S – Federal Individual Taxation
(3 UL) CSU Global ACT415S – Business Taxation
(3 UL) CSU Global ACT425S – Information Systems for Accounting

Total = 24 semester hours, 18 upper level
Needed: 24 total, 15 upper level


Based on other threads I've devoured here, it feels like I could knock out all of the Study.com classes in just one or two months, and across those four classes there are only 2 homework assignments/projects (which I'm trying to avoid, in the interest of time).

The two CSU Global tax exams I am assuming that I could complete either same day, or within a few days of each other. The IT class might be a different story.

For the general business credits, TESU already sent me a list of additional CLEP/DANTES exams I could take to round that out. I only need to take two, for 6 credits, to hit the 24 general business credits for the CPA exam. So, that's a single morning.

My apologies for the lengthy post.

Thank you for any additional feedback on this plan.


Edit: I'm using my state's definition of how they count "upper level" to sit for the CPA exam, not the ACE credit recommendations, which are different.