Returning Student TESU (WGU?) - IT Degree - Planning Help

[rachel83az]

The TESU Associate's is, IMO, a huge waste of time/money/tuition reimbursement. The AAS requires both the cornerstone and a capstone. At that point, it's about as expensive as a TESU Bachelor's degree: https://tesu.smartcatalogiq.com/current/...r-studies/ This one only requires the cornerstone: https://tesu.smartcatalogiq.com/en/curre...r-science/ buuuuuuuut....

For both, then there is the residency waiver fee for not taking at least 15 credits at TESU. If you take 15 TESU credits: why not also get a TESU Bachelor's degree? If you don't take 15 TESU credits, the waiver fee usually isn't covered by tuition reimbursement. So you're paying thousands of dollars out of pocket for a degree that isn't really worth all that much in today's job market.

(The 30 RA credits, BTW, you more than have that covered with your Indiana credits. Don't worry about it. Don't think about it.)

What about the (almost free) Pierpont Associate instead? https://degreeforum.miraheze.org/wiki/Pierpont_C%26TC $130 out of pocket and you could get an Area of Emphasis in Information Systems. You've got everything you need; no money wasted on unnecessary courses or waiver fees.

From there, you can continue on to WGU, if you want. Buuuut... you've only got one Finite Math and Algebra. WGU requires Calc I and two Discrete Math classes. https://partners.wgu.edu/transfer-pathwa...d=BSCS4424 Discrete Math II at WGU cannot be transferred in and it's closed-book. I don't think this is going to work for you.

What I would recommend, instead, would be TESU's BA Computer Science degree. Yes, it also requires Calculus I. But it doesn't require two Finite/Discrete Math courses. For both TESU and WGU Calculus, Sophia is an option. Sophia is open book and not proctored. It won't be easy, but it'll be easier than Study.com or a B&M university elsewhere.

So, here's what I would do:

1. Go sign up for https://theamericandreamacademy.org/ and start banging out the Google IT Support Professional certificate right now. Can be completed in ~1 week, despite what the Coursera page says. That will hopefully grant you access to more Coursera later and that might be important...
   
2. Decide if you're going to do Pierpont & WGU or go all-in at TESU. Either way, if at all possible, withdraw from the courses you have planned. For now, at least. You need to take some time to actually plan. It sounds like you signed up at TESU first, then found this forum. So, you're not going to be doing things optimally yet.
   
3. Ask TESU to add the BA Computer Science to your degree plan. Tell them not to remove the AS(NSM) Computer Science. This will let you see what else you need to complete their Comp Sci degree.
   
4. After finishing the Google IT Support Professional certificate, you can sign up at Sophia.org and start taking classes you need. Ethics & Calculus I at minimum for TESU. You also probably need science and history; gen eds for the Associate degrees are slightly different than the gen eds for the Bachelor's degrees. See https://degreeforum.miraheze.org/wiki/Sa...ts_Roadmap and also https://degreeforum.miraheze.org/wiki/Sa...ience_Plan for suggestions to fill in the holes.
   
5. Take necessary Study.com classes. See links above.
   
6. Finish up by taking 15 credits at TESU. You'll need to figure out if, even with tuition reimbursement, it makes more sense to do a flat-rate term than it does to do the classes one at a time. Suggested TESU credits for a Computer Science degree are:
   • SOS-1100 (cornerstone)
     
   • LIB-4950 (capstone)
     
   • CIS-3510 Software Engineering
     
   • CIS-1070 Computer Concepts and Applications (ePack)
     
   • Whatever else you want... Maybe English Comp II here.
     

If you do things this way, I'm guessing you could be done with the TESU degrees by the middle of 2024. I don't think you'd be able to finish WGU before the end of 2024. Even with maximum transfer to WGU, most students aren't able to complete a WGU degree in fewer than 2 terms. 

You could, theoretically, also throw in a BSBA CIS from TESU for not much more time/energy/money spent. But that would require 2 more (unproctored) math classes and you said you want to avoid math.