New to the game: PUG questions

[housecat]

Again, it really depends on how you want to do things, one-and-done institution like PUG BSIT/MSIT or the WGU Accelerated BSIT/MSITM.  Either one would work for you as both are competency based, it is up to you.  I suggest deciding between the two and see which options are best, especially the classes you're interested in most...

Does WGU have scheduled classes? Like for example, 7PM EST every Thursday? Also can anyone confirm if PUG has scheduled time classes? This is also called synchronous teaching in Canada.

---

I can definitely see the appeal of speeding through. In my case they're all about me having a bachelor's degree and community college over lots of programs and having a master's degree isn't enough, so I was looking at BS in IT or BS in Analytics, but then I figured maybe I can do a bunch of transfer from my Canadian community colleges into Bachelor of Professional Studies.

This degree has a bunch of open-ended "you decide" slots which I could cram with transfer credits then use the rest of the slots with courses which would also qualify to BS in Analytics degree, AND get alum discount for the BS in IT/BS in Analytics. Then I do the master's in analytics (only open to PUG Alum I'm told) and/or MS IT.

I gotta go to Vegas again and really win big, because these are premiums, but the coursework... any comments on the coursework? From paper it seems solid in the BS or MS degrees?...

I would say the coursework for the ExcelTrack BSIT and MSIT is interesting and relevant without being overwhelming. Like practically every PUG degree, it focuses much more on writing, projects, and PowerPoint creation than tests and quizzes, which works well if you're a relatively competent and quick writer like me. Most modules I was able to complete in 3 to 7 hours -- some shorter (particular in the 200s), a few longer -- but keep in mind I had 10 years of IT experience and 20 certs when I started, so I already had a pretty comprehensive IT background, which definitely helps. There's a lot of directions you can go with the elective IT courses, which is nice. 

I think for someone who is willing to put in the work, the BSIT ExcelTrack is still a great program that I'd enthusiastically recommend, provided that you get as much credit as you possibly can from Sophia, Study.com, certs, etc. beforehand. Likely the same is true with the related BS ExcelTrack degrees. I'm not sure I can give the same recommendation for the MSIT without ExcelTrack, given the price increase and the time needed to complete it. If it were me today looking for a Masters, I'd likely either get the PUG MBA with the IT concentration (available through ExcelTrack, at least for now) or the Masters in IT from WGU.

Interesting, perhaps that would work too. Yeah of course there is no more ExcelTrack for MSIT and is above my pay-grade right now, considering they want me to take the bachelors. Also an recommendations on which NAECS member company to use to evaluate my Canadian credentials for the USA? I may just use WES but any ideas on this?

Tbh, I may have to wait a year to do this as it's looking more and more like self-funding, as my provincial student funding only does partial-funding outside of Canada, although I'm still looking into other options.

My background is Software Development in community college, lots of programming/freelance before that, then I want back to do AI. So I've done most of the rudimentary stuff like data structs and algos, linear algebra, etc, plus the actual AI stuff like deep learning. I have dabbled in networking, and know some basics, and I've been using computers for longer than I care to admit, so I know my way around Windows 3.1 to Windows 11 and NT to Server 2019. In addition I know Linux, but I prefer my Windows desktop for desktopping because when I get home I just want it to work. Yeah I would say my networking skills are lacking and of course I have zero patience for resetting people's password and fixing their printers so I trended toward development. If you ask me about Active Directory, I can't see the forest for the trees. Permissions in AWS are wild to me, and not a fan of Docker, but I can sure launch an Azure VM no problem. So yeah more or less a mixed bag.

However, I like analytics, data cleaning is a bit of a bore but it works and it's part-and-parcel of the job so gotta do it. AI methods are interesting to me. I am comparing it to Abertay University (https://online.abertay.ac.uk/) and Wrexham University (https://online.wrexham.ac.uk/) in the UK because I am an international student to the USA and to UK. So far I've learned that Wrexham has asynchronous (no scheduled classes) which is a huuuuuuuuge bonus for me.

Back to PUG, I love the Purdue brand, but I would have to do a bachelors, scheduled classes maybe? and ~13k USD for SlowTrack with all credits transferred in at 75% transfer.

I suppose I am in no rush to dive in before looking, because I need a good experience, and I want to know almost everything before I jump in so there's no more gotchas...