Adult students that are considering an online degree who have already earned some college credits during the course of their careers can decrease the time it takes to earn an undergraduate online degree by transferring credits from another school. Many institutions of higher learning, including online schools, allow the transferring of credits toward a degree. Since each online degree program’s requirements vary, check before you enroll to make sure transferred credits are accepted.
A student going to a traditional college cannot move from campus to campus and expect to easily transfer credits. It is the same with online schools. Students often assume that they can take courses from several institutions and that all those credits will transfer toward an education online. Although consortia members typically work together to maximize the transferability of credits from one college to another, it is still up to you to ensure that credits earned elsewhere can be applied at your new online college.
What if you have taken courses at an online school that is not recognized or accredited? This can be a source of great frustration. However, you might have some legitimate reasons to question and change the amount of credit you receive. You can petition the online college if the registrar’s office won’t accept the credits you want to transfer. But you must gather ALL your paperwork and be persistent. Transferring credits can shorten your online education and speed up the completion of your degree.
Earning Credits Before You Even Enroll
Even before enrolling in a online college, adult learners may already possess college credits through courses, examinations, or learning acquired in the workplace. Many undergraduate online degree programs, especially those designed for adults, give credit for knowledge and skills gained through life experience. Although the knowledge usually comes through paid employment, it can be acquired through volunteer work, company or military training courses, travel, recreational activities, and hobbies and reading.
There is a catch, of course. You must document the specifics of what you have learned. It’s simply not enough to say that you learned about marketing while selling widgets. Instead, you must demonstrate what you learned, for example, by showing plans for a marketing campaign that you created or implemented.
To earn credit for learning from life experience, assemble a file or portfolio of information about your work and other accomplishments. The file may include writing samples, awards, taped presentations or performances, copies of speeches, newspaper articles, official job descriptions, military records, works of art, designs and blueprints, films, or photographs. Your portfolio is then evaluated by an institution’s faculty member. In many cases a student can earn as many as 30 credits—one quarter the number needed for a bachelor’s degree—as the result of a good portfolio review. Rarely, though, will a portfolio allow you to earn a majority of the credits you need.
How much credit you receive depends on the online university and, within the institution, the policies of internal schools, departments, or programs. For more information about assessment opportunities for adult learners, check the CAEL Web site at www.cael.org.
Earning Credits by Taking Exams
It is possible to earn credit for prior learning if you take examinations to assess your knowledge and skills. For example, if you worked in the human resources department of a large organization for years, you may know a lot about human resource management. If you take and pass a college-level exam in human resource management, you can earn credits toward your online degree without taking the course or paying tuition. Although some online schools have developed their own equivalency exams, most online schools accept the results of examinations taken through national programs such as those that follow.
CLEP (College-Level Examination Program) is the best known of the national equivalency exam programs. It is administered by the College Entrance Examination Board and recognized by 2,900 colleges and universities. Most of the CLEP tests are multiple-choice and some include essays. The test covers what most students take in their first two years of college. CLEP exams are free to military service members.
Excelsior College Examinations, formerly the Regents College Examination series, are similar to the CLEP. The series consists of about forty subject-area equivalency examinations, which are recognized by nearly 1,000 colleges and universities.
DANTES Subject Standardized Tests are offered by Thomson Prometric and are accepted or administered at more than 1,900 colleges and universities.
Credit for Work Training
Since 1974, thousands of employees have earned college credit for selected educational programs sponsored by businesses, industry, professional associations, labor unions, and government agencies. The American Council on Education’s College Credit Recommendation Service evaluates such programs according to established college-level criteria and recommends college credit for those programs that measure up to these standards. The ACE College Credit Recommendation Service (ACE/Credit) is offered through ACE’s Center for Lifelong Learning.
Credit for Military Training
Service in the military, specialized training, and occupational experience have the potential to earn college credit. Many military programs have already been evaluated in terms of their equivalency to college credit. The institutions that belong to Service members Opportunity Colleges (SOC) have agreed to assess students’ prior learning and accept each other’s credits in transfer.
