Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Learning Environments College Plus program

Has anyone on this board heard of or used the College Plus program? www.collegeplus.org

I learned about it through my homeschooling support group. There is a 16 year old we know who is currently doing this and loving it. He will have earned a 4 year degree by the time he is 18 and then plans on entering school for a masters and doctorate. Wondering if anyone here has thoughts or experiences.

My thoughts are based on what I've read elsewhere about them, and their own website, e.g. http://www.collegeplus.org/howitworks/distancelearningcollege .

The first thing that jumps out at me is that this is not a degree program. They exclusively refer a student to local or online colleges in order to get a degree.

The second thing that seems apparent (someone please correct me if I'm wrong) is that a student could save the entire CollegePlus tuition price by simply taking the CLEP exams etc. on her own, then enrolling herself in a local or online institution.

Also, this Thomas Edison College they tout is an online institution. It is an extreme outlier, for example in terms of how many credits it'll accept from CLEP exams. I think that there's nothing wrong with getting an education solely or mostly online, but it would curtail some opportunities after that point.

If it were me, I'd strongly consider saving $15,000 and just looking taking a back-to-front approach: figure out what my child wants to do with himself (while keeping his options as open as possible to accommodate mid-stream changes), find the list of institutions that would support those goal(s), and find the prerequisites for entry to those institutions. Then if time and money could be saved with CLEP tests and the like, I'd just help my child enroll in the tests and prepare for them. (Of course the total money savings might be less than $15,000 if the CollegePlus "tuition" includes exam fees, but I didn't read far enough to determine that.)

http://www.collegeplus.org/howitworks/faqs#6

http://bbs.stardestroyer.net/viewtopic.php?style=4&f=7&t=143569

The last link prompted me to run this search:
http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=site:www.collegeplus.org+christian

... leading to this:

http://www.collegeplus.org/whoweare

"CollegePlus! is a revolutionary Christian based distance learning program... Instead of fitting into a semester schedule, students study whenever it is convenient for them as they balance college, work, and ministry responsibilities... CollegePlus! students also focus on developing a biblical worldview as they complete their degrees. They are challenged to develop a foundational worldview perspective through reading and listening to works from Doug Phillips, Gary DeMar, and other Christian leaders."

I'll pass.

ETA:
http://www.collegeplus.org/whoweare/statementoffaith
http://www.collegeplus.org/whoweare/endorsements

I've read about it and I am not a fan. Basically the program charges a fee for students to self study for CLEP and DANTES tests to get out of taking college classes. In order to actually complete a degree the student will then need to enroll in one of the few low quality online programs that will allow a student to bypass taking most of their education through taking multiple choice tests. The majors they offer are very limited. Many non highly selective schools will accept some of these sorts of CLEP credits but it typically is quite limited - the better the school, the fewer they accept so if a student intends to study at a traditional college or university in their area they will likely discover they can't get too far without taking actual classes.

Collegeplus claims to be saving students money when they are actually charging them for the privilege of doing something they could already be doing for free on their own. High school students can already earn college credits for only the cost of the test by self studying for APs or CLEP exams. In many areas they can also take dual enrollment courses as a reduced cost. The only service they are really providing is access to "coaches" who seems to be mostly unqualified recent college graduates. These coaches don't provide actual content support - they are not teaching history, math, etc. but instead just talking students through this process of testing out of classes.

For me this is the worst part of an education minus all the good stuff. It is doing the minimum to pass tests to pretend you learned something. There is no assigned reading, no papers, no lectures, no discussion, no professors, no classmates, none of the life of experience of being in a classroom or on a campus. It feels to me like basically like a tricky way to get a credential without actually having the real experience of earning a college degree. This is different from strict online degree programs because in those you are still taking classes, interacting with classmates, and completing work. With CollegePlus most of the degree is just self studying for tests.

I do not think it is a good preparation for a student who intends to go on to graduate study. In this program a student will learn how to self cram for multiple choice exams. That's really different than learning how to actually be successful in college. They are not going to develop the quality of transcript to get into competitive graduate programs and they are not going to develop the relationships that lead to good recommendations.

I do think it can be a great idea for high school students to begin to earn college credits through APs or dual enrollment classes. These are ways to access more challenging material and having some credits can save money or give the student more flexibility during college. For our homeschooler dual enrollment turned out to be much more appealing than self study for APs because he found out having a professor, classmates, discussion, papers, etc. all helped him learn and grow in a way that self study for a single test doesn't.

Yes, I agree. Also, I think it is important to distinguish between online programs that more mirror a traditional experience (professors, assigned work, tests, papers, classmates, etc.) from this cram for exams approach. They are totally different.


I agree this would be much less expensive. The College Board has an easy to use tool to help find out what CLEP credit colleges will accept. http://apps.collegeboard.com/cbsearch_clep/searchCLEPColleges.jsp

While CLEP tests are much easier than APs, personally I would encourage gifted students to look instead to APs. They are much more equivalent of taking a college course as the exams are harder and require writing. Reflecting this difficulty they are much more helpful for college admissions and more likely to earn credit (though they still won't at highly selective colleges). This tool is an easy way to get an idea what sorts of AP credit your student may be able to earn at the colleges they are considering. http://collegesearch.collegeboard.com/apcreditpolicy/index.jsp

Oh, yeah. AP credits would be superior for sure, in terms of experience and admissions.

Oh and one more thing... The majority of the money paid to College Plus is for "coaching" and is thus not covered by financial aid. Students with high financial need (and/or high potential to earn merit scholarships) may discover they could actually attend college and earn a much better quality degree for a lot less.