Home school College?

[Magrus]

The education thread here made rethink some things. My grasping of things at my job as well as I have, having started as a part time, entry level stock-boy and ending up taking over my whole department almost in its entirety nearly on my own without training has led me to think that my brain might not be as badly damaged as I once thought. As it seems the majority of the people that post here that are my age or older are either in or were in college at one point I was curious to see the opinions on this.

I used to teach myself nearly everything in school up until high school. So, it isn't too far fetched for me to think that it may be possible to purchase college level books, read them, devise practices for myself and see if I did them properly. However, I was curious, has anyone that either works within the college education system, or happens to be using it ever heard of something akin to a "test for credit" type system in college/universities?

I personally do not do well in school settings, but if I can get my memory to function again, I believe I could learn what I want on my own. However, simply writing down on a resume "Home schooled masters degree from my apartment" won't go over well. It would be much more cost effective for me to purchase the books, learn myself, then go to a school, pay for a testing right and if I pass, graduate with a degree. I just have never heard of this happening outside of high schools.

[dragon wench]

A lot of colleges and universities offer distance ed. This is especially feasible now with the advent of online communication. You may want to check it out if you haven't already considered it.

[Magrus]

I remember looking into that when it had first become available. I may look into it again as I am thinking that is the closest thing to what I happen to want to do. Still, I believe I need to pay the same fees and all as those who actually attend classes regularly for that. Which was something I was trying to avoid. Some classes I would need regular guidance, but basic history, english, psychology, business and sociology classes I could do completely on my own and just test out of.

[dragon wench]

You'd need to pay, unfortunately.
But, at least you'd get accredited, and you'd be able to go at more of your own pace in a way that worked with your schedule.

I do know that sometimes schools will let you challenge courses if you think you are qualified, and they'll give you a test of some kind to write. But I don't know much about it, and I don't know what kind of fees this would involve.

[Bloodstalker]

there are usually testing procedures you can go through to get credit for a college course, but I'm not sure what the prerequisites for most of those are. I believe there is a fee to take them though. Depending on what you do or have done for a living, you can also apply to get real world exeperience transferred into college credit, but that depends on what classes you have to take and your background. For example, if someone speaks french fluently, they would be able to test out of the french classes. I know in that case at the university I attend, that involves hanfing you a dictionary, a couple of french literature texts, and requireing you to translate them into english.

Also, I don't know if you've ever taken college classes before, but it's a lot different from the public school system.It's not as memory oriented for one thing. They actually expect you to take the material, reason through it, and work out your own opinions and ideas, which, from reading your posts, I get the feeling you would enjoy anyway.

Don't get me wrong, taking gen ed courses sucks majorly, but once you get into the higher level courses of whatever you are majoring in it gets to be a lot of fun. Hell, depending on how much you've read about whatever you're majoring in before you sign up, it can be a breeze.

RE: distance learning, yeah, you have to pay full price for the courses, and in many cases you have to pay more for the books since most online courses I've taken require you to buy a new book rather than a used one. That way, you get the code to access the website...which is of course only good for one semesters worth of use.

I don't think you could obtain a degree without attending classes though, most higher level classes require you to attend. But like I said, it's nothing like a HS experience. It's a lot more about interpretaion and reasoning than memorization. In fact, a lot of Professors I've taken have told their freshmen students to forget everything they were told in HS because it's wrong anyway

As far as being able to do it, well, my brother has a learning problem, it takes him longer to remember things than other people. Makes it harder for him to study and all that than for most people, and he almost didn't go to college for that reason. He decided to try it first though, and by setting up a really disciplined study regime and managing his time to make extra room here and there for studying, he's now one semester away from his Masters in criminal justice. Basically what I'm saying is, don't write it off as something you can;t do until you try it. There are a few people I know here who have learning disablities worse than his, and they are doing fine. Besides, if you advanced in your job that quickly, you have to have a sense of responsability and desire to do well. You seem capable of reasoning things out from your posts, and you can argue, and that's pretty much all you need in college anyway

[Magrus]

I've sat through some classes. I went to a college while I was in high school, St. John Fisher, as a guest and ended up answering all of the questions in the class that day. Pissed all the students off and the teacher begged me to apply and join her class for good. Some class if a high school kid can show up randomly one day and do better in a 3rd year english class than the people who are paying for it.

I didn't mind the classes I took, except they were terribly easy. Which, is why I'd rather just pay say $2000 and get the books for 8 or 9 classes that I know I could teach myself, and then maybe $50 a credit hour in fees to test out and get the credit if I could. Rather than sitting in a class and being frustrated at the waste of time in being there. Although, now I may need to go through the classes again as my memory is bad and I don't remember much beyond last week.

Quote:

As far as being able to do it, well, my brother has a learning problem, it takes him longer to remember things than other people. Makes it harder for him to study and all that than for most people, and he almost didn't go to college for that reason. He decided to try it first though, and by setting up a really disciplined study regime and managing his time to make extra room here and there for studying, he's now one semester away from his Masters in criminal justice. Basically what I'm saying is, don't write it off as something you can;t do until you try it. There are a few people I know here who have learning disablities worse than his, and they are doing fine. Besides, if you advanced in your job that quickly, you have to have a sense of responsability and desire to do well. You seem capable of reasoning things out from your posts, and you can argue, and that's pretty much all you need in college anyway

Well hmm, it's possible, which is why I am interested in attempting it again. However, given the money involved in getting a degree nowadays, and the economy situation in this state, I would rather do it on my own and test out if I could. Hell, even if I were rich and I had money to blow I'd prefer it. If I couldn't, and failed, well I could always just keep the book and go to class and try again afterwards. The problem is, I am capable of learning just about anything, but my memory was ruined and retaining things long term is a problem. If I use the knowledge regularly, I will retain it, but it takes a bit of time to get it stuck in my head because my short term memory is shot. So, my doing things at my pace, and on my own would work much, much better. Still, thanks for the vote of confidence.

[Bloodstalker]

Well, then my advice would be to contact some colleges and talk to them about what you have in mind. Personally, I've never heard of it, but then again, I doubt many people have ever really tried to check that option out. There are colleges where they let you have a large input in designing your own courseload and so one though. I'm not sure how that works out, but I have seen that option from time to time. Sort of a customize and at your own pace degree for the working people I think. Like I said, the colleges would know more than anyone here would, but that might be just the kinda thing you are looking for.