Unschooling College

So your fifteen-year-old is ready for an academic challenge, or your seventeen-year old wants to learn at his own pace…what’s available?

Here are a few alternative approaches to college that you may not have considered. They don’t work for all types of degrees – there’s no distance med school that I’ve ever come across - but for many popular degrees, they can be an inexpensive way to get an accredited degree. They also generally have fewer ‘hoops’ to jump through in the college admissions process. There are no residency requirements, either.

They feature their own internet courses, credit by examination, and assessment of prior learning experiences. They also accept credits from any other accredited college. This means that you could take some courses from a brick-and-mortar college in your town, some from online schools, some CLEP exams, and assessment of job-related learning and combine them into an affordable degree.

The degrees gained from these schools are perfectly legitimate...and very well-accepted. They offer certificate programs, Associate’s degrees, Bachelor’s degrees, and, in some cases, Master’s degrees. Fields of study vary widely, from Computer Security to Anthropology to Religious Studies to Criminal Justice.

The ‘Big Three’ regionally-accredited colleges which allow students to achieve a degree through distance learning, life experience and examinations are Thomas Edison State College, Excelsior College, and Charter Oak State College. Here’s a brief intro to each:

• Charter Oak State College’s motto is "Degrees Without Boundaries." Headquartered in New Britain, Connecticut, They will take homeschooled students beginning at age 16, though students may take courses from other schools earlier and transfer the credits. The cost of advisement and 12 credits per year is $3750 for one year for an out-of-state resident.

• Excelsior College, formerly known as Regent’s College was founded in 1971 by the Board of Regents of The University of the State of New York as an external studies degree-granting program. They also have a very useful Credit Banking service which will, for a fee, allow you to keep all your credits from various sources on one transcript, which can be useful when documenting educational experiences for employers or colleges.

• Thomas Edison State College works mostly with those twenty-one and over, but they sometimes accept younger students with college credits already banked up. A non-New Jersey resident will pay about $5800 for a year of up to 36 credits, earned in many ways, and $5100 for subsequent years.

Most colleges that offer distance learning allow students of any age to take courses without being admitted to the school, which means that your bright fourteen or fifteen year-old can take courses, then transfer the credits later to one of the Big Three easily.

So, for the cost of most community colleges, your student can get a fully-accredited degree with a wide range of ways to gain the credits….without ever setting foot on campus. They are also a good choice for parents who want to further their own education while raising a family.