This HS4CC Happy Story features Jennifer C. of Iowa. You may remember that earlier this summer I shared her son’s happy story, but this is a reminder that moms earn college credit too – and Jennifer used hers for a degree!
I asked (begged) Jennifer C. to let me share her story with all of you! When she sent me her son’s story to appear in our Happy Stories section, she casually mentioned to me that she earned a Bachelors of Arts in Liberal Studies in Social Sciences, an Associates of Science in Business Administration, an Associates in General Studies, and a Certificate in Criminal Justice while her son was Homeschooling for College Credit.
Wait, what?
After a quick chat, I knew that we needed our community to hear her story. Like my own personal story, I knew that parents could earn college credit alongside their teens, and I suspect many of you are doing just that!
So for those parents wondering if it’s too late? It isn’t. Enjoy.
Working toward my college degree at the same time my child was working toward his was not something I had envisioned for my life. I was an overachiever in high school, and graduating from college was a given. But then my health began to take a toll on my ability to function, and I knew I had to make a change. After completing one
and a half years of college, I was forced to take a medical leave of absence. This was
followed by several years of moving from state to state for my husband’s job, and then
the birth of my son. Each time I thought about going back to school, we would have to
pick up and move again, so I gave up on the idea of ever being able to qualify for in-
state tuition in order to finish my degree.
Eight states later, my son was beginning high school and, as his homeschool
teacher, I was on the hunt for anything that might give him a jump start in life. When I
discovered HS4CC, I knew it would be life-changing for him, but I didn’t anticipate that it would change my life, as well.
As he began trying out the different types of alternative college credit, I realized that if he could take these courses, then so could I. Following the advice I learned from HS4CC, I started with CLEP testing, since it is free through Modern States, and found the material easy to move through quickly and the tests much
easier than I anticipated, having been out of school for so many years. After passing 5
CLEP tests, I convinced myself that I could do this, and made a goal of completing my
degree within a year.
I started that summer, when I wasn’t teaching my son, and completed 19 courses
through Sophia in those 3 months. I am a cheap person-I would say frugal to be kind,
but truly, I am cheap. Since Sophia has a monthly service fee, rather than a per-credit
fee, I was going to complete those classes as quickly as I could to get the most bang for
my buck. It paid off! At that point, between Sophia, CLEP, and the 36 credits I had
earned when I attended college, all I had left was my upper-level credits. To complete
these, I chose courses through Coopersmith and Study.com. Based on what I had
learned through HS4CC, though, I knew that taking upper-level courses before knowing
they would be accepted in my planned degree would be a mistake.
By using all of the information that HS4CC provided about the Big Three (COSC,
TESU, and Excelsior), I decided that earning my degree through TESU would be the
best option for me. To make sure I didn’t pay for any unnecessary courses, I took a
TECEP exam through TESU so that I could have access to their academic advisors and
their degree planner, and then had my planned courses approved by the school. In my
ongoing effort to get the most bang for my buck, I evaluated each degree offered by
TESU to see if any of the requirements would overlap. I found that, by taking just a few
extra courses, I would be able to overlap my credits to earn not just a bachelor’s, but
two associate degrees and a certificate. My overachieving side won over my cheap
side, and I decided that the extra month of Study.com I would need to pay for would be worth it.
In just under 8 months from when I began the journey, I completed my degree.
This made my overachieving side happy and my cheap side thrilled because I was able
to do so by spending about $1,200 for the alternative credits and about $6,000 for
TESU, which meant that, excluding the cost of the credits I earned 20 years ago, the
total cost of my degrees was only about $7,200. I utilized several sources of alternative
credit, my existing RA credits, and the two required courses taken at TESU to earn a
Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Studies Social Sciences, an Associate of Science in
Business Administration, an Associate of Art in General Studies, and a Certificate in
Criminal Justice. I had given up on the possibility of ever completing a degree, but
because HS4CC provided all of the information I needed to navigate the process, I am
finally able to say that I am a college graduate! And so can my son! A year after I
graduated from TESU, he graduated from not only high school, but from our local
community college as well with an Associate in General Studies, and while it isn’t in his
current plan, I hope that in the future he chooses to use the 94 credits he earned in high school to complete a Bachelor’s degree from one of the big three, too. Both of us owe a debt of gratitude to HS4CC for providing the tools we needed to achieve these
accomplishments.
