Every year, our parents report that “saving money” is the #1 reason they are Homeschooling for College Credit. When your teen takes college classes before they’ve graduated from high school, you’ll have the opportunity to pay significantly less than that college’s “rack rate” tuition. Once your teen graduates high school, everyone pays full price.
College Costs Money, HS4CC Saves Money
The best part of setting your college credit budget in high school is your freedom to price shop. If your teen were enrolled in college as a college student, you’re locked into that college’s costs and your only options are scholarships, savings, working, or loans. When your teen is taking college classes in high school, you have zero restrictions. If you want to sign up for the most expensive classes or focus only on the lowest costs, it’s completely your choice.
Parents sometimes tell me that their local university charges X per credit for high school students, and that it’s too expensive. Good news! You don’t have to use your local university. Most dual enrollment programs offer online learning, so if your local university is too expensive, keep shopping. You might find a university across the country that has the same class for a fraction of the cost.
Rack Rate
I use the term “rack rate” to help parents put costs in context. You may be familiar with the term “rack rate” as it applies to hotels. That’s the price they advertise, and that’s the price you’ll pay when you just show up and ask for a room, but most of us know there are deals and coupons available to us if we do a little digging ahead of time. College degrees work in a similar way, but with more zeros! If you just show up, your teen will pay the “rack rate” full price tuition and fees. Unlike a hotel, this advertised price is the price, but by taking advantage of outsourcing as many courses as possible (for less cost) your degree can consist of both cheaper outsourced courses AND those you’ve paid rack rate for. Once you bring down the number of courses you’ll need at rack rate, you can start using scholarships, grants, and your savings to handle those costs.
Dual Enrollment Pricing
Dual enrollment courses are the same courses your teen would take as a college student. This is not to be confused with public school dual enrollment which sometimes happens in a high school with other high school students and taught by high school teachers. Homeschooling for College Credit families take dual enrollment courses directly with a college. It’s important to know that the discount varies by college, so it’s not easy to find the deals without a lot of searching. Our volunteers write lists of colleges and prices to help you with this search.
Stay or Go? PRO TIP: Use DE for Residency
Most dual enrollment students do not stay at the college to finish a degree, rather they transfer their earned credit into a target college after high school. There are many things to consider, but speaking strictly in terms of your budget, an advantage of staying with a college, is that you’ve taken course that count towards your teen’s residency requirement. The residency requirement is the number of courses the college requires you take with them in order to earn a degree. It’s typical for a residency requirement to be 25% – 50% of the degree. Since Homeschooling for College Credit families are probably also bringing in a lot of alternative credit, coupling it with dual enrollment gets you that much closer to the maximum savings. Take a look at this real example of how HS4CC parents can resourcefully plan to save at Liberty University.
Example: Liberty University
- Bachelor’s Degree requirement: 120 credits
- Residency requirement: 25% (30 credits)
- Transfer allowance: 75% (90 credits)
With those facts in hand, you can calculate a budget based on knowing that you have total control over the transfer allowance (up to 90 credits) and what you spend. Liberty, on the other hand, will control the residency credits at their current tuition rate. Currently, their online tuition is the lowest rate they offer $390 per credit.
At $390 per credit, you can calculate that you’ll spend a minimum of $390 x 30 credits because their residency requirement is 30 credits.
- Residency requirement: 25% (30 credits) <– no control over cost
- Transfer allowance: 75% (90 credits) <– total control over cost
As you can see in the breakdown above, it’s not the 90 credits that can break the bank, it’s the 30 credits at full rack rate. While you can hope for scholarships, you must budget for those 30 credits because that tuition will be the most expensive part of the degree.
This is where dual enrollment steps in and saves the day! Remember that dual enrollment courses meet a university’s residency requirement, so if you can take those courses for less than rack rate, you’ll reduce your costs.
Liberty University’s dual enrollment courses are approximately $180 per credit, which is saving over HALF the cost for each course you replace! A parent who resourcefully plans for their teen to take dual enrollment with Liberty and then STAY at Liberty, you can now control and reduce costs that were previously out of your control.
- Residency requirement: 25% (30 credits)
- 7 dual enrollment courses (21 credits) at 50% cost
- 3 college courses (9 credits) at rack rate
Using Alternative Credits
$3,000 to hit 90 credits.
When you use a Type 3 (ACE) or Type 4 (NCCRS) credits (see table below) you usually need to attend a university that has partnered with those sources. The good news is that there are several hundred colleges that are partners, the bad news is that there are several hundred that are not! When using ACE / NCCRS credits, many universities operate as “all or nothing” in their acceptance. Partner colleges and universities that eagerly accept ACE and NCCRS credits are generally expecting you to bring in large amounts of credit prior to enrollment.
For Homeschooling families, ACE and NCCRS credit can make a degree affordable.
As a rule of thumb, ACE or NCCRS partner colleges will accept as many as 90 well-planned credits (3 years), leaving about 30 residency credits (1 year) to complete via online or on campus classes. There are a lot of variations, but a good budget for this strategy is $3,000 for the first 90 credits and rack rate of $400/credit for the last 30 credits. You’ll pay cash (starting in high school) for the first 90 credits, and complete the last 30 after high school. After high school you’ll have access to financial aid, 529 savings, grants, employer tuition assistance, and scholarships. Using national averages, you would expect to pay $15,000 TOTAL for a degree this way.
Pro Tips: HS4CC on a Budget
- Everything you pay for during high school is out of pocket. Financial aid is not available until after high school.
- Scholarships for dual enrollment may be available in very rare circumstances.
- Scholarships for after high school can be stretched to their fullest by bringing in as much credit as possible and reducing what is left to cover at rack rate.
- CLEP exams are free with very good transferability and should be used as final exams for every high school class you teach to your teen (where applicable). There is no downside to accumulating credit by exam, even if it isn’t used. Read more.
- 17 states currently offer free dual enrollment in some amount. If you live in one of those states, be sure to take full advantage of what’s available, and then build on top of that program using other college credit options available to you.
- On our 30 Ways to Earn College Credit list, the credits are ranked by transferability. The less transferable a course is, the more important it is to have a college picked out.
- Price can be computed per course or per credit, for this exercise I’ve computed everything by credit so you can compare apples to apples.
- To learn more about each option below, refer to our 30 Ways to Earn College Credit guide.
Rough Numbers: What You’ll Probably Pay
- A typical college course is billed at 3 credits.
- A typical 2-year degree requires 60 college credits.
- A typical 4-year degree requires 120 college credits.
| Type | Transferability | During High School | After High School |
|---|---|---|---|
| OnlineDegree.com | Type 4: NCCRS Credit (Very Limited Transferability) | $3/credit | $3/credit |
| Law Shelf | Type 4: NCCRS Credit (Very Limited Transferability) | $10/credit | $10/credit |
| Coopersmith & Davar | Type 4: NCCRS Credit (Very Limited Transferability) | $50/credit | $50/credit |
| TEEX | Type 3: ACE Credit (Limited Transferability) | free | free |
| Saylor Academy | Type 3: ACE Credit (Limited Transferability) | $2/credit | $2/credit |
| SeeMore Labs | Type 3: ACE Credit (Limited Transferability) | $13/credit | $13/credit |
| Gateway Education | Type 3: ACE Credit (Limited Transferability) | $23/credit | $23/credit |
| Statistics.com | Type 3: ACE Credit (Limited Transferability) | $300/credit | $300/credit |
| Study.com | Type 3: ACE Credit (Limited Transferability) | $40/credit* | $40/credit* |
| Straighterline | Type 3: ACE Credit (Limited Transferability) | $49/credit* | $40/credit* |
| Sophia | Type 3: ACE Credit (Limited Transferability) | $17/credit* | $17/credit* |
| Advanced Placement Exam | Type 2: Credit by Exam (Good Transferability) | $33/credit | NA |
| CLEP Exam | Type 2: Credit by Exam (Good Transferability) | free^ | free^ |
| DSST Exam | Type 2: Credit by Exam (Good Transferability) | $33/credit | $33/credit |
| IEW Christian Halls | Type 1: RA Graded Credit (Excellent Transferability) | $200/credit | NA |
| Classical Conversations Plus | Type 1: RA Graded Credit (Excellent Transferability) | $167/credit + CC enrollment | NA |
| Veritas Press / Scholars Academy (VSA) | Type 1: RA Graded Credit (Excellent Transferability) | $260/credit + VSA enrollment | NA |
| Wescott Courses | Type 1: RA Graded Credit (Excellent Transferability) | $200/credit | $200/credit |
| Arizona State University Universal Learner | Type 1: RA Graded Credit (Excellent Transferability) | $141/credit | $141/credit |
| Any community college national average | Type 1: RA Graded Credit (Excellent Transferability) | $0/credit – $141/credit | $141/credit |
| Any public university in-state tuition national average | Type 1: RA Graded Credit (Excellent Transferability) | $0/credit- $390/credit | $390/credit |
| Any public university out-of-state tuition national average | Type 1: RA Graded Credit (Excellent Transferability) | $0/credit-$1,200/credit | $1,200/credit |
| Any private university national average | Type 1: RA Graded Credit (Excellent Transferability) | $0/credit – $1,400/credit | $1,400/credit |
^obtain a voucher to take this exam for free through Modern States CLEP pre course. There is no cost to take the course or obtain the voucher. There is no limit to the number of vouchers you can earn.