TEL Learning

Overview
TEL Learning is a site that offers a number of course study materials for free. This includes things like American Government, Chemistry, History, and more. This makes them a good resource, in addition to Modern States to studying for some CLEP exams. But where TEL Learning shines is their affordable access to RA credits. Through partnership agreements, courses you pay for at TEL Learning will be transcripted on one of two (as of October 2020) partner universities as if you had taken the courses at the university itself. Costs (as of October 2020) are $200 for 3-credit courses and $67 for 1-credit courses. Because everything is included (proctor fees, educational resources, etc.), this makes them one of the most inexpensive sources of a science-with-a-lab course to fulfill COSC's requirement for this Gen Ed.

As of October 2020, the partner universities that will transcript TEL Learning are Greenville University and Mid-America Christian University. The course equivalencies available for Mid-America are more specific, with multiple TEL Learning courses transcribing at Greenville as simply "Elective Credit". Check equivalencies for each partner before making your choice for a given course.

Course content
According to TEL Learning's site, their courses:


 * TEL Library Courses on Demand are all-inclusive, meaning they contain all course materials, instruction, technology, and proctored exams.


 * Each TEL Library college-credit course features between 60-70 lessons, quizzes, mastery assignments (with peer-review), and 2 proctored exams. Each three-hour course represents approximately 135-150 hours of study.


 * In addition, each course provides course meetups with the instructor, live and recorded special topic sessions, and access to course support via chat, phone, and email.

Associate's Degree for HS Students
Via YC Academy, in partnership with York College, high school students are able to earn an Associate in Arts for a total cost of $4,000. According to the FAQ page, they only allow 6 credits to be transferred in from elsewhere meaning that students are unable to fully utilize less expensive resources like Sophia.org for their requirements. Despite the lack of in-bound transfers, this is still one of the lowest-cost ways to obtain an associate's degree, especially for students still in high school. When considering any of the big 3 for associate's degrees, TESU has an expensive residency fee waiver that is more than $3,000 and all of the big 3 require between 3 and 7 credits to be taken at the university itself (for a tuition cost of between approximately $1500 and $3600 before you even consider the cost of the other required courses). This requirement does not exist with YC Academy; all you pay is the $4,000.

Mature students residing in the US should consider Pierpont as a low-cost way to obtain an associate's degree.

Resources

 * TEL Learning homepage
 * Courses-on-Demand - Courses available for credit
 * Partner Institutions