College credit for FEMA independent study courses

[cap235629]

I was doing some continuing education classes through the FEMA Independent Study program and came across a link to a site offering college credit for the classes.  I said to myself, yeah, right, DIPLOMA MILL.

I was wrong.

I did some research and was pleasantly surprised that it was in fact legitimate.

Frederick Community College in Frederick Maryland has partnered with FEMA to accept the classes and award credit toward a LEGITIMATELY ACCREDITED A.A.S. degree in Emergency Management.

They even have matriculation agreement with 3 other schools that will accept the AAS credits toward the completion of a Bachelors Degree.   ALL OF THEM.

I have almost 50 credit hours from various attempts at college over the past 20 years and really wanted to finish a degree without going broke.  I also have changed career focus late in life and have jumped headfirst into the Emergency Managemet career field.  I earned certification through the State of Arkansas and I sit for my AEM certification test from the International Association of Emergency Managers in the spring.  So I have an impressive professional education resume but no degree.  This program makes that a reality.

I submitted my previous transcripts from 2 educational institutions and the Army and was SHOCKED to find out that I need to complete 2 additional classes and do a 6 month internship and I have my degree.

My total cost to will be less than $3500.  The FEMA courses that are recognized will be converted to credit for $79.00 per credit hour. There are 30 credits required from the IS program for the degree.  So do the math.  It costs NOTHING to take the IS classes and to receive credit you pay a whopping total of $2370. 

That is 1 full year of college credit!

The best part?  You can take any required core classes from ANY accredited institution, you do not have to take ANY classes at FCC except for them approving your internship and having to take 4 exams for about $25 each.  So my 2 classes are going to cost me less that $400 here through our Adult Education Center and a local university and the internship will cost me about $900 through FCC because I have to pay out of state tuition for those 3 credits.

They also are fully accredited so all Federal Student Aid programs are available if you qualify. The also offer online classes so you can finish your degree that way if you prefer.

This program was briefly mention HERE about 6 years ago.

Here is a link to the program

EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT DEGREE

I would say that you are getting a pretty good bang for your buck.....

[RiverAux]

Well, I congratulate you on finding that, but speaking as a graduate of many FEMA independent study courses I have yet to find one that I thought was college-level material. 

Now, the classroom-based ICS courses came a bit closer, but I would personally question the quality of a degree based primarily upon them. 

[lordmonar]

Why piss on the parade?

Someone wants to give credit for FEMA classes.....more power to them.

[GroundHawg]

The much, much, much, cheaper option is to use the credit bank option at Thomas Edison State University. For a flat rate, they will put all your FEMA credits onto their transcript. I received 48 credit hours for less than $400. I didn't pursue the AAS degree they offer (I may still btw) but I didn't have to do a single elective for my BS in Management from a traditional brick and mortar school.

[RiverAux]

Why piss on the parade?

Someone wants to give credit for FEMA classes.....more power to them.

Why?  Because as a college graduate I have some level of self-interest in making sure that college degrees are not devalued by schools that give credit for courses that I don't think represent college-level work. 

Can anyone honestly say that ICS-100/200 are worth a college credit hour? 

Besides those two easy ones I've taken about 5 others that are on the list and the total time I spent on them was probably less than 8 hours. 

Now, many of these are most certainly worthwhile courses, but I'd probably be looking at having 10-15 of those courses equal to about 1 credit hour before I'd say they were worth a single credit hour. 

[Eclipse]

^ Seriously?

You've got colleges out there that give hours for "life experience" (i.e. a check).

[cap235629]

Well, I congratulate you on finding that, but speaking as a graduate of many FEMA independent study courses I have yet to find one that I thought was college-level material. 

Now, the classroom-based ICS courses came a bit closer, but I would personally question the quality of a degree based primarily upon them.

I actually brought up the classroom courses (of which I have 9) not being on the list.  I asked if they could be evaluated based upon this very argument.  The registrars office informed me the courses they give credit for were evaluated by ACE and that they only awarded credit for courses that ACE assigns credit for.  I too thought it odd that a 5 day long, 8 hour a day class WITH homework wasn't worth any credit but  IS100 and 200 combined were evaluated and deemed worthy of 1 credit...  But it is what it is.  I guess the fault lies with ACE and not the institution.......

[cap235629]

Oh and on another note, IAEM allows the following hours for CAP courses for the required 100 hours of General Leadership and Management training for both their AEM and CEM certifications.

Civil Air Patrol Corporate Learning Course                                         16   
Civil Air Patrol Unit Commanders Course                                                 16   
Civil Air Patrol Squadron Leadership School                                         16   
Civil Air Patrol Train Leaders of Cadets                                                 16   
Civil Air Patrol Regional Staff College                                                     50
Civil Air Patrol National Staff College                                                  50   
Civil Air Patrol Wing and Region Commander's Course                         40   

That was a surprise for me.  We are on the radar of the International Association of Emergency Managers.

Pretty cool.

[RiverAux]

BTW, I'm not going to ever fault anyone for taking advantage of something that is available even if I don't think it should be in the first place. 

[cap235629]

The much, much, much, cheaper option is to use the credit bank option at Thomas Edison State University. For a flat rate, they will put all your FEMA credits onto their transcript. I received 48 credit hours for less than $400. I didn't pursue the AAS degree they offer (I may still btw) but I didn't have to do a single elective for my BS in Management from a traditional brick and mortar school.

Thanks for the info.  I checked it out.  They no longer offer an AAS in Emergency Management/Homeland Security only a BAS.  They offer "credit banking" but my concern is the credits won't be transferable to another program so the money will be wasted.  I may look at banking the classes FCC also awards credit for and save even more money.......

[JC004]

Why piss on the parade?

Someone wants to give credit for FEMA classes.....more power to them.

Why?  Because as a college graduate I have some level of self-interest in making sure that college degrees are not devalued by schools that give credit for courses that I don't think represent college-level work. 

Can anyone honestly say that ICS-100/200 are worth a college credit hour? 

Besides those two easy ones I've taken about 5 others that are on the list and the total time I spent on them was probably less than 8 hours. 

Now, many of these are most certainly worthwhile courses, but I'd probably be looking at having 10-15 of those courses equal to about 1 credit hour before I'd say they were worth a single credit hour.

Come on.  You're single-handedly preserving the integrity of the U.S. degree system?  Are you being serious right now? 

College course quality can be plain lousy.  Someone I know was submitting papers for the college English class that were absolutely awful.  I marked one of those up with corrections.  The pages were COVERED in red corrections.  But he submitted his own, achieving a B+ (with only about 2 corrections added by the professor).  That wouldn't be my only experience with lousy course standards (far from it). 

When we get IT students who come work with our organization as work study, interns, etc., I have my own material that I teach them because their program doesn't even teach them basic things you need to know in a business IT position (like planning a network).  Not only are their course standards low, but the DEGREE standards suck.

^ Seriously?

You've got colleges out there that give hours for "life experience" (i.e. a check).

I'm not against colleges offering credit for experience in volunteer programs and paid jobs.  In my opinion, many degrees should require MORE practical application before the degree is granted - not less.  I can't tell you how many times we've had applicants, students, or workers who simply had very little idea how to do what their degree should have taught them.  I can remember an interesting experience from when I revised all of the organization's publications.  I gave the drafts to the people who had degrees in English.  They needed a lot of work because after pulling together material from A LOT of sources for the drafts, there were a lot of issues with tense use, writing styles clashing, levels of quality from previous writers, etc.  I scrapped the idea after getting the first few publications listed because those folks found only a tiny fraction of what needed to be fixed.  I had to do the bulk of that work myself.

[RiverAux]

College course quality can be plain lousy.  Someone I know was submitting papers for the college English class that were absolutely awful.  I marked one of those up with corrections.  The pages were COVERED in red corrections.  But he submitted his own, achieving a B+ (with only about 2 corrections added by the professor).  That wouldn't be my only experience with lousy course standards (far from it). 

I was doing just what you did here -- complain about the quality of a course being given college credit. 

I'm not against colleges offering credit for experience in volunteer programs and paid jobs.

I don't have a problem with intern programs either.  I'm also not against college credit for internet-based courses.  I'm just not in favor of giving an inordinate amount of credit to courses that are not really college level material. 

You know, I took a "library skills" class as an undergraduate that I think was a 1 credit class.  It was certainly an easy class, but I learned a lot that really helped in other classes.  However, even that class is more justified as a 1 credit class than ICS100 and 200. 

[Woodsy]

I wonder if FCC would count CAP involvement as an internship?  I don't see why not...  As a wing level director, I spend way more hours per week doing CAP stuff than most people do for an "internship." 

Granted, my current responsibility of public affairs likely wouldn't directly relate to EM, but say I were to attach myself to Ops for the time being...

I actually looked into the FCC option, even applied and was accepted.  Financial concerns at the time prevented me from pursuing it.  It also doesn't relate to my current career, but if it can be had for a decent price, I'm not opposed to adding it to my resume...

I've never heard of this AEM certification.  May look into that as well. 

[wuzafuzz]

When I worked in public safety most of the in-service classes I took offered .5 credits, 1 credit, etc.  All you had to do was attend the class for a week or a few days and write a check to the sponsoring college.  My police academy was good for even more credits.  Years later I decided to complete an associates degree in Criminal Justice.  I had to get transcripts from about 15 colleges, but my main school accepted them.  I was a very happy camper.

Many moons later I chased my bachelor's degree in IT.  The university awarded credits for life experience, but those had to be justified with professional designations and certified work experience.  Also, I had to demonstrate my experience satisfied the course learning objectives listed in a college course catalog.  It was no easy ride, particularly when considering what I did to earn the knowledge being documented.  (Other schools may be easier.)  That knocked about 3 elective classes off my to-do list.

So, if you have practical experience and can demonstrate you achieved the learning objectives of a specific course, you may very well be able to earn some credit for it.  It's all up to your school.  Some are reasonable, some want you to take all your classes from them, and I've heard some will do anything if you pay them enough.

[JC004]

I wonder if FCC would count CAP involvement as an internship?  I don't see why not...  As a wing level director, I spend way more hours per week doing CAP stuff than most people do for an "internship." 

Granted, my current responsibility of public affairs likely wouldn't directly relate to EM, but say I were to attach myself to Ops for the time being...

I actually looked into the FCC option, even applied and was accepted.  Financial concerns at the time prevented me from pursuing it.  It also doesn't relate to my current career, but if it can be had for a decent price, I'm not opposed to adding it to my resume...

I've never heard of this AEM certification.  May look into that as well.

Internships usually require a formal relationship with an organization, a written agreement, a supervisor with a relevant degree, and such.  Credit for life learning usually requires you to prepare a portfolio that meets the requirements of the department and registrar.  That portfolio shows that you learned/performed the relevant skills.  Of course, these things varies by institution. 

[lordmonar]

Some universities give credit for your summer vacation.

Say you are going to Europe or Asia for a week or two.  Basically you do a report "What I did on my summer vacation: By Patrick Harris age 8" for an few credits.

Again...usually has to be approved before hand and must meet certain requirements.

[JC004]

DOING something (especially repeatedly) and needing to learn exactly how to do it are a heck of a lot more effective ways to learn than just memorizing long enough for the test. 

It blows my mind when I see programs that don't require practice or application in areas of study for which some application/practice is really necessary (like business).  You can graduate with a degree in business without having actually worked, ever?  Yikes. 

[lordmonar]

DOING something (especially repeatedly) and needing to learn exactly how to do it are a heck of a lot more effective ways to learn than just memorizing long enough for the test. 

It blows my mind when I see programs that don't require practice or application in areas of study for which some application/practice is really necessary (like business).  You can graduate with a degree in business without having actually worked, ever?  Yikes.

And that's the sneaky thing about degrees.
Not only that....but half the stuff you learned to get your degree has nothing to do with what ever the degree is.  (foreign languages anyone?)

[Майор Хаткевич]

DOING something (especially repeatedly) and needing to learn exactly how to do it are a heck of a lot more effective ways to learn than just memorizing long enough for the test. 

It blows my mind when I see programs that don't require practice or application in areas of study for which some application/practice is really necessary (like business).  You can graduate with a degree in business without having actually worked, ever?  Yikes.

And that's the sneaky thing about degrees.
Not only that....but half the stuff you learned to get your degree has nothing to do with what ever the degree is.  (foreign languages anyone?)

Foreign Languages are more useful than many other subjects when it comes to overall "might be useful down the line".

[lordmonar]

DOING something (especially repeatedly) and needing to learn exactly how to do it are a heck of a lot more effective ways to learn than just memorizing long enough for the test. 

It blows my mind when I see programs that don't require practice or application in areas of study for which some application/practice is really necessary (like business).  You can graduate with a degree in business without having actually worked, ever?  Yikes.

And that's the sneaky thing about degrees.
Not only that....but half the stuff you learned to get your degree has nothing to do with what ever the degree is.  (foreign languages anyone?)

Foreign Languages are more useful than many other subjects when it comes to overall "might be useful down the line".

Sure.....just one example of "useless" classes that are required to maintain the prestige of a degree and having a well rounded education.