How can my boyfriend finish college so he can go to grad school?

October 11, 2008 5:33 AM

My boyfriend just revealed that he left college four classes short (~1 semester's worth of work) of a Bachelor's degree. He is now interested in a master's program. What options does he have?

Nearly a decade ago, my boyfriend became extremely depressed during his senior year of college. He kept it together fall semester but crashed and burned during the spring semester, going from a 4.4 GPA to failing all four classes.

At the time, he couldn't borrow more and needed to go to work. No one but his teachers knew- he walked with his class in front of his friends and family. His adviser and all of his teachers lobbied on his behalf but the school insisted that in order to get his bachelor's degree he would have to reside on campus for the final semester- no distance learning, no nothing.

We now live across the country. He feels a great deal of shame about this and has kept it a secret from everyone except me and his teachers, but until now his career hasn't necessitated him having a degree. He's now interested in a master's program, which changes everything.

Without him returning and residing at his old school or basically starting over by transferring as a junior to a new school, how can he most efficiently (financially and time-wise) get a bachelor's degree from a reasonably accredited school?

Thanks in advance for any thoughts you might have.

posted by anonymous to education (11 comments total)

Perhaps he can find a suitable local institution which has a generous policy towards transfer credits, and then get credit for all the classes he had taken previously?
posted by NucleophilicAttack at 6:03 AM on October 11, 2008

Has he been in touch with the school yet? Ten years can make a big difference in both personnel and attitudes towards this kind of situation. In a school's mind (I've worked at a bunch), there are few reasons a 22 year old can't come back to finish a semester's work; but there is more understanding about the situation for a 32 year old. Distance learning has come a long way as well, and many schools that never would have been able to offer it ten years ago now can and do.

Find out who is in charge of readmissions and set up a phone appointment to *ask for help* (this is important, actually say "I need your help") and find out what his options realistically are. Be heartfelt and don't get defensive or pissy if you don't hear the answer you want the first time around. Be persistent but extremely humble; if there are roadblocks, ask if it would help for him to write to the chair of his department, his former advisor or anyone else. He's got nothing to lose and there's no need to spend time churning over your plan B until you know that plan A won't work.

If, however, the plan A doesn't work, most schools require 30 hours in residence, so that's probably more like a year.

Be wary of taking the online-only option at a "virtual" university: while many are accredited and offer a relatively decent educational experience, most graduate faculty are disdainful of them and it could actually hurt his chance of getting into a master's program.
posted by Sweetie Darling at 6:05 AM on October 11, 2008 [1 favorite has favorites]

Wow. Well, first off, good for him for wanting to go ahead. I wish him the best.

One thing you might start with is contacting an academic dean at his old school. They deal with this kind of thing fairly often; their main job is to examine the rules and then determine whether or not they'll let someone bend or break them.

The first order of business is likely to start by seeing what classes or requirements he still needs to meet. The deans may evaluate this based on the current standards, which may not match the standards in place when he was in the program. Either way, you'll get a good look at what still needs to be met.

He may also want to get in contact with some of the profs who were working in his department at the time he was there. Whether or not they remember him, they might be able to do a bit of comparison of the standards and give the dean a better idea of what needs to be done. If none of the profs are still there, contacting the department is still a good idea. He may be able to get some things taken care of through a directed/independent study with a prof or two, either at that university or a university near your home, so building/renewing good relationships will be a big help.

Depending on what field he's in, your boyfriend may be able to fudge things through experience. Example: a friend of mine was a CS major before dropping out, but he kept his IT job on campus and parlayed it into a full-time position. He decided to go talk to a dean a few years later, so he went in and had the guy pull his records up on the computer. The dean asked what he'd been up to since dropping out. He pointed to the computer and said, "See that? I made the system that let you do it."

Finally, whether someone tries to fix things immediately or years later, the deans want to know that whatever made the person have problems in the first place is no longer a factor. They'll want to know if he is doing better psychologically, if he's been doing productive work, etc. Don't worry; it's not a real in-depth assessment. However, it's still very important. If they bend the rules for him, they want to know that their faith will be rewarded, right? Your boyfriend just needs to get his shit together and be ready to go forward.

The deans are there to help, and I hope your boyfriend can get things moving. Again, congratulations for coming to terms with this and getting things done; it's a big step that many people might not be able to do.
posted by Madamina at 6:20 AM on October 11, 2008

Along the lines of Sweetie Darling, at the same time you are taking that advice, call the grad school you bf wants to attend and explain the situation to them. They may be very sympathetic to the situation. Not exactly the same thing, but I know two people who applied and got into college without finishing their high school degree, one of whom went on to law school. A lot of schools will consider life and work experience as a substitute for classes especially if it was only a few and the student has great grades otherwise. Also, the admissions test would be a big help if he scores well on it. Having 10 ears experience is a big plus to many programs.
posted by JohnnyGunn at 6:24 AM on October 11, 2008

You can get into an undergraduate program without finishing high school; you cannot get into a master's program without finishing an undergraduate degree. The grad school will expect him to finish the degree he started, and will also expect a good GPA. Were the failures on his record expunged, or are they still there?
posted by Hildegarde at 6:35 AM on October 11, 2008 [1 favorite has favorites]

This example may not fit the desired kind of master's program/direction in life/geographic location, but it's the only example I know. Maybe other schools or law schools also have a similar policy (??) -- Cooley Law School does admit students who are close to finishing a bachelor's degree. It's a real school, down the street from me.

It seems like one way to narrow it down would be for him to first decide on a few schools where he would WANT to go, and then try to work with their admissions staff one-on-one. Then his approach can be more like "I really, really, want to attend your academic institution. Here is one complicating factor though: ________. Can you help?" If the admissions staff can see that he has a genuine drive to go to to their school, that should help his case. (And if he doesn't know what schools he'd actually want to attend, have him start by making a list of schools he definitely wouldn't like.)
posted by oldtimey at 6:44 AM on October 11, 2008

Most grad schools aren't particularly hard up for students, though. You've have to find a program that's really desperate to admit more people. They can always find 200 other people WITH degrees to admit.

Law school is really a professional school, not a graduate school per se. Though some do offer graduate degrees as well.
posted by Hildegarde at 7:04 AM on October 11, 2008

Some schools will allow you to take the last few courses by correspondance if you've been away from school for a long time to earn a Bachelor of General Studies, that might help him.
posted by blue_beetle at 7:25 AM on October 11, 2008

I had a somewhat similar situation when me original school decided one of my credits didn't count. Four years later, I got the final class at a different school. Most colleges require you to have a certain number of the total credits at that school to get the degree (at least half).

In short, the easiest way to finish the bachelor's degree is to get the remaining four courses at some school near you, transfer them to your old school, and then apply for the degree from the original school. Make sure all the classes will transfer, though!

As for the applying to graduate school part, it will definitely be easier if you finish the degree first. He may wish to develop a relationship with a possible adviser and program while finishing his other degree. In many disciplines, developing a relationship with possible advisers goes a long way towards getting into the program, barring any other concerns.
posted by Gneisskate at 7:33 AM on October 11, 2008

The above advice is correct — he should contact the old school. If it is a huge university, he should probably try both the department (any profs still there?) and the Dean of Students (or whatever they call that sort of position at that school). If it is a small place, like a liberal arts college, he could talk to the dean of students, the president's office, or the registrar. I'd probably start with the registrar, get the rules-based answer from them, and then talk to someone higher up about "how can we solve this problem?" What he wants is to find a specific person who gets interested and is willing to work with him to find a creative solution. Maybe a combination of online or independent study, plus flying out for finals week? Or credit for classes taken locally? Or?

He should also (in case the first plan fails) look into local public universities. Tuition is reasonable, and many have programs for returning students that are focused on graduation, rather than on all the barriers to keeping you from graduating. Here is an example, in West Virginia; many places will have something similar.

He may want to go to grad school right away, but delaying for nine months while he picks up a BA through this kind of program would be time well spent. It would also be a chance to take some grad classes in his field, as a way of demonstrating that he is serious and ready for business. (And it would let him create a good story of how this all happened for the graduate application. He could even fudge and say something like "I walked with my class in 1982, but later discovered that bureaucratic errors and my own youthful inattention meant that I in fact did not have a BA. While at State U's Returning Scholar program, I had the opportunity to take 18 credit hours of graduate coursework in [this field], conducted research on XYZ," and so on.)

There are certainly going to be grad schools that won't care if you didn't quite get that BA, too. It will depend a lot on the field, and on the ranking of the department. A really bottom-ranked school may just be desperate for paying bodies, and a really top-ranked school may be willing to "take a risk" on an unusual applicant who is outrageously qualified in other ways, for example. Anywhere with strict GPA and GRE cutoffs is probably not going to have this kind of flexibility. But since it should be so easy to rectify the lack of a BA, I think that he should take care of that, rather than searching for an unusually open graduate program.
posted by Forktine at 7:34 AM on October 11, 2008

What Gneisskate said.

I was in a similar situation as well, though I was only one class short, and I contacted my old academic advisor to find out what my options were. Think of it as a reverse-transfer situation: I was told to take the remaining class at a local community college and transfer the credit to them (instead of starting at a CC and finishing at a 4-year university). Depending on the actual classes your boyfriend needs, he may have the same option available to him, either from a CC or another local 4-year school (if some of the classes are upper level, for instance). Most universities require a certain amount of credits to be taken in residence, but otherwise it shouldn't matter where or when the rest are earned as long as they are transferable to the institution from which you intend to receive your degree.

Tell your boyfriend that what he is doing is courageous and wonderful. After a decade, I'd venture that many people wouldn't attempt to do what he is considering. Bonne chance!
posted by fictionalcara at 12:41 PM on October 12, 2008 [1 favorite has favorites]