Link of the Week: June 14... Strayer University

246 Best Practice College and University Website Pages

Most weeks I add a link to a college or university website that is superior to what else is available in student recruitment, alumni relations, fundraising or other areas that I visit in preparing conference presentations and website reviews for my clients.

Links that are no longer active (or no longer lead to the featured content) are at the end of the list below. To my surprise: 10 of the links for the 2006 year are still good. Check the venerable ones below. (Links of the Week after February 8 are missing from the archives. Working to fix this in the near future.)

• For  Link of the Week selections between February 15 and April 19, visit my blog. 

Recommend a Link of the Week feature on your website. Email me at bob@bobjohnsonconsulting.com

14 June — Strayer University... "Affordability Calculator" Goes Past Net Cost Calculators        

Visit the usual college and university website and you'll find that the net cost calculator usually excludes anyone who is not a traditional age student entering direct from high school. That leaves "adult" students with transfer credit, work exprience and any other non-traditional way of earning credit out in the cold.

Today's Link of the Week selection takes a much different approach, with an Affordability Calculator that assembles in a single place the various options that adult students might have to reduce the courses they have to take to earn a degree. And that, of course, will reduce the cost of that degree.

Here's what Strayer University includes on the affordability form:

• Courses, "not credits," that will transfer
• Challenge exams offered by Stayer
• CLEP and DSST exames
• Past work experience
• Employer tuition assitance

The first result you'll see is the total tuition cost minus the tuition saved from the courses you expect to transfer. Afther that, potential students can learn more about courses with challenge exams and other opportuities to reduce the sticker price of a degree. All of this before we get to loans and other forms of financial aid.

Most universities offer the same options to earn credit. Finding them all in a prominent place on the website requires extraordinary diligence, if you even know the options exist. Review a different approach to dealing with college affordability when you visit the Strayer University "Affordability Calculator."

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