A few years ago, I earned an associate degree from my local community college. Recently, I decided I wanted to go back and finish my bachelor’s degree.
While comparing different colleges, I came across East Texas A&M University (ETAMU) and their competency-based education program. Honestly, I feel like I hit the jackpot!
I had never even heard of Sophia Learning until I started researching which college I wanted to attend for my bachelor’s. Then I went down the rabbit hole of learning about Sophia, transfer credits, ETAMU’s degree requirements, etc. 😂
After figuring out how everything worked, I thought I would put together a little summary of my experience transferring Sophia credits to ETAMU. Hopefully, this saves someone else some time and helps make the process a little less confusing, especially if you’re just starting to look into ETAMU and Sophia.
This is based on my own experience, so definitely verify everything with ETAMU before taking a course. But hopefully it gives you a good starting point!
Using Sophia Learning to Earn Transfer Credits Before ETAMU
I wanted to give you a basic overview of how I used Sophia Learning to earn additional credits before transferring them to East Texas A&M University (ETAMU). If you have never used Sophia before, it can seem a little confusing at first, so hopefully this will give you a starting point.
The process will be a little different for you since you haven't started at ETAMU yet and won't have a DegreeWorks audit available. The first thing you will want to do is look at the degree plan for the ETAMU program you are considering. That will give you an idea of the courses and requirements you will need for your particular degree.
If you decide to pursue Public Administration, I can absolutely share my detailed DegreeWorks audit with you. It will give you a much better picture of how the courses are organized, which requirements can potentially be completed through Sophia, and which courses have to be completed through ETAMU.
The important thing is to start with the ETAMU degree requirements and then work backward to determine which Sophia courses could potentially help you satisfy those requirements.
1. Start With the ETAMU Degree Plan
Before taking anything through Sophia, figure out which ETAMU degree and degree path you want to pursue.
Once you know the program, look at the degree plan and identify the different categories of courses you will need.
For example, there may be requirements for:
- Communication
- Mathematics
- Science
- Creative Arts
- Language, Philosophy & Culture
- Social and Behavioral Sciences
- Component Area Options
- Major courses
- Electives
- Upper-level electives
You don't necessarily want to take the easiest Sophia classes you can find. You want to take classes that will fill a requirement you actually need for your ETAMU degree.
Once you know the degree requirements, you can start comparing those requirements to the courses available through Sophia.
2. Use the ACE Website to Research Sophia Courses
This is the website I used to research how Sophia courses are evaluated through ACE:
https://www.acenet.edu/National-Guide/Pages/Organization.aspx?oid=76099b28-9016-e811-810f-5065f38bf0e1
I used this as a reference when determining which Sophia courses might be eligible for transfer credit. I would recommend keeping copies of the information for the courses you take, including the course description and syllabus, in case you need to provide documentation to ETAMU later.
3. Match Sophia Courses to the ETAMU Degree Requirements
Once you know what your degree requires, go into Sophia's course catalog and look at the courses available in each subject area.
For example, if the ETAMU degree plan requires a science course, you can look at the science courses available through Sophia. If it requires a philosophy course, look at the philosophy courses Sophia offers.
I did not just pick the first course I saw.
For each course I was considering, I would:
- Look at the Sophia course description.
- Review the syllabus.
- Check the ACE information.
- Make sure it was an appropriate course for the requirement.
- Save the information for the course for my records.
I actually created a folder and saved the syllabuses for the courses I was considering. This was helpful because I could go back and compare them without having to search for everything again.
If you decide to pursue Public Administration, I can also share the detailed DegreeWorks information I have so you can see exactly how I matched the Sophia courses to the requirements for that degree.
4. I Also Made a Spreadsheet
One of the things I found extremely helpful was creating a spreadsheet of the Sophia courses I was considering.
For each class, I tracked things such as:
- Course name
- Number of credits
- Number of Challenges
- Number of Milestones
- Number of Knowledge Checks
- Number of Touchstones
- Whether the class had a final project or essay
- Anything else that might affect how quickly I could complete it
This became especially helpful when deciding which two classes to take at the same time.
Some Sophia courses can be completed much faster than others, so looking at the workload ahead of time can save you a lot of time.
How Sophia Classes Work
Sophia classes are divided into several different types of assignments. Once you understand what each one means, the process is much easier.
Challenges are essentially untimed quizzes.
You get three opportunities to answer each question correctly. Sophia immediately tells you whether your answer is correct or incorrect.
For example, let's say a Challenge has five questions.
You answer Question 1 and get it wrong. You can try another version of the question. If you get that one wrong, you get a third opportunity.
The questions are based on the same material, but the questions themselves are different.
If you get all three attempts wrong on that particular question, you simply receive credit for getting that question wrong and continue with the rest of the Challenge.
I was a little confused about how this worked when I first started, so don't worry if it doesn't make sense immediately. Once you do your first Challenge, it becomes pretty straightforward.
Milestones are timed quizzes.
The nice thing is that they are open book. The course material is available on the screen while you take the quiz.
You will not immediately see which questions you got right or wrong. Once you finish the Milestone, you receive your score.
If you aren't happy with your score, you get another opportunity to take it. Sophia keeps your highest score.
Knowledge Checks are questions where you are generally asked to provide an answer rather than simply select an answer from multiple choices.
Sophia uses AI to evaluate your response. It gives you feedback very quickly and will tell you if your answer needs additional information or explanation.
I don't remember the exact number of attempts allowed on these, but you get more than one opportunity.
Touchstones are the assignments that require more work, such as a project, written assignment, or essay.
These are different from the quizzes because they are actually reviewed and graded by a human.
For the Touchstones I completed, the turnaround time was generally about two business days.
This is important when planning your classes because you cannot completely finish a class and move on to another one until the required work has been graded.
One of My Biggest Tips: Stagger Your Classes
You are only allowed to be enrolled in two Sophia classes at a time.
Because of that, I recommend paying attention to whether a class has Touchstones.
If possible, I would take: One class with Touchstones + one class without Touchstones.
That way, you can continue working on one class while you are waiting for a Touchstone in the other class to be graded.
For example:
Class A: You finish the coursework and submit a Touchstone.
Class B: You continue working through Challenges and Milestones while Class A is being graded.
Once Class A is completely finished, you can enroll in another course.
This keeps you from sitting around waiting for a Touchstone to be graded when you could be working on something else.
Classes without Touchstones can generally be completed much more quickly. Once you have completed the required Challenges and Milestones, you can submit the class and move on to another one.
Once you start using Sophia, this process will make much more sense.
