Clep Prep
The College Level Examination Program (CLEP) is a series of over 34 tests that have been put together by the college board that gives the ability for students who were able to show understanding of subject taught over the semester the ability to test out the entire class, earn the full credit hours, without having to spend the time submitting homework attending class or paying full tuition.
Over 3000 colleges and universities accept clep testing credit hours, in order to clep college classes you typically need to score a 50 or higher on the grading level of 20 – 80 for each test. These are particularly useful for students who obtain knowledge prior to enrolling in college or have a basic understanding of subjects or who have the ability to remember what they’ve read and retain it to test out of the class.
I was able to personally test out of nearly a year of college by taking clep tests, this saved a tremendous amount of time off my overall college experience as well as cost because each clip test is typically $77, the only additional fee that you pay, is a sitting fee that will range based on where you’re taking the test. I never found the sitting fees to be more than $20 per test.
One of the benefits of taking a clep tests is that you will find many that are worth 6 and even 12 credit hours in addition to the traditional 3 credit hours available. My recommendation would be to work with your school counselor to find out which subjects you can test out of and where you can apply the credit hours. There are many easy clep tests that you can take even without having prior experience simply by studying the official study guide and applying those credits to your undergraduate electives requirements. This means that you can entirely skipped taking any elective classes and paying full tuition and apply clep test credit hours for elective classes as well as other core undergraduate classes.
If you are wondering the best way to prepare yourself to take a clep test, start by reading through the official club study guide. These can be obtained at any online bookstore or local bookstore. Just make sure that you call ahead to your local bookstore, I found that they typically only carried a few subjects, some of the more popular subjects, and when I needed to take clep tests I would have to special order the books from the bookstore which they all did easily for me.
This site has a clep difficulty list published, you should review this list and see which ones you may have a natural fit for and which ones are the easiest so you can start with those. There’s no reason that you can’t shave a year of college off of your overall experience by preparing and taking advantage of clep testing.
Nearly every clep test is multiple-choice and the score of 50 or higher is required to pass. There are some clep test such as the Spanish test you that is obtaining 50 or higher earning 6 full credit hours however if you score of 62 will earn you 12 credit hours. Mention pain only $77 for 12 credit hours, you can do this with many subjects.
Here is a list of available clep subjects and how much each is worth:
Business:
Financial Accounting 3
Business Law, Introductory 3
Information Systems and Computer Applications 3
Management, Principles of 3
Marketing, Principles of 3
Composition and Literature:
American Literature 6
Analyzing and Interpreting Literature 6
College Composition 6
College Composition Modular 3
English Literature 6
Humanities 6
Foreign Languages:
French Language, Levels 1 and 2 3-12
German Language, Levels 1 and 2 3-12
Spanish Language, Levels 1 and 2 3-12
History and Social Sciences:
American Government 3
Educational Psychology, Introduction to 3
History of the United States I: Early Colonization to 1877 3
History of the United States II: 1865 to Present 3
Human Growth and Development 3
Macroeconomics, Principles of 3
Microeconomics, Principles of 3
Psychology, Introductory 3
Social Sciences and History 6
Sociology, Introductory 3
Western Civilization I: Ancient Near East to 1648 3
Western Civilization II: 1648 to Present 3
Science and Mathematics:
Biology 6
Calculus 3
Chemistry 6
College Algebra 3
College Mathematics 6
Precalculus 3
Natural Sciences 6