FollowAs time passes, more and more college-level open courses are being created, and open courses for accounting are no different. While there are plenty of courses available online, you need to do some research to figure out whether taking open courses is the best decision for you or not.
Getting Credit
Open courses for accounting are open to the public, so you won’t have to worry about paying tuition. While this is great, you need to realize that most Massive Open Online Courses, or MOOCs, will not give you credit. You may be able to print out a certificate to prove that you’ve taken a certain course, but colleges won’t be able to give you credit. You’ll either have to take the course again from an accredited institution or test out of the class. If you feel like you have the knowledge needed to test out of a class, there are a few options. You may be able to:
- take a CLEP exam
- take a DANTES exam
- take a test offered at your college
- make a portfolio to show your knowledge
Keep in mind that some colleges are more likely to give credit by alternative means than other schools. If you’re already enrolled in a college that’s okay with different ways of earning credit, you’re all set. On the other hand, if you aren’t enrolled in a school that you consider a good fit, you can always transfer.
Difficulty
If you’re a total beginner when it comes to accounting, you should be able to find more open courses for accounting than you can count. On the other hand, if you’ve already taken a few years’ worth of accounting courses and are now looking for specialized classes to take, you might not be able to find an online course that covers the material that you are interested in learning. If you want to take a hard or specialized class, you may want to take a regular class so that you can have access to a teacher who can talk to you in person. If you’re just taking an introductory accounting course, it’ll be easier to learn the material without extra help.
Finding Courses
Open courses for accounting are available all over the Internet, and they are offered by actual colleges. For instance, both MIT and Harvard offer various online classes for free to anyone with access to the Internet. Other colleges that are less prestigious can also offer good courses. Coursera, a website for anyone looking to learn about different academic subjects, often has multiple accounting courses listed. Saylor, a website that offers classes that you can take at your own pace, also has accounting courses. In fact, you can even complete a course of study that is similar to what you could expect to take at an accredited college. Just remember that Saylor isn’t accredited, so you won’t earn an actual online accounting degree.
Open accounting classes are great because they’re free and easily accessible. There are many open courses for accounting – you just have to know where to look.
Related Resource: Pros and Cons to Online Accounting Degrees
