The College Network Study Guides

[lsmith3532]

I have been browsing this site for a few weeks. I have purchased a few of The College Network study guides off of Ebay. These books seem to be structured towards passing the CLEPs for their respective subjects. I have been looking for some other opinions on these guides. Good, Bad, or whatever?

Thanks

[larry7crys]

Are you signed up here i.e. able to access the member area?

[lsmith3532]

Yes, I also joined the instantcert site.

[sheeenz]

I am suscribed to TCN and their services. I really like it. Their information is up to date on what you actually encounter on the exams.

[Sache]

Bump....anyone else have experience with these study guides?

[april004]

I have some of these study guides. The most recent I used was Ethics. I still felt the need to supplement the material. Nothing really wrong with the material, but the Ethics study guide in particular was a very dry read.

[socal1]

I have my English Comp next month and also wanted to know if i should purchase "CLEP Official Study Guide, 19th Edition " or sign up with IC, i will have a couple more test after that and wanted to know what has worked best for everyone.

thanks

[thewholewearld]

Originally Posted by sheeenz

I am suscribed to TCN and their services. I really like it. Their information is up to date on what you actually encounter on the exams.

Hi!!

I'm new to the site and I am trying to get as mucn info as possible. What is TCN and what are their services?

[april004]

TCN will try to talk you into a contract. They recruited a few of us LPNS @ my clinic to an information session about the Lpn- BSN program through Indiana State. Turns out it was more of a sales presentation. A very pressured sales presentation.

I went and they were busy signing people up and having them sign CONTRACTS on the spot. One of my friend's contracts had her paying a little over $200 a month- total $5000 due to the fact she had barely any college credits behind her and had to pay for most of the study guides!

(This is just for the study guides, I also remember them talking about tutoring services if one fails twice.) But it's not like you can take these tests right away if you fail. You have to wait a few months in between. Amongst my Lpn friends who signed up none has used the tutoring services as of yet, so I can't comment. And maybe on that point alone, it may be worth it to some people. It just wasn't for me. Also none of the fee you pay towards TCN goes towards Indiana State or whatever college they have partnered up with Indiana State University,etc. is still very much separate from TCN . TCN does not award the degree. The actual college does.

I signed up and later decided it wasn't what I wanted to do. ( I think one has to opt out within 2 days or you're stuck!) I eventually bought some for much much cheaper through ebay!

I think one has to be wary when signing their name on the dotted line. They tried their hardest to not have me break the contract.

If I was going to do it over again or advise someone who thought of going through TCN, I would tell them to use resources like Instantcert/ Idiot's Guides/etc/ to clep out of some of the Gen Ed classes first. You will save alot of money. I would hate someone to go into debt over study guides when there are resources that are just as good if not better. Why pay 100-200 monthly for TCN study guides when you can pay $20 a month for instantcert? That's a no brainer right there.

If one feels like joining TCN ,do it after you've done the max cleps/dsst's/ECE's you can without TCN, then join so that the monthly fee is lower and you have less study guides to purchase! Or just get them through ebay like me!

So many of my Lpn friends now wish they had known about the other methods in testing out of cleps/DSST's rather than buying expensive study guides. The people that are trying to get ahead are the ones that are being put into needless debt. Really, I hate to see ones who can afford it least, put into this situation. Instead of putting all that money towards those study guides put it towards your exams and tuition!

Sure, here @ instantcert there aren't tutoring sessions but I find the info from my peers here is more than helpful.