K.E.
If you only have four courses remaining, your best option is to find equivalents online of the courses you have left at McHenry CC and transfer them back to your "home" school. I have did this with my Master's in Education. I attended a four-year university and when we moved a few hours away, I only had four classes left. If I were to transfer everything to another school, I would have lost too many hours. It was the better option to just seek the classes elsewhere, check with my home school to ensure they would transfer in, and then take the classes. That is what I did and I was able to finish my degree and graduate from my original school. I have several years of college administration experience and have also worked with advising several students in your situation. My suggestion would be to look online (more to come below on selecting reputable/accredited schools) and find a similar course description for each of your remaining classes at McHenry. Every school should have their course catalog online with the course descriptions. Take each description back to McHenry to the Registrar's or Registration office and get approval. As long as the hours and description are equivalent, they should transfer. You may have them from different schools. I took one from Univ. of Phoenix and a couple of others from Olivet Nazarene Univ. in Bourbonnais (a correspondence course where I watched the videos from home and completed the work and sent in). I had a positive experience with Univ. of Phoenix. Please note that most schools will have a limit on how many hours you can transfer in from another school, but in my experience, four hours should be no problem.
As far as online classes/colleges, just be sure you select an accredited college. Every accredited school is governed by one of six accrediting agencies in the U.S. This link details those: http://www.back2college.com/library/accreditfaq.htm
Any school should have no problem providing you their accreditation information. It should actually be on their website. If you don't choose an accredited school, your classes will not likely transfer.
From a student and college instructor perspective,I have enjoyed both taking and teaching online courses. There previously was a stigma (and perhaps there still is) about online classes not being "quality." I disagree. I currently teach at a local college as well as online for a university. As a student, the courses I have taken were just as demanding (if not more due to me having to make sure to allow enough time to be online) and rigorous. As an instructor, I expect the same behavior and results from my "on-ground" students. Yes, you may have students in your class, who occasionally post something in the discussion board that is not written properly or curses, but as an instructor at my online college, we have procedures in place to stop those actions immediately and remove the student if necessary. I have had it happen twice in five years of teaching online. But I have had to remove two students in my on-ground class as well in the past five years for inappropriate behavior as well. In online classes, you typically have a weekly discussion assignment where you correspond quite a bit with others in the class. Some people miss the face-to-face interaction, but sometimes the convenience of online is necessary due to work or other obligations.
As long as the degree is from an accredited school it should be viewed as the same level as a degree from an on-ground school. With this day and age, many of the online requirements require clinicals on-site, hands-on experiences through arranging of your own, etc. You still sit through lectures; they are just on video or are read. They just aren't delivered in person. My online students still have the same amount of chapter reading, paper writing, etc. as do my on-ground students. Most online colleges are "for profit." Many are still accredited, but do shop around for costs when comparing. Your federal financial aid (through FAFSA) can still be used for an online accredited school. Many principals or asst. principals complete their advanced degrees for those positions online. In today's society,
If you transfer four online classes back to McHenry, though, your degree will still come from McHenry.
Also, this site has actual student reviews of their experiences with online schools. You will see that for most schools, there are both good and bad experiences. I have found that goes for both online and traditional colleges. http://www.guidetoonlineschools.com/online-reviews
Best of luck as you finish your degree. It will give you a great sense of accomplishment to finish and hopefully provide you with the career you want.
