Online Education
Human Development and Family Studies (HDFS) now offers a Bachelor of Science degree completion program online through the Division of Continuing Education. The HDFS online courses are designed to be comparable to their parallel resident instruction courses in HDFS, providing a high quality university education. The online Bachelor of Science degree in HDFS carries the full accreditation of Colorado State University, and is indistinguishable on student transcripts from the on-campus version of the degree. To view a list of courses available, visit our degree page on the Division of Continuing Education Site.
Prospective Students
- A Personal Computer or laptop (or unlimited access to one)
- Internet connection: dial-up modem will work, high-speed connection (DSL, Broadband, etc.) is preferable
- Internet browser to allow you to view the internet, such as: Internet Explorer 5.0 or higher; Netscape 6.2 or higher; AOL 7.0 or higher; Mozilla 1.5 or higher; Safari 1.2
- Associate’s degree (with maximum transferability from an AA in ECE from Colorado community college) or at least 60 credits of college education (check specific requirements)
- You can request a preliminary Transfer Evaluation by contacting Frances Betts fbetts@learn.colostate.edu in Continuing Education and submitting an unofficial transcript to her. This step is recommended to occur as early as possible to give you an idea of how your courses may transfer and what you may need to take before applying for admission. If you have an AA in Early Childhood Education from a Colorado institution, or are confident that you already have the prerequisites for the degree completion program, you may choose to skip this step and to immediately apply to Colorado State University. Be sure to major in the online HDFS degree completion program: (Undergraduate Admission)
- You may register for individual courses through Continuing Education without being admitted to Colorado State University: click on this link and select your course(s) of interest.
- You can complete a FAFSA form and apply for financial aid at the following website: http://www.sfs.colostate.edu/
- You can apply for scholarships
- Note: Continuing Education credit courses are not eligible for College Opportunity Fund (COF) funding. Credit earned through Continuing Education courses will not be counted toward the 145 lifetime hour maximum for COF.
- Basically, this is up to you! There are no minimum or maximum credit requirements for this program, although some scholarships may require you to take a minimum number of credits. Most of our courses are offered three times per year, in traditional Fall (16 week), Spring (16 week), and Summer (12 week) semesters.
- Our online coursework will not prepare you to take the licensing exam in Colorado, although it will provide most of the necessary coursework. In order to become licensed, you can complete a post-degree licensure program at a number of different universities, or if you have teaching experience, you may qualify for alternative licensure: State of Colorado ECE Requirements
- When you become a student at CSU, you will be given an online identification name and password, which you will use to login to the RamCT course platform. You will see a list of your courses, and when you enter a course, a typical homepage looks like this:
Current Students
GOODE Project
Growing Our Own Degreed Educators (GOODE) is a project funded by the Administration for Children and Families, to help Head Start teaching staff obtain their Bachelor’s degree from Department of Human Development and Family Studies at Colorado State University. Click here for more information.