College Pathway

You earn your Outlier Certificate of Completion when you complete all of the courses in your certificate sequence with a passing grade (of 69.5% or higher). All courses must be taken for credit, and not audited, to count towards Certificates.

Certificate sequences are designed to fit even the busiest lifestyles, so you can complete them at your own pace, and take up to two years from date of purchase to do so. You can take as many courses as you’d like concurrently, in most cases. That said, some courses must be completed in a particular sequence (e.g. Precalculus must be completed before Calculus I).

Great news: If you’ve passed some (or all) of the courses with Outlier, you’re ahead of the game! We’ll count these towards your Certificate, and you’ll receive the discounted certificate price for any remaining courses you’ll need to take to complete your Certificate sequence. Simply reach out to our Student Success team at success@outlier.org and let them know that you plan to enroll in the Certificate and include your previously passed courses, and we’ll send along the discount code and instructions for next steps. Note: For any previously completed courses to count towards a Certificate, they must have been taken for credit, and not audited.

Additionally, if you’re already confident in your Precalculus skills, you can test out of the Precalculus requirement for any Certificate sequence and head straight to the Calculus I course. To do so, first take the pretest here. If you pass, send a note to our Student Success team and let us know which Certificate you’d like to enroll in. We can be reached at success@outlier.org.

The Outlier courses that comprise a Certificate sequence will earn you transferable college credits (3 per course) from the University of Pittsburgh, an accredited top 60 US school. However, our Certificates of Completion are granted solely by Outlier, and aren’t currently accredited. That said, they are shareable on your LinkedIn Profile and resume, and offer proof that you’ve completed—and passed—a sequence of academically rigorous courses with us.

As with all Outlier courses, if you've put in the time and effort to do all the work for a course within the Certificate sequence, but do not receive a passing grade, that's on us, and you will receive a full refund for that course! You may also exit courses in your sequence before the drop deadline to receive a full refund (14 days from start for 14-week courses, and 7 days from start for 7-week Intensive courses).

Additionally, we offer a full refund of the total Certificate price within 6 months of your purchase, so long as vouchers have not been redeemed for course sign-up(s), or you have exited all Certificate courses prior to the drop deadlines.

For more information on refunds please refer to our Refund Policy.