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I hope this is a good place to ask the question.

My issue is that I have finished high school a number of years ago, and although I did some (non-advanced) math courses then, I did not do an exam in maths for the final high school matriculation exam. Now, years later, I would like to enter a university course for computer science, but all of the programmes of interest to me require sufficient knowledge of maths as an admissions criterion. Theoretically I could go back to supplement my matriculation exam with an advanced math grade, but this is quite a bureaucratic and logistical hurdle since I live abroad and it would take a couple of years to officially pass all the courses. I am confident in being able to self-study the curriculum with support from online resources, but the issue is how to prove my knowledge to the admissions people.

I would really appreciate it if someone could let me know whether there are any certificates or qualifications for high school maths, accepted either internationally or in Europe, so that I could attend just one big exam instead of trying to organise how to sit all the 10+ individual courses and the big exam in a high school in my home country.

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    $\begingroup$ Where is your home country though? If you're in the UK then you can sit A levels as an external candidate. $\endgroup$
    – baxx
    Dec 28, 2016 at 11:46
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    $\begingroup$ Your country is an important detail here. It might also depend on what courses you took in high school even if you never took the final exam. $\endgroup$
    – Joonas Ilmavirta
    Dec 28, 2016 at 14:34
  • $\begingroup$ In principle, you could come to the United States and then simply take whatever prerequisite courses are needed at the university in question. But at most US colleges there wouldn't be such a large bureaucratic hurdle; this may also be true in some other countries as well. Of course, that would require finding money for this, as well as moving, which are huge matters. $\endgroup$
    – kcrisman
    Dec 28, 2016 at 15:04
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    $\begingroup$ Thanks, my home country is Finland but I currently live in Belgium and am looking to be admitted to university in the Netherlands. $\endgroup$
    – Leist01
    Dec 28, 2016 at 15:40
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    $\begingroup$ You could investigate taking a College Board "CLEP" exam. clep.collegeboard.org $\endgroup$
    – user52817
    Dec 29, 2016 at 17:44

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The UK A-levels are widely studied outside the UK. The new syllabus is designed to have all the exams at the end, rather than the modular system that was in place before. So while there might be more than one exam (I don't remember the details), they could be taken in one block.

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    $\begingroup$ There seems to be an important word missing in the first sentence. While one can infer the direction from context, I prefer to let you add the one you intended rather than to simply edit. $\endgroup$
    – quid ♦
    Jan 17, 2017 at 15:24
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In Canada, universities and colleges offer non-credit courses covering grade 12 subjects required for offered programs. I believe they can also be taken in parallel with program courses. There are also reduced entry requirements for mature students, that is, for individuals who have been in the work force for 4-5 years. This seems to be cheating a bit, but I remember reading that the success rate for mature students is quite high; apparently mature students tend to be more highly motivated than students entering university straight out of high school. There is strong feeling that people who for one reason or another dropped out before graduating high school should be actively encouraged, (including subsidized education and living for individuals who have been on unemployed for a while) to get qualified for something, get a job, or better job, start a career, so they are drawn into the mainstream: get married/coupled, buy a house, have a family etc. In the long term this is cheaper for society as a whole. I believe refugees are also encouraged to get into training programs to get themselves economically established as soon as possible.

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  • $\begingroup$ This doesn't seem to answer the question. The OP was looking to self-educate and then take a single or small number of exams. Your answer seems to be offering advice on how to take courses. This especially doesn't seem helpful because the OP is looking to get credit for their self-education in maths, not take non-credit maths courses that might train them in maths but not get them a recognized qualification. $\endgroup$
    – Robert Columbia
    Dec 2, 2019 at 14:00

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