Earlier quoted context omitted.
How were you able to afford taking the classes for credit instead, at a cost of over two orders of magnitude more per class?
Correct me if I'm wrong but it seems like you assuming they took the class for credit at university. Community college is also a possibility where it would be cheaper or around the same price. That also comes with the benefit of financial aid.
Community college is cheap, but isn't $65 for four credits cheap. Most financial aid I've seen has been in the form of loans, which also won't be as cheap as getting credit for those classes from testing out.