>I have started to look into certification. Nearly had a stroke when I saw the price of the classes at the local university!! Those prices are simply beyond our budget at the moment. Can anyone give me some input on less costly ways to go? Is self study a viable option using books?

For VFP, I don't think there are any certification classes, so self study is really your only option. It worked for me. Here are some options:

VFP Cert book (from Cindy and me)
http://www.hentzenwerke.com/catalogavailability/certfox6.htm

Logs of the Beta Exam study grou
http://fox.wikis.com/wc.dll?Wiki~CategoryExam70-156StudyGroup
http://fox.wikis.com/wc.dll?Wiki~CategoryExam70-155StudyGroup

Personally, I found that reviewing the demo exams for the 70-100 test was enough for me. There are books for 70-100. Amazon has a bunch.
http://fox.wikis.com/wc.dll?Wiki~Exam70-100StudyGuide~softwareEng

If you are going for an MCSD, there defintely are tons of books for VC++, VB and SQL. I used the Exam Cram for VB, which was okay. Probably a bunch of courses for these, but as you noticed, they are expensive.

I would recommend starting a study group as a great way to motivate yourself. The beta exam study group used the UT chatroom for this.