University College of Advanced Studies

Discussion in 'Accreditation Discussions (RA, DETC, state approva' started by galanga, Jan 19, 2004.

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  1. galanga

    galanga New Member

    University College of Advanced Studies is brand new: it names some Saint Regis faculty as the folks "teaching" its programs. There are:

    Professor John S. Dovelos, Ph.D.,
    Dean of Faculty, University College of Advanced Studies

    Professor Syed Shams H. Azeemi, Ph.D. (Criminology), MBA

    Professor Leonard van der Walt, Ph.D, MBA, DMS (Postgrad.),
    CM (Postgrad.), BBA (Econ.), BA (Com.), CRTM

    It ain't cheap!
    Domain info:
    Domain Name: UNICOLLEGE-EDU.NET
    IP Address: 66.132.170.142
    IP Location: United States - Florida - Davie - Dialtone Inc
    Created: 2003-12-02
    Expires: 2005-12-02

    Administrative Contact:
    THE WEB POWER Support [email protected]
    MEDIA POWER LTD
    61 Veikou str.
    Athens, Attika 11741
    GR
    Phone: +30-1-9214584
    Fax: +30-1-9220572

    Technical Contact:
    THE WEB POWER Support [email protected]
    MEDIA POWER LTD
    61 Veikou str.
    Athens, Attika 11741
    GR
    Phone: +30-1-9214584
    Fax: +30-1-9220572

    G
     
  2. roysavia

    roysavia New Member

    yep...it ain't cheap and it probably ain't real.
     
  3. John Bear

    John Bear Senior Member

    Galanga: University College of Advanced Studies is brand new.

    John: And just in time to be included in our database. The new book goes off to the publisher in two weeks. So let this be a warning: if you are planning to start a new non-GAAP school, would you please do it before February 1st? Thank you.

    Galanga: it names some Saint Regis faculty as the folks "teaching" its programs.

    John: And it uses a very similar Old English font, and a very similar statement about the (useless) Apostille process.
     
  4. MarkIsrael@aol.com

    [email protected] New Member

    To Galanga: Great find.

    To John Bear: Do you need a proofreader for your book?

    To Uncle Janko: The motto of the University College of Advanced Studies is Libertas Discere, which I presume means "the freedom to learn". Is this correct Latin, or should it be Libertas Discendi or something?

    To Rich Douglas: In http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&postid=87074#post87074, you said "St. Regis [...] offers no courses of instruction", and dismissed the indications I proffered that it had courses. Do the course listings in the "Curricula" folder at http://www.unicollege-edu.net, corresponding to the courseware that each professor apparently developed to obtain his SRU professorship, convince you that SRU does, in fact, offer courses?

    To anyone at UCAS: At http://www.unicollege-edu.net/html/home.html, it says: "All University College of Advanced Studies degree programs have been pre-approved in their entirety by three fully accredited universities." Why are the "three fully accredited universities" not named? If these are NBOE universities such as SRU and Robertstown, are you sure that "fully accredited" is an accurate description? If Abdulah K. Dunbar says they're accredited and Aaron B. Kollie says they're not, isn't that more like "halfly accredited"?
     
  5. uncle janko

    uncle janko member

    Hi Mark: Off the cuff I'd say libertas discendi is better than libertas discere. The latter sounds like a Hellenism (replicating the effect of an articular infinitive in Greek?). If I knew where my Latin composition textbook was, I'd look it up, but I'm about 85% sure that libertas discendi is the more normal way of saying it. Somehow, if this is a morph of St Regis, Carthago delenda est might be more appropriate (African motif, geddit?; also the largest non-black group in Liberia used to be the Lebanese, descendants of the Phoenicians, who inter alia founded Carthage--notice that the names of the Carthaginian figures in the Punic Wars are all Semitic theophoric names--Hannibal, Hasdrubal, etc).
     
  6. John D

    John D member

    To All,

    Thank you for the attention paid to our newly established school. University College of Advanced Studies.

    There's no secrecy or any mystery whatsoever about our new school as some have insinuated. UCAS is a totally independent non degree-granting school registered in Athens, Greece duly licensed to provide "educational services through the internet".

    UCAS was established and is owned in its entirety by yours truly. No other institution, including St Regis, NBOE, etc., has any ownership rights or are in any way involved in the development of policies or the running of the school, nor were they involved in its establishment. After independently checking and rechecking the legality and full accreditation of a number of universities by the appropriate authorities of the Ministry of Education of their home country, UCAS decided to sign an agreement with the said schools to become the degree-granting institutions for its graduates.

    The names of the institutions are not disclosed in the UCAS website, and cannot be disclosed in its promotional material either, because of specific contract restrictions and not because we're trying to hide something. The names are immediately disclosed, however, in private emails to serious inquirers.

    As an aside, I'd like to inform you that we checked with a number of Liberian Government Officials who repeatedly assured us that Abdulah K. Dunbar is the ONLY official representative of the Liberian Government in Washington DC. Aaron B. Kollie, who doesn't even belong to the Liberian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, has been recalled several times, but he refuses to return to Liberia. It seems that he belongs to the old regime and he is still able to intimidate some of his compatriots. We were assured, however, that he will be gone soon.

    John D
     
  7. John D

    John D member

    To All,

    The total value of any school, I hope you agree, consists of two dimensions. The first and foremost is the quality and content of its programs, the effectiveness of the teaching methods employed, the reliability of the assessment methods, the quality of support provided to students.

    The second dimension consists of the relative value, acceptance, and usability of the qualifications awarded to students when they graduate from the programs.

    As to the first dimension, you can check our website, it's all there. Check our Admission and Graduation Requirements, our assessment methods, and our Curricula. Our programs have been carefully designed to be in full accordance - as to content, quality, and inclusiveness - with similar programs offered by major universities, the prescriptions of major professional organizations, and the requirements of licensing boards.

    Our courses are based on very extensive lecture notes, often equal in length to a live lecture, which are not simply based on the course textbook, but on the collection of information through researching a large variety of sources. The latest editions of textbooks are selected and appropriate further reading is also recommended. The students are also encouraged to use our linked virtual library which contains hundreds of links to resources on the different subjects taught at our college. Some of our programs also include supervised practica which are arranged locally by the students themselves. The type of settings must, however, be approved by the college and the students must provide evidence that all required practica have been completed before they graduate.

    The support offered to students is continuous. Students can contact their instructors at any time with any questions, queries they may have.

    John D
     
  8. John D

    John D member

    To All,

    Now, with regards to the second dimensiion mentioned above, the question has already been partly answered in my first post above.

    We've done our research properly, not like some other people who rely largely on "acts of faith" to guide them when they gather and interpret their so-called facts. Our degree-granting institutions ARE fully and properly accredited by the Higher Education Division of the Ministry of Education of their home country. Their home country IS a member in good standing of both UNESCO and the Hague Conference. Despite the racist and denigrating remarks of some, educational standards were never lowered in that country despite some internal strife taking place there in recent years. The reason is probably the fact that the Minister of Education was a most capable, dynamic and educated person who continues to be part of the new government (as predicted by me sometime ago, remember?).

    As per the above, countries members of UNESCO and signatories of the Hague Conference are bound by law to accept all properly accredited degrees issued by other countries members as legal. They are also bound by law to officially evaluate such degrees against comparable local recognized or accredited degrees to determine their equivalency or lack of it. Note that legitimacy and equivalency are two different things in all countries. Equivalency means much more than a degree being legal because it has been granted by a fully accredited or recognized university. It means course by course evaluation of content and standard of studies completed, which need to be proven to be equal and equivalent to the content and standard of a comparable local degree.

    There may still be some problems with the enforcement of these international laws in countries like the U.S.A., due mainly to the insistence of some private individuals in that country to persevere with their totally baseless "detracting" campaigns against some schools. These private individuals are still able to exercise some influence in certain quarters which, therefore, continue to treat these schools prejudicially without bothering to conduct their own investigations. This stance is plainly illegal when Government or Government-sponsored organizations are involved. It is certain though that this persisting state of affairs will soon be rectified through appropriate action.

    John D
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jan 20, 2004
  9. Rich Douglas

    Rich Douglas Well-Known Member

    No.
     
  10. MarkIsrael@aol.com

    [email protected] New Member

    John Dovelos writes:

    > Despite the racist and denigrating remarks of some,
    > educational standards were never lowered in that country
    > despite some internal strife taking place there in recent years.


    See the "Rage" thread http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=9884 for what The New York Times and The Washington Post have had to say about the state of education in Liberia. Are those 2 newspapers "racist" as well?
     
  11. galanga

    galanga New Member

    maybe Saint Regis awards their degrees

    I wonder if that means that Saint Regis is a degree-granter for them. Note that John S. Dovelos' Saint Regis bio says this:
    That would suggest recognition by SRU.

    What are the other two degree-granting partners, I wonder?

    This seems like a novel way for operators of an unaccredited organization to skirt local laws. Would it stand up to a court test in North Dakota? "No, we aren't committing class C felonies since we don't provide the degrees; all we do is place orders to another organization and IT awards the degrees."

    G
     
  12. oxpecker

    oxpecker New Member

    Mr. Kollie has had other things on his mind during the past week: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A14570-2004Jan13.html
     
  13. Gus Sainz

    Gus Sainz New Member

    "Oh what a twisted web we weave..."

    Although some of this information has appeared in disparate DegreeInfo threads, perhaps this post can shed some light on what is certainly a Byzantine and egregious conspiracy of Brobdingnagian proportions.

    The University College of Advanced Studies is listed on St. Regis’ Web site as “a St. Regis University approved Qualified Independent School (QIS).” DegreeToday.com has, for some time, employed the term “Qualified Independent School (QIS)” as a marketing tool to describe their franchising opportunity allowing anyone to offer degrees (they also have a Referral Partner Program that pays commissions).

    The University College of Advanced Studies claims their credits “are PRE-APPROVED for transfer to degree programs at fully accredited universities through the DegreeToday Program.” DegreeToday is registered to the same Dr. Johnson that is the registrant for one of the AED sites (advancedu.net) that fronts for the St. Regis Group of schools (the other AED mirror site, advancedu.org, is now registered to a group in Liberia, but was once registered to Steve and Dixie Randcock, who were also the registrants of, among others, Hampton Bay University, Branford Academy, and James Monroe University). Moreover, it is William Johnson, Ph.D., Ed.D., Saint Regis University (SRU), whose signature and name appears on the certificate (see here) declaring that The International University (formerly The International College of Security, Technology & Management, Dr. Richard J. Hoyer, Executive Director) is an affiliate of St. Regis University. The certificate prominently displays the seal of the NBOE and the Approved DegreeToday Affiliate logo.

    The International University’s Web site used to state, “DegreeToday Affiliates do not need other accreditation because they gain full government recognition and accreditation through St. Regis University and the National Board of Education by affiliation." They now claim accreditation and recognition from a related group of bogus organizations such as the Association of Distance Learning Programs, the National Academy of Higher Education, Accreditation Governing Commission (Dr. Richard Hoyer, Chief Accrediting Commissioner), and Christhomas Consortium London.

    The Accreditation Governing Commission also accredits American Coastline University, (“an agent of and branch division of the International University Of Fundamental Studies”) which, coincidentally, claims to be an “Accredited provider to Christhomas Consortium London for assessing and awarding Professional Degrees.” Christhomas Consortium London also accredits the London Executive Schools (“the On Campus Arm of the Irish International University.”). Christhomas Consortium London, London Executive Schools, and Irish International University (whatever happened to Jeff Wooller?) all share the same address of convenience (along with numerous other organizations) at The Multi-Purpose Resource Centre, 5 Westminster Bridge Road, London.

    In addition to that from Christhomas Consortium London, Irish International University also claims accreditation by the Education Quality Accrediting Commission (as does America Coastline), the Accreditation Governing Commission, and the Association of Distance Learning Programs (a division of NAHE). With the exception of EQAC, these same organizations also accredit The American University of London, which is linked to the International College of Homeland Security (Dr. Richard J. Hoyer, Executive Director). I am sure that the International College of Homeland Security is proud to have Stephen R. Barnhart, Ph.D. as a faculty member, as he is also Chancellor of The International University.

    Christhomas Consortium London also accredits the Kingdom College of Natural Health, which used to claim affiliation with the International University of Fundamental Studies. Kingdom states it is headquartered in Wyoming, but it lists a Louisiana address. Christopher R. Campbell, President of Kingdom, holds a Ph.D. from Al Qasim University, a partner university of St. Regis and American Coastline. It has been reported that he also is a faculty member of Hoyer’s homeland security college; perhaps this is only fair, as Kingdom College of Natural Health lists as a faculty member one Richard J. Hoyer, Ph.D., Psy. D., Ed.D., M.D.

    The University of NorthWest also claims accreditations by the Accreditation Governing Commission and Christhomas Consortium London. Not surprisingly, it lists the International University of Fundamental Studies as one of its study centers.

    If a DegreeInfo member meeting ever comes to pass (Hey, Chip! How about Vegas?), I volunteer to moderate a game of “Six Degrees of Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. Hoyer” TM. :D
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jan 21, 2004
  14. uncle janko

    uncle janko member

    Byzantine? You said it, Gus. Comrade Enver rides again.
     
  15. MarkIsrael@aol.com

    [email protected] New Member

    John Dovelos wrote:

    > the Minister of Education was a most capable, dynamic and
    > educated person who continues to be part of the new
    > government (as predicted by me sometime ago, remember?).


    Want to know what Liberian educators think of her reappointment?

    This article is from The Perspective, the same news source that Saint Regis University still links to from its Accreditation page where it says "'Liberian Government's Minister of Education becomes MINISTER OF THE YEAR 2002-2003'' http://saintregis.edu.lr/accreditation.htm
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Mar 5, 2004
  16. MarkIsrael@aol.com

    [email protected] New Member

    Dr Richard Evans writes:
     
  17. uncle janko

    uncle janko member

    He posts lots of nice poetry, too.
     
  18. jeffwooller

    jeffwooller New Member

    Re: "Oh what a twisted web we weave..."

    I am still around IIU but as I have pointed out on other threads I have never had any executive powers with the IIU. Nor was I associated with it in its earlier years.

    At present I am taking a look at the web site of the university and recommending that two thirds of what is there be removed. Whether the IIU will follow my advice is something else.

    I have worked with Ralph Thomas of Christhomas Consortium but have never been to his premises at 5 Westminster Bridge Road, London.

    Christhomas appears as one of only a few accreditation agencies in Kogan Page's 'British Qualifications'. As I know that they have turned away other organisations who have applied for a listing I have assumed that Christhomas was a valid accreditation agency.

    But I am not sure that these agencies serve much purpose as they seem to dwell on the structure of the university but not to look at the quality of the output. Do any accreditors actually look at student output to ensure that reasonable standards are being maintained?
     
  19. Jake_A

    Jake_A New Member

    You have got to be kidding, right? Please tell me it ain't so.

    Is this a snide aside - or a broadside wallop - maybe even a frontal oppugn and joust, against recognized and legitimate institutional accreditation?

    Maybe it is time to call upon the learned and lettered dr. Latin Juris (oops, I mean Dr. Latin Juris - freudian slip writ to the rescue!) - to verify the following latin translation of your ponderous last sentence postulate above:

    Operor ullus accreditors vere inviso discipulus output ut subsequens ut oportet vexillum es res suscipio?

    DLJ, help me out here: what are the latin words for "accreditors" and "output?"

    I merely ask you, DLJ, since it appears that you probably understand the concept of accreditation better in latin than en anglaise, given your vituperations against it in the service of KWE mill shillism.
     
  20. galanga

    galanga New Member

    a new look, but still with Blenheim Palace

    The UCAS site at http://www.unicollege-edu.net/faculty.html continues to refer to the organization as Athenaeum University International. The site has been redone-- the end product looks very nice.

    As is/was the case with Robertstown, though, the web designer has included an image of Blenheim Palace (Winston Churchill's birthplace) in the "campus" photo. It's attached below.

    The faculty are still the same guys as before, mostly:

    John S. Dovelos
    [email protected]
    Chief Provost and Dean of Behavioral Sciences.

    Syed Shams H. Azeemi
    [email protected]
    Dean of Criminology and Forensic Science.

    Leonard van der Walt
    [email protected]
    Dean of Business Administration

    Al Infande
    [email protected]
    Dean of Education, Main Instructor of Organizational Psychology and Human Resources Management.

    Alan Hernandez
    [email protected]
    Dean of Criminal Justice

    Saly J. Leak, D.Sc.
    [email protected]
    Dean of Electrical, Electronic and Computer Engineering

    Edward Sepuvelda
    [email protected]
    Main Instructor of Alternative Dispute Resolution

    William Eydler
    [email protected]
    Dean of Studies in Sports and Athletics.

    Najib Fatayerji
    [email protected]
    Business Administration

    Paul Silva
    [email protected]
    Dean of Literary Arts and Publishing

    Sahib Bleher
    [email protected]
    Sociolinguistics/Media Texts

    Arcie G. Mizelle
    [email protected]
    Dean of Natural and Health Sciences

    Lots of Saint Regis people.
     

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