I am a bit of a collector of degrees and have a chance to work on another one. I am looking at Liberty University for Master of Arts in Management Leadership (M.A.M.L) any value in this degree? Or should I look for something totally different? For back ground, Naval Officer have a BA in ECON, MA in National Security Studies (Navy War College),and MBA (Thunderbird). Would like to go the go the on line professor route down the road, but currently the Navy does not pay for PHD work so that will have to wait till I "retire". The Navy's TA pays for $250 a credit so I am only limited by that and effort.
I have a MAML from LU. I just graduated late last year so I really don't know what sort of value it has. I will say since I had my MAML conferred I'm getting WAY more GS interviews. But that just could be good timing on my part. The MAML is just a low calorie MBA so I honestly don't see much value in it for you. If you really want something different look at LU's MSIS degree.
To Curtis83. What do you mean by a low calorie degree? I am also looking at the MAML program. How long did it take you to complete it? Did you have to do group projects or something to that effect. I hear that is required for this program. Give me some in depth information about the program.
The MAML shares around 6 classes with the MBA. That's why I say its a low calorie MBA. It took me about 12 months to complete.
Curtis83 Low calorie MBA is a great term. It only took you a year to do-really? I have been seriously looking at this degree. I hear that Liberty has group projects for this program. Is that true and how did that go? What type of work did you do-lot's of research papers, tests, projects, etc.
I doubled up on classes. Not exactly smart but I needed to be done before 2014. They do have group projects for a few classes. It's not a big deal just annoying when someone is dead weight. I think schools that bury students in meaningless weekly papers is wasting time. LU requires research papers but it's usually one maybe two per course. You spend the entire class doing it and have certain graded benchmarks till it's completed. Maybe it's a project and research paper but the same thing applies on what's expected. It's not a cake walk by any means. You just focus your efforts on a fantastic research paper and or project instead of a bunch of rushed ones.
There was a time when the MBA was the "it" degree. Alternative, business-related degrees were considered inferior. But this was before the great explosion of adult-oriented, part-time degree programs we experienced in the 1980's and beyond. Now--and I have no way of measuring this--the master's is so much more common that these alternative degree titles don't seem to be a big deal. This is especially true for mid-career adults (as opposed to those fresh out of school who are using mainly their degrees to get into the workforce.) If the degree fits, worry less about the title and more about what you will learn.
A slightly OT story: When I did my MBA at National University, I was in the military. I had transferred the maximum number of credits from another school and had set out to finish the degree. While stationed in Sacramento, I was just finishing my core courses when the Air Force gave me orders to San Antonio (where National didn't have a campus and there was no DL option back then). This created a dilemma. I had completed all my core courses, but still needed 4 electives to graduate with an MBA. But since I had already transferred the maximum number, National wouldn't let me take courses at another school to finish the National MBA. I was stuck. So I submitted a request to waive the transfer-credit limit. At the time, National offered an M.A. in Business as an alternative to the MBA. The only differences were that (a) the MA required 3 fewer electives (a total of 12 courses instead of the MBA's 15), and the M.A. didn't have concentration options. (That didn't matter to me since I was taking whatever electives I could and wasn't completing a concentration.) So National offered to allow me to transfer in 1 extra class and graduate with an M.A. in Business. But back then, the MBA was the holy grail of graduate degrees and the M.A. would be perceived as an "MBA-lite" degree. So I appealed this decision, wanting the MBA instead. I based my appeal on my active duty requirements--that I was being transferred before I could graduate. The NU chancellor supported my cause. I got the waiver, transferred the extra credits, and graduated. I don't think I would have bothered today. I would have taken the M.A. and moved on. I just don't think it matters all that much. But back then it sure did. Second lesson: negotiate. Grad school is all about negotiation. Yes, catalogs have rules. But ask. You'd be surprised what a school will do for you, especially when you have a relationship with them. Don't expect to walk up to a school cold and unknown and have them toss out their rules, but after you've engaged them you'd be surprised at what you can do. They really, really want their students to graduate, and while they won't violate their academic integrity (usually), they will accommodate unusual circumstances and challenges where possible.
This degree is a mammal of different strips. ak gagagaga.. No just kidding. I have no clue who would care that you have a degree in "management leadership". I'm not even sure what that is really supposed to be. I would look for something that provides leadership insights, management tools, but also provides some real world skill. I cannot imagine a single person who I would follow just because they had a degree in mammals.
