Chelsea University UK

I have been inundated with mail to get a university degree based on my life experience from an accredited university. Just for fun I completed the application and VOILA a received a call from an educational counsellor that assured me my work and prior RA college credits would get me the degree I always wanted. The price tag for an MBA for Chelsea University was $1800 US. I have searched and googled this place and have not found any information on it being a diploma mill. I think from the approach they took they could be considered nothing less. Degree based on life experience rubbish. Does anyone have any information on this place that I can pass along to my human resource manager?

 

My Google search didn't find anything on such a school. Do you have a URL?

It did find some items like this, seeming legitimate reference, from a New Zealand site: "Perkins recently received a national scholarship to complete a Masters at Chelsea University in England for 2005." But there does appear to be a Chelsea University of Art in the UK, which clearly is not going to be offering MBAs for $1,800.

The British-sounding name, and the modus operandi suggests yet another new name for the Romanian diploma mill cartel, but it would be helpful to have more information.

 

Would that be this Chelsea University?

http://www.chelseau.org.uk

 

Thank you, Carlos.

It is certainly reminiscent of the sites put up by the criminals in Romania (Brentwick, Palmers Green, Shelbourne, dozens of others). Perhaps Galanga will work his magic on IP registration numbers and the like.

 

I am more than suspicious of so-called 'Chelsea University'.

First, no official university web site would call itself such a name: it would be the 'University of Chelsea'.

Second, all British Universities have e-mail addresses using the 'ac.uk' prefix not 'org' (they are all connected via 'JANET').

Third, 'life experience' nonsense would not count towards a British university degree, and certainly not the MBA.

Fourth, all British universities are located on a campus - minimum about 100 acres - and that such a large new site is located in the highly expensive Chelsea suburb is most unlikely.

Fifth, that such a campus exists, though the address given appears as a single street number, and it has never come to my attention before, is also most unlikely.

Sixth, a slight giveaway is the picture of the woman on the front page wearing a black gown and a 'mortar board' hat. The latter went out of fashion in the UK by the middle of the 20th century and are only used by degree mills to trap the gullible. That they are still worn in the US at graduations, including for a class I saw 'graduating' at junior school, suggests the adds are aimed at US, not British, 'marks'.

I suggest that you dump the application in the bin, and save your money and the embarrassment. Any UK MBA 'degree' costing under GBP2000 is worthless.

 

So what headgear do you wear for graduation at Bacehelor and Masters level?

 

The only academic degree headwear I have seen graduates wearing is for the PhD (e.g, University of London) and it is far more splendid affair than the old style 'mortar board'.

It was common in comics like 'Beano' and 'Dandy' for the schoomasters in them to be drawn with 'mortar boards' in class.

Why do you need a hat? Are you suggesting these are common in Australia? There may even be isolated pockets for them in the UK (I have not been to all graduations, of course), but these would be rare exceptions. As the graduation ceremony requires the 'hood' to be placed over the head, a hat would get in the way.

My suggestion is that this shows up the 'Chelsea scam'.

 

Mortar boards are still worn for graduation ceremonies at the University of Wolverhampton (where I teach) and the University of Liverpool (from which I received a Master's degree 18 months ago). When I was an undergraduate wearing them on ceremonial occasions was optional, but the alternative was to carry them.

Malcolm S Jenner

 

I would hesitate to acquire a diploma mill degree, even in jest. Years ago, an agnostic friend of mine bought a Doctor of Divinity degree so he could call himself "Reverend" and jokingly display his beautiful diploma. He quickly found himself on all manner of mailing lists for everything from more bogus doctorates to rip-off "business opportunities". Once they mark you as a shyster or fool, it can stay with you for life. Given ever intrusive databases, it might even impact your credit rating or opportunities for employment.

 

Thank you everyone for your honest comments.
I found this excerpt on the Oregon State list for bogus universities. It makes me wonder how I got on this e-mail list. I graduated from Penn State and I know the Alumni Association wouldn't sell our names to some rascaly and bogus scam artists.
We'll have to dismiss the potential sales candidate from employment with our firm. He had a real gift and sales pitch for our HR Director, who believed him that the MBA from Chelsea U.
was valid. I'm glad we caught it in time before spending company funds.
Walt

Chelsea University United Kingdom "It has never been recognised as a university with UK degree awarding powers. They have been reported to Companies House for use of the word university without permission and Trading Standards for possible breach of the Education Reform Act 1988." - Higher Education Governance and Health Professions Team Department for Education and Skills 1D, Sanctuary Buildings, Great Smith Street, London SW1P 3BT Tel: 020 7925 6932 Fax: 020 7925 6664

 

Hi Malcolm

Your alma mater and your current employer must be among the last redoubts of this old fashioned habit. I suspect that where ever an item of uniform becomes 'optional' it is on its way out.

It ic certainly not common whenever I have been been to a graduation in the UK. I shall enquire of my many contacts around the place.

Students complain about hiring gowns - the 'caps' must add to costs. The mortar board certainly originated in the UK and was picked up elsewhere. Even degreeinfo home page has people in them. I was recently in China and they had them there too. Our Chinese students who graduate from EBS may have been surprised to appear hatless - I shall ask the next cohort this month.

The fact is it is cliche image. Out dated and only impresses those who seek short cuts to a degree - the mortar board hats may be the only authentic part of their 'graduation', except it isn't even that. Sad.

 

Gown and mortarboard worn at Nottingham and St Andrews for graduation. And across the US, as well.

 

With all due to respect to Professor Kennedy, and with a clear understanding that practice does not always follow regulation, a quick survey of the regulations links from the Burgon Society Web site (http://www.burgon.org.uk/practice/regs/univ.html) indicates that academic headwear is still in vogue in many UK universities: Oxford (rules for headwear depend upon ceremony), Cambridge (New Hall), Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds, Bristol, Reading, Nottingham, Southampton, Exeter, Leicester . . . and I stopped searching at this point, weak from exhaustion. The only universities encountered on this brief journey that did not specify headwear were Durham and Edinburgh.

And if displaying a photograph of students wearing the mortar board is a cause for suspicion regarding the institution, perhaps the following institutions might be suspect as well:

Birmingham
http://www.studserv.bham.ac.uk/congregations/Staff.htm
http://www.business.bham.ac.uk/bbs/static/page1336.htm

Sheffield
http://www.shef.ac.uk/ceremonies/colours.html

London
http://www.lon.ac.uk/About_Us/History/Academic_Dress/home.asp

Just a little jocularity.



marilynd

 

Hi Marilynd

"if displaying a photograph of students wearing the mortar board is a cause for suspicion...'

Let's not get too serious but in the interests of accuracy I gave the comment as my sixth ground for suspicion after the other five grounds as: "Sixth, a slight giveaway...".

All degree mills' literature I have seen shows people wearing mortar boards; I have not seen anybody wearing them in the UK graduations I have attended (whether they were supposed to do so, I do not know). I will check out colleagues who visit other universities. It certainly does not happen in Edinburgh or Heriot-Watt, Strathclyde, or Glasgow (maybe it's an English thing? - yes, I know St Andrews is in Scotland - but it is ultra traditional, with the highest proportion of English students of any Scottish university; students used to wear their red gowns everyday as undergraduates, but then it is on a windy coast and bitterly cold).

The practice has been dying out in the UK since about 1950. It seems to be coming in in North America and China...and then, our Courts hang onto strange 18th century head dress...

 

Professor Kennedy:

Hope I didn't give offense with the "suspicion" comment, but when I ran across these photographs I couldn't resist a little gentle chiding (actually, people where I come from would call it a "dig").

I was responding more to your general comment about the mortar board dying out. I must say, it seems to be everywhere. You certainly know the UK better, but I've seen many graduation photos of UK students wearing it. Ditto for South African universities. It's been the standard in U.S. colleges and universities since the adoption of the Intercollegiate standards in 1895. It is so ubiquitous in the U.S. today, that primary and secondary schools--even kindergartens--use mortar boards in graduation ceremonies. It's use seems to be well-nigh universal in Canada as well. You mentioned expansion to China. I would add India and Indochina to that list. If use of the thing (do you call it a trencher?) is dying out in the UK (and I would be interested in some evidence, if it is), it seems to be expanding elsewhere in the world.

Regards,



marilynd

 

Hats useless in Australia -- they fall off when you're upside down.

Hah hah. Gratuitous Aussie joke of the day.

 

No hats when I graduated from U. Cape Town about 25 years ago.

 

Apropos degree mills using academic dress as a marketing tool, at least one mill, St. George University International, advertises their own academic dress for sale to their "graduates."

http://www.stgeorgeuniversity.edu/application/gowns.htm

How would you like to be in procession and have someone ask "What school does that gown represent?" Talk about committing ritual suicide!

At least they got one thing right. Harcourts is a first-rate manufacturer of academic apparel. I wonder if Harcourts actually has agreed to make this gown and hood, however.



marilynd

 

Did you wear a hat when you graduated from Birkbeck?

marilynd

 

They were also present at my graduation from Leicester in 1991 but were carried not worn.