Association for online academic excellence

I was shocked to see the university where I teach listed here. The problem is that we don’t offer any online program so how can we be accredited? This seems to be a scam where legitimate universities are listed together with “less than wonderful” schools to make them look real. Is this legal? Can anyone create a fake accrediting organization and then join for free real universities so they can give credibility to other institutions? It is kind of sad that we can let this happen. No telephone number neither address on the website.


check the website, may be your university is listed too! http://www.aoaex.org/pbo.htm

 

This is a fake accreditation agency created by Trinity C&U. Reportedly, several of the legitimate schools on the list have attempted to have their names removed, with no success.

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Bill Gossett

 

I was crushed that my SF State was not listed. Not suitable to be listed with the likes of Trinity C&U I guess... jeez...

But San Jose State WAS there! More to Trinity's liking. Bwa ha ha ha ha!!!

Seriously, I think that all the schools on the list are legitimate except Trinity C&U. I looked up a few that sounded iffy: eSocrates.com seemed to be a dead link, the University of Advancing Computer Technology is ACICS, the American University of Bulgaria is a candidate with the northeastern association. Several others were RA.

I suppose that this is legal. It is within free speech to post lists of universities one likes, to create rankings and stuff. Certainly no defamation is happening since the site is accusing them of being good schools.

Didn't somebody post a link to an almost identical copy of this list the other day, except the "accreditor" had a different name and a different degree-mill was tucked into the list?

 

This list, though, seems to take things one step further. It says that they are all accredited by AOAE. If untrue, it wouldn't be a free speech issue.

I notice that on the list is the university where I teach classes (which is also my alma mater). I think I'll send an e-mail to the distance learning folks and see what they have to say about this accreditation.


Tom Nixon