online degrees...not at all effective.

I don't agree with the header, but check this article:

http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB112688308882842954.html?mod=2_1181_2

 

In my view, the article is interesting yet it neglects one supremely important fact. Many people would like nothing more than to go back to school full time and earn that prestigious B&M grad degree. However, ther are those among us who are unable to do so due to their responsibilities to their families and their employment position. If I was given the choice (and the money to make it work) I would opt for a full-time B&M program but, since that is not an option I have pursued the best available options available to me. Overall, I'd say the article comes off as being snobbish.
Jack

 

Yes, a snobbish article. Online degrees not effective? They sure hell beat the gas crunch!


Sulla

 

We already beat these guys up rhetorically pretty good on an earlier thread here at DI. And they had it coming.

http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=21442

 

What a load of crap. The article is nonsense. How the hell does a recruiter know if it was a part time or full time MBA. If you think the HR wonk will not hire you if you went to a DL MBA (at a B&M school) then don't tell them. Don't lie, just don't tell

Any place that has a chief talent officer is more concerned with form over function. And giving preference to someone who has been a consultant is hilarious. I worked for IBM for years and the consultants they sent out, and the ones that came in were frankly the most ill prepared dolts I ever met.

Give me someone who can get an MBA while still working as opposed to some 23 year old barfly any day. I did 40 hrs a week while getting my graduate degrees. I know what it takes. I didn't hang around to appreciate the experience of an on campus MBA. What an utter load of crap.

 

What the article does not take into account is the ammount of work experience that a student/worker may acumulate in the time spent doing his or her distance MBA. That may cancel any "shortcomings" in perception that recruiters may have. I agree with mdoneil, the article is crap.

Plus, who is Dr. Mark Rice, dean of the Olin Graduate School of Business at Babson College, to say these degrees are less useful when more prestigios schools are ofering distance MBAs right now? I think he is just protecting his turf.

 

I was looking into some ranking B-schools in my area - Mercer and Terry at Georgia - but my job involves unexpected long distance travel, sometimes for weeks or months at a time, and I cannot commit to attending class week after week at specified times. Add to that the stress of raising toddlers and trying to find "quality time" with the wife - and I sitting in a classroom is not an option.

Most of my job is done at a distance - I'm currently at home, in shorts and a polo shirt working on a laptop - and getting paid handsomely for it - so if I can be trusted to work a high-level, managerial level job at a distance, why can't I learn and earn a degree in the same fashion.

If I were in my twenties and my "home office: included a bong, a live-in girlfriend and half of the members of a punk band crashing on futons, then it might be a bit much - but I think I've accomplished enough in life to be able to work independently.

 

If you applied the article's reasoning to law programs, it would be dead on accurate.

Look, folks, our being outraged and offended by the perceived injustice of it all matters not one whit. The TRUTH is, if you want to work in areas of the law or the corporate culture where prestige matters, you HAVE TO PLAY THEIR GAME.

If a law student wants to work for a big Wall Street firm, he can't go part time to Western State and expect to be interviewed, let alone hired. It isn't going to happen.

 

Of course, this article is based on the perception of those who completed the Wall Street survey. It is useful data, but incomplete. The people quoted in the article made assumptions that run contrary to nearly a century of research on mediated instruction (including distance learning). I always laugh when I read that being able to read facial expressions is a critical condition for learning. I would like to have someone point to the body of research that supports that.

What we have here is the same kind of snobbery that exists currently in academia. There is no research to back up the opinion that learning at a distance is inferior to traditional classroom learning, but the people interviewed earned their degrees traditionally. This is what they know--it is normal (through not correct) for them to assume that "different" must mean "not as good".

I agree with the quote by Rice that the current wave of prejudice in hiring will give way as the old guard retires from the work force.

Although my degrees were earned traditionally, many of my colleagues have earned their graduate degrees via DL. They are every bit as competent and qualified as those I know with traditionally-earned degrees.

 

Hello, all,

As for this article - I started a DL course with UC Berkeley Extension in September (aiming for a PG Certificate) - and am very disappointed and, sad to say this, may understand some of the article arguments.

I am very much disheartened - for all the learning comes from what I can find myself in books and through Internet search. Nothing else...

The instructor's input is nil - his lectures cover only the basics, he doesn't participate in online discussions, which are, for the moment, just a string of student's monologues.

Yes, the instructor promptly answers the questions - but only those he chooses himself - for others I look for and when lucky find some explanations in other sources... As for grading - no concrete comments, remarks or else... Just the grade... Actually, it feels more like a certification, not like University program when someone is supposed to some extent educate students...

Maybe it is just my bad luck, but if some of the DL programs are like this, I can understand a recruiter, who prefers a full-time graduate.

I had a 2-year DL-experience 10 years ago with one of the leading Universities of my country, when I was working abroad, it was much different and much better, and now for the moment I am again living abroad, in a Spanish-speaking country (and my Spanish definitely needs improvement for me to be ready to study in it) and, thus, I was very much counting on a good DL program in English...

YSM

 

The research literature has supported the idea that there is no significance achievement difference between learners who receive instruction "traditionally" or via technology. This literature is not without its critics, of course; however the critics have been unable to produce a body of research demonstrating that distance learning produces lower levels of achievement.

One of the more popular sites on the web to address this issue is Thomas Russell's "No Significant Difference Phenomenon"

 

But Dr Tony's point needs to be understood; the article doesn't make any claims about the effectiveness or ineffectiveness of an online or D/L educational process. The article concerns itself with how D/L credentials are perceived by those people that make hiring decisions.

I disagree with the idea that the attitude will change. Why should it? If the highest level positions in major corporations continue to be filled largely, or only, by graduates of prestigous, full time B&M MBA programs, the incoming executives will preserve the same set of prejudices as the retiring executives possessed.

It hasn't changed in the law in 100 years and we don't even HAVE significant online or D/L programs.

 

I have to agree with those who attribute the bias toward snobbery and elitism. As Anthony Pina already noted, no significant difference was found by those who have done studies comparing traditional B&M education with non-traditional education delivered via technology.

Particularly interesting was the part in the article mentioning concern that non-traditional students aren't learning "communication and teamwork" due to the way their education is delivered. A ridiculous assumption especially when you consider that most DL students already have jobs where they have learned, and continue to learn, communication and teamwork in real-life situations in real businesses. I believe that may well put them at an advantage to full-time students with little or no business experience who only learn communication and teamwork as taught in a classroom. As anyone with business experience knows, much in the real world does not operate like it says in the textbooks.

Kit