Is California Coast U. a good choice for a bachelor's degree?

Hello all,

Just signed up and had a question I was hoping could be answered. I finished 1 semester of college about 7 years ago and since then have been working full-time. I have decided I want to go back and get my degree while working full-time.

After doing some research, I came across CCU. The biggest draw is the cost which, in the current economic times, is a BIG draw. I love the payment plan and the ability to work at your own pace.

My biggest concern is the accreditation. I'm hoping to eventually use the degree to do a Masters in Education (possibly also at CCU) and move into the teaching field, which is a much more stable line of work than my current job.

My question is....is CCU a good idea? Are they recognized throughout the country as a legit school? I've been told that national accreditation isn't looked as highly upon as regional, although I don't know the legitimacy of that claim.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks for having this wonderful forum to help people like me!

Sincerely,
Voorhees13

 

If you're looking to teach, by pursuing a Nationally Accredited degree as opposed to Regionally Accredited you will be limiting your options.

From what I found on Wikipedia, DETC accredits around 100 institutions while the RA bodies accredit many more.

If you have a RA degree you can most probably teach DETC (NA). If you have a NA degree you most likely can't teach at a RA school.

What field of study are you looking into?

 

Still looking into the various fields. I was hoping to teach at a lower level - junior high or high school.

 

This is an advice that has been related for many years in this forum: Always, always, and always, check with your prospective employers (for work of course), state agencies (in the case of licensing) and schools (in the case of transferring credits of starting new degree and or if you intend to teach). If you do this, then your decision in the long run should not backfire.

Welcome to board.

 

There are so many great options for regionally accredited programs that offer distance learning, it's hard to make an argument in favor of a DETC-accredited school in a situation like this.

If even a handful of school systems require an RA degree, you're limiting your options by going to a DETC-accredited program.

That isn't to say that DETC programs don't have a place; they most certainly do, and the acceptance of DETC as an accreditor is definitely growing. But in the field of education, there's still a certain amount of academic snobbery or whatever you want to call it where regional accreditation is still considered the gold standard.

 

The importance of accreditation in a particular occupation varies in direct proportion to the extent of regulation.

In general, public secondary school teachers are heavily regulated. So if you want to teach in public schools, then you need to be very concerned about accreditation requirements. Private schools may be more flexible, but they typically don't pay as well and there aren't as many opportunities.

In California, for example, you need a regionally-accredited degree to qualify for a teaching credential. So earning a nationally-accredited CCU degree would be a waste of time and money. This page includes a post from "Silvia" who claims to have been denied a "Single-Subject" credential in California, after meeting all other requirements, solely because her CCU degree was not regionally accredited.

 

Or look at the requirements in New Jersey. For every certification, it states that "All credits must appear on a regionally accredited 4-year college/university transcript."

New Jersey won't even accept credits from RA community colleges, unless thay are transferred first to RA 4-year schools.

Of course, some states may be more flexible than NJ or CA. But you never where your life or career will take you, and you never know when the rules may change. For a field like teaching, which is subject to strict regulation, it's probably advisable to seek a degree that will be good everywhere.

 

I appreciate the responses. Do any of you know some good, cheap regionally accredited schools that offer online degrees (I'm sure they've been listed on here a million times before so I apologize)? The price as I said before is the biggest draw to CCU. I'm not really in a position to afford a 30, 40, 50 thousand dollar degree at this point.

Thanks again for the help.

 

My suggestion is first obtain an associates degree from a local community college or from Excelsior, COSC, or TESC. You can then figure out which college/university to transfer your associates credit to while you earn a bachelors degree.

Personally I would go with Excelsior all the way. You can earn your credits at any RA school. This helps reduce cost since you can look around for low cost courses. There are many ways to earn credit - Excelsior offers courses and tests, there are CLEP and DANTES/DSST tests, and by portfolio.

 

stick with regional accredited school as possible.

 

I concur - if you're looking to teach middle or high school, you'll want a RA degree. Excelsior, TECO or COSC (aka the "big three") will provide you with serviceable options, but it depends on what you want to end up teaching.

Do you have a better idea of your subject matter and what state you will end up teaching in?

 

Leaning toward English, but the state doesn't particularly matter. I'll go where the work is.

 

Teaching English is different from getting a degree in English. To teach secondary English required me to have enough education classes to meet certification. These extra classes add up. Getting an education degree with the ability to teach English is a better route for teaching at the elementary and secondary level but will make it more difficult pursuing other jobs if you leave the teaching profession since your degree will be in Education. Since I wasn't sure if I wanted to stay in teaching I pursued the English degree and added the education classes. I didn't stay in teaching.

 

The Excelsior BSLS degree allows 60 elective credits - so conceivably one could include up to 30 units in teaching english and 30 units in business (or any other area of interest - math is always good and welcomed by schools, many businesses, and many government agencies).

 

You really want to plan out what state you are going to teach in. California requires a bachelors in the subject to teach at the high school level. In other states you will be fine with an education bachelors. Of course these states will also be happy to accept your content area degree if you also have the education coursework to go along with it.

My suggestion would be to get a degree in English and enter an alternative licensure program. Most urban areas have these programs.

 

Hi Voorhees - Here are a few tips for you to check (jeez guys, you'd might want to throw the guy a link or two)

Ft. Hays State
http://www.fhsu.edu/virtualcollege/degrees/index.htm

Peru State
http://www.peru.edu/academics/programs_majors.htm

UMass
http://www.umassonline.net/DegreeList.cfm?degree_Category_ID=3

North Carolina
http://www.northcarolina.edu/content.php/aa/distance/index.htm