Bears Guide To Earning Degrees By Distance Learning

Will this book give me the pros and cons of attending an online school? I'm interested in the reactions I will receive when people ask me about the online school and how local, regionally accredited schools will view an online school even IF IT IS REGIONALLY accredited also.

I just want to education myself about all of thise before paying money for something i will later regret.

I'm also looking for information about transfers so if i decide i don't like the online program, I can at least keep the credits I have and can complete the degree in a traditional school or go to another school.

I know that Regionally Accredited schools are the safest routes.

 

My edition of Bears guide ia a museum quality antique so I can't answer your question directly.

However no one (business or academia) has ever asked me about how my Excelsior degree was earned. My last employer jotted down that I had a BS degree just to check a box. Both my graduate schools accepted me with my Excelsoir transcript (they counted ten years practical experience as being equal to a BS degree for salary purposes) - although I took all but one courses at around a dozen different B&M schools in the UK and USA - the exception was my CLEP english).

 

Nobody has ever asked me how my degree was earned. I've told a couple of my bosses and honestly they never even batted an eye.

We bank online.

We buy things online.

We download movies online.

We communicate online.

We invest online.

We pay bills online.

We research stuff concerning life changing decisions online.

Why should education be some ivory towered exception to how a modern American lives and relates to the internet?

 

Same here. After spending 10 years in the AF as enlisted I have batted around the idea of going back in with a commission. I told the reserve recruiter my degree was from Excelsior and he never batted an eye. That doesn't necessarily mean I would get accepted into the program, just that I met the qualifications to move on. I'm still debating going back in, that 100% tuition is hard to pass up .

 

For the most part I've heard good things. However, I do see job ads that specify "No Online Schools" when listing the degree requirements. Here's an accounting job that was posted earlier this month in my area with this description:
http://accounting.jobs.net/Job.asp?jid=J8A8CH6K4H76MNLSL6Y

 

1) I would not work for a place that is that close minded(that is just me that don't care about money).
2) Why I would even consider a position that may be fishing for your information to sell later?, you can notice this a common practice in jobs website such as monster.com where suppose recruiters will put "company confidential" but don't give you the clients information, because they got nothing, you have to be careful.

 

Now I'm wondering whether or why I should by the book. Amazon didn't have a lot of information on it. The reviews didn't say a lot to me. They just said it was a must read!

Should i cancel?

 

Just buy the book.

As for that particular job posting, they were using reputable university (translation "a school I've heard of") and online school (translation "UofP" or "diploma mills"). His or her language was ignorant but I think I understand what they're after. They don't want a bunch of heavily advertised school alumni applying. In Texas you cannot use more than 50% of the required accounting for a CPA anyways. Perhaps there is a similar restriction there.

I wonder what kind of CPA they are going to get for $45,000 a year in Augusta? Here in Texas we call that big fishin' with small bait.

Good luck to 'em.

 

Bears' Guide
http://books.google.com/books?id=k67XC_7y5xEC&printsec=frontcover&dq=bears+guide#PPA299,M1

 

I would never work for a company which would post something so asinine. It makes you wonder what other backwards views are part of their company culture.

 

My favorite is the 14th edition. I think it's the best of the bunch.

 

Wow, I'm pretty sure this violates about a dozen non-discrimination laws. I would assume that the majority of such employers see their spam folders and Google ads and assume that online equals diploma mill. This will get better over time.

 

I have seen the "no online degree" posted in a job requirement intelligently exactly once. It was for a CPA position in Texas whereby the poster itemized that the reason they felt that an online degree wouldn't be acceptable was because of the Texas accountancy licensing board placing restrictions on how many credits can be earned via distance ed. This employer wasn't willing to take a chance on hiring an executive CPA only to have that credential yanked in a technicality.

Granted there was little to no chance of that happening IF the employer checked out their applicants thoroughly, but I'm thinking this was a head hunting agency that wanted a sure bet. I couldn't blame them, Texas has had a weird relationship with distance education and accreditation for that matter for some time.

 

Yeah, I agree with most of the comments about the job posting I linked. I don't like it either when the employer doesn't disclose who they are, you really don't know who you are sending your info to. I know the original thread topic wasn't specifically asking about how employers view online degrees, it was just fresh on my mind since I had seen that job yesterday.

 

Here is a piece of an article that I pulled from GetEducated.com that may answer your question about how others may view the degree:

"GetEducated has consistently found that distance brands tied to large public university systems, such as California State University, the University of Maryland, the University of Texas System, and Indiana University, tend to receive high employer approval marks (90% or more) regardless of the assessor’s state of residency.

Universities that lack a brick-and-mortar legacy, offering degrees only by correspondence, earn the lowest approval marks. People are waiting for “Internet Only” universities to prove themselves. They tend not to trust universities that operate only distance-learning programs."



Pug

 

I'm pretty sure this employer is referring to degree mills, or to schools that have a reputation as being degree mills, deserved or undeserved. I am certain this employer would accept a degree that was earned online from Umass, UMUC, CalState, but may reject one earned from Phoenix or Kaplan.

Pug