California Coast University Time Bomb???

Is anyone familiar with a scenario where a Cal Coast degree became a time bomb?

The CCU doctorate allows one to sit for the CA psych exam, and a Google search shows more than a handful within academe who have RA BA's and MA's with a CCU Ph.D. or Ed.D.

CCU appears to be one of the better CA state-approved schools, and indeed fills a niche for some people. Thus, my curiosity as to any cases of CCU time bombs.

 

CCU seems to be very well accepted by everyone other than the local inquisition.

 

In the 1980s, I testified as an expert witness in California Superior Court on behalf of a CCU (actually he did it under their earlier name, CWU) graduate who had been fired when the employer learned of the source of the degree. The employer required accredited degrees, although they did not specifically state that the accreditor needed to be approved by the Dept. of Education. CCU did claim accreditation at that time, from an unrecognized (but, I still believe, sincere) accreditor. My recollection is that the matter was settled out of court after the trial began, so there was no verdict.

 

Dennis: CCU seems to be very well accepted by everyone other than the local inquisition.

John: My belief is that of the 3,000+ junior colleges, colleges, and universities with recognized accreditation in the US, the number that would routinely accept transfer credit or degrees of CCU is approximately zero. (There have some case-by-case acceptances.)

 

I don't necessarily disagree but, from internet searches, the number of people in prominent positions, including academia, seems high compared to even many accredited universities. Is this simply a fluke, a conspiracy, or a degree of acceptance.

 

My guess would be ingnorance of accreditation in the case of industry or the degree from CCU was not really required for the position. Academia may be similar. The PhD was not needed for the position, guy already had the job and got the PhD. Remember we had the woman with the milled PhD who had a job at a well respected college. It happens.

North

 

CCU appears to be one of the better CA state-approved schools, and indeed fills a niche for some people. Thus, my curiosity as to any cases of CCU time bombs. [/B][/QUOTE]

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I think it was Walter Martin who had a CCU PhD (before a name change... of the University that is) and who wrote the "Kingdom of the Cults." Then some of those whom he attacked in his book were able to use the unaccredited status of his alma mater to question his qualifications. I suppose the degree to which this is a "time bomb" is something only time will tell.

 

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Critics could also point out that a degree was earned 100% via DL from a non-US school. My point being that critics will always find something to criticize. Martin stated that his CCU Ph.D. was in comparative religion, yet CCU has never offered religious degrees. I think this is what his critics highlighted, although the unaccredited status of CCU probably added to their argument.

Charles Stanley's unaccredited Th.D. from Luther Rice Seminary (earned some 20 years before LRS became TRACS accredited) doesn't seem to have given him similar problems. He is an accomplished author, as well as pastor/teacher. And though he has written myriad books/articles/pamphlets, the unaccredited Th.D. has never been an issue--or at least I have never heard it mentioned, except on this forum.

Again, my point is that Walter Martin claimed a degree which CCU did not offer. It could have been that Martin did his degree in psychology, and wrote the dissertation on some aspect of comparative religion and just stated that the degree was in that field. I don't have enough information to speculate, but it seems that the main issue his critics had was that the degree was claimed to be in comparative religion when CCU offered no such degree.

 

Gosh...whatever happened to Dr. Trudy? Did we ever discover the sources of all her degrees?

 

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This was not a personal criticism of your UZ degree program, Bill. As you well know, I think UZ (and other SA universities) is indeed a credible institution. My point only referenced the fact that one is always subject to criticism when following a non-traditional route.

As for White and Martin, yes, they have been criticized for earning unaccredited doctorates. Others have taken this route without such major criticism, thus my reference to Charles Stanley.

 

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Good point Bill. As mentioned, James White has also been slammed using straw man tactics to divert attention from theological issues. The issue has been over White's unaccredited ThD. (Columbia Evangelical Seminary). Same for Martin. It allows folks to attack their credibility. White is a bright guy (although he comes across on his site as a little arrogant) and I have no idea why he never pursued a SA or AU research doctorate.

Russell brings up Stanley but that is a little different. I do not know if Stanley would have done quite as well had his ThD not been from a school that eventually became accredited and was fairly well accepted among Southern Baptists.

North

Russell brings up the

 

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Not at all, I have stated on many threads that the accredited route is always the "best case scenario." One should always pursue an accredited (RA, GAAP, TRACS, DETC, etc.) degree if it is within one's reach--financially, logistically, etc. However, where this is not realistic, schools such as CCU do afford an option. And I speak specifically of those at the doctoral level who may/may not need the degree for a particular job, or for those who may seek to practice psychology in CA.

 

It seems to me that when a person reaches the doctoral level, he or she ceases to be a fungible commodity that can be replaced at a whim with anyone else with the same degree title.

Ph.D.s are supposed to be scholars, they are supposed to be specialists, they are supposed to be authorities. When they are hired, they are hired precisely on the basis of their academic qualifications to fill specific highly responsible positions that are often very well defined.

If a biotech firm hires a Ph.D., they aren't just hiring some guy because he has an RA (or not) doctorate. They might not even care a whole lot about the degree (despite advertising it as a requirement for the position). The company has a problem getting its agent into cells or something like that. They are terribly interested in finding somebody who is an expert on active transport across cell membranes. So they are gonna home in on previous research experience, on publications, on recomendations and on dissertation topic. The guy interviewing you and who is gonna make the final decision whether or not to hire you is their research guy, and the interview is going to be very technical.

Seen that way, I don't think that accreditation looms very large. The biggest problem with the non-accredited doctoral programs (and with many DL doctoral programs in general) is that there is very little there there.

These schools churn out what purport to be top-level scholars, but the programs never seem to produce any scholarship.

There do seem to be places where doctorates appear to be rather commoditized: Meeting state licencing requirements in clinical psychology, filling part-time temporary adjunct teaching positions in high demand subjects (like business) in less-competitive non-research institutions. In non-scholarly writing.

And these are where one most often finds the DL docs, RA or not.

That's probably going to be the case until some DL doctoral programs raise their academic profile. The day has to come when people simply can't come up to speed in their specialty unless they familiarize themselves with the influential widely-discussed work produced by individuals in DL programs.

 

Part of the purpose of doctoral study is the completion of research that adds new information to the field. Whether this is done by dissertation or some other orginal reasearch, the meaningful component of the doctorate is this contribution. The problem with state approved docs is that the quality of the dissertation, even general infromation about the dissertation is rarely known. Their research projects/dissertations are not listed in any of the dissertation listings (such as Proquest or Dissertation Abstracts). Regarding RA DL docs, I think their credibility will increase as the qaulity of the disserations and the orginal research generated by the instituions increase. It is important that doctoral programs are not recognized for how fast they produce graduates, rather they are recognized for the quality of work their graduates produce.

 

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Bill Dayson: "If a biotech firm hires a Ph.D., they aren't just hiring some guy because he has an RA (or not) doctorate. They might not even care a whole lot about the degree (despite advertising it as a requirement for the position)..."

John: Indeed. During my involvement with Greenwich, we had a Ph.D. applicant who worked at the NYU medical school, doing advanced and significant work in Alzheimers research. Because he had no Ph.D., most journals would not accept his articles, so they were submitted with other faculty as author, and he as a thanked person in a footnote. And because he was 72 years old, NYU would not admit him to their Ph.D. program. Four senior faculty at NYU agreed to sign on as Greenwich adjunct faculty solely to guide his work. When he finished, NYU formally acknowledged his Ph.D., and his papers were accepted by most journals, under his own name.