DL PhDs that hold full-time faculty positions

Academically or economically speaking?

Andy or all,

I noticed you were comparing the DL vs B&M degrees. But I wanted to point out my observation:

1) Part-time programs are designed for those who have related experience and are already have a full-time job vs full-time programs where you typically are dedicating your life (for those 4-5 years or however long it is) to academic theory in the hopes that you can later apply what you've learned.

In a part time program, you can more readily apply what you learn in real time (because you are already working a full time job, usually in a related profession).

Full timers do not have that benefit.

2) If the degree served it's purpose (of getting that promotion, tenure, another career field, etc.), then what difference did it make? Will those DL-ers ever actually use the more complex research methods that you speak of? Will the B&M-ers even have to? I guess for research the answer would be yes. But what if you wanted to be a ceo of a company?

3) And what does publishing in top journals have anything to do with being competent? I have no intention on publishing anything career related if I do move on to a Ph.D (other than the curicculum-required stuff). Now I may write a book about distance learning, but that's more of a personal thing.

I'm not sure what you meant about the caliber of employment history.

Not knocking your opinion by any means, but just trying to get a better feel as to how you are measuring competence.

I measure it as the person's ability to understand, plan, and execute his/her job duties and responsibilities to meet company goals or desired outcomes.

I know what the degrees can/will do for my career (navy or civilian); that's why I got mine. So perhaps I'm thinking from a non-academic standpoint, which is why I found your opinion of DL degrees somewhat conflicting.

 

Re: Academically or economically speaking?

Ybfjax - I'll agree that if the degree serves its purpose for you than it doesn't make any difference whether you go B&M or DL. The problem comes when people confuse purposes. If you aspire to teach at a teaching institution than DL may work - you can serve your purpose with a DL degres. Do beware of the growing number of DL grads, however, that are looking for full-time work. If you aspire to work at a major research university, you likely won't fulfill that purpose with a DL degree.

As for advanced stats - if you're going to be a CEO or teacher at a teaching focused college or university you probably don't need complex reserach methods. Again, if you want to go to a top research university, you'll need these skills.

As for journals - understand that if you are in the reserach world publishing in journals is a measure of your competence and contribution to the discipline. Publishing probably doesn't matter a bit if you are in industry. Do beware that many teaching institutions are raising their research expectations for full-time faculty. I know I wouldn't have the job I have now with out publications.

Regards - Andy

 

Originally posted by Dr Rene
It seems there is an Assistant Professor of Electronic Commerce and Information Systems with a Ph D. from Northcentral University at Our Lady of the Lake University in San Antonio, Texas. Don't know if he is tenured or not.

http://business.ollusa.edu/faculty/azuar/default.htm

Allow me to provide first-hand opinion on this. I have been teaching CIS/EC in this institution for the past 5 years as an Instructor and recently promoted to Assistant Professor due to Ph.D.
I thank this forum for providing very useful information. It did a great service to me.
I see DL and BM institutions as educational providers where you learn the tools to accomplish your educational goals, what you do with these tools is up to you, either to build a small boat or a Titanic.

In my case I have a passion to teach future professionals, to make a difference in their life and perhaps to serve as a humble model of persistence. My colleagues do not “see” me as a “special” doctor. They have seen my 4 years struggle to earn my Ph.D.

Unfortunately my institution is downsizing faculty due to low enrollment and retention, therefore I need to find another place to teach.
Thanks again for the great service that you are providing to the net-citizen community.

Rafael Azuaje, Ph,D. (NCU,2004)

 

Rafael,

Thanks for sharing your experiences. I'm also a MIS instructor and experienced the drop of enrollements in the MIS programs. I survive by teaching general business courses but I guess things will come back to normal eventually.

 

DL - Phd's in Tenure Track Roles

Yes....Sacred Heart University - which is located in Fairfield, CT has several tenure track's teaching. Both have PhD's one from Capella the other from Walden.

 

Now wait just a minute, what is wrong with a Hyundai?

 

Don't you think that Hyundai is "perceived" as a lower quality car than Mercedes? I think I am utterly right.
On the other hand, it doesn't necesarily mean that Hyunday is not asa good as Mercedes from a strictly technical perspective. It's about brand!

 

And what would a Roller be in higher education? Oxbridge?

 

Harvard!

 

Regarding higher education, in this instance of DL vs. standard BM (not talking about Harvard), then ok.
But regarding cars, no, its just not about brand here. Mercedes are not only perceived as better but from a technical perspective, they are amongst (if not) the best cars in the world. Hyundai? you gotta be kidding me.


S

 

OK. Thus Mercedes is much better than Hyundai overall.
Again, is it appropriate to make the same analogy between DL and B&M schools???

 

No. There is no research that indicates that B&M students are better than DL students. In fact, the only research available has shown that DL students perform just as well as B&M students if not better. Also, B&M schools vary tremendously in quality and reputation, and some DL schools are just as good as many decent B&M schools even if they are not perceived that way.

-S

 

No significant difference....

I concur with sulla. Many of your B&M schools have DL programs. And remember, the degree and transcript will still say "Harvard" not "Harvard B&M" or "Harvard Online/DL".

distancelearn.about.com had an article about the 'No Significant Difference phenomenon' in which the article essentially said that there was no significant difference between the outcomes of DL vs B&M students. However, in a few categories where there was a 'significant difference', it was usually in favor of the DL student!

A new moderator has seemed to have taken over that part of the about.com website, and I cannot find that article when I tried to do a search. Perhaps someone else knows where it is....

 

I think that the main concern is the DL format. If a student gets a DBA from Manchester school of business or University of Glasgow, he or she would expect to perform the same or more work than an on campus student and not less than 5 or 6 years of part time work. The main issue is that it seems that schools like NCU have found the formula to compress this to 3 years for what it takes normally 5 to 6 years. I would have a hard time to believe that a for profit school have found a magic way to make this happen.

 

Well Andy, all I have to say is:

#1: Dissertation quality: I have reviewed a bunch of dissertations from B&M schools in the course of doing my PhD. They ranged in quality from the sublime to the ridiculous. So, I found no magic bullet.

#2: Use of statistics: Well, it really depends on your research question, doesn't it? Does your research question require use of multi-variate statistical methods? If it requires such technique, but you are not using it, then that's bad. If your research question does not require that technique, then fine.

(In my case, I did a case study, and used techniques such as Yin, Miles & Huberman, etc--no different from any other I have seen)

#3: Committee composition: Ok, so I had two PhDs from Walden U on my committee--but also on University of Arizona (Committee Chair), and on PhD from Vanderbuilt. You can fool some of the PhDs some of the time, but not all PhD's all of the time....

Just my two cents...

 

Greetings to all,

There are three individuals listed in the Bronx Community College Bulletin, with degrees from Nova Southeatern University. Two are faculty and the third is in adminstration. I would bet their are more in the within CUNY system (City University of New York).

Maria

 

Please excuse the typing error!

Maria

 

Hi Maria - I'm glad you signed your post as it allowed me to avoid having to deal with your screen name. My first thought was something like that Prince thing... the artist formerly known as Prince...we could do something like, "the member known as '10 asterisks'." Or maybe a Star Trek thing (like 7 of 9), we could do Asterisks(10). As to your spotting several people from Nova Southeastern, you need to be a bit careful with that as they do have a big B&M campus that graduates lots of regular students every year. See you later.
Jack

 

Andy,

I cannot argue, in any definitive sense, the relative rigor/merit/difficulty/reliability/validity of DL dissertations to their BM counterparts. However, I can offer my own experience of having purchased a dozen or so dissertations through UMI as a part of my own program. These were chosen based in research topics in the general area of my own and methodologies similar to my own. They were from Penn State, U of New Mexico, Columbia, University of Washington, Southern Mississippi, and the others I cannot remember.

In the course of my dissertation search, I was able to satisfy my own curiosity of relative merit, DL to BM. I found that most dissertations I reviewed, and ended up purchasing, to be quite ordinary and typical of those I have read from DL learners. There was, in my estimation, nothing at all particularly rigorous in those dissertations from the institution I mentioned. I saw little that would speak to the notion of a single minded, constant devotion to 4-5 years of empirical scholarly research, unencumbered by the timely requirements of other professional duties. They were, mostly, quite ordinary, though obviously having met the muster required by their respective institutions and committee members - committees with members that serve on both BM and many on DL panels.

I have an acquaintance that is in her third year of a doctoral program in Economics at the University of Chicago. Most would agree a top ten in that category. She plans on taking 5-7 years in her program. However, she is regularly absent from her research duties and includes time for travel. She is not full time engaged in her research. When she is completed, the appearance of a six year dissertation process will be misleading if one tried to infer that that is how long her research actually took.

This was my limited experience. I am satisfied that there are far more noteworthy dissertations produced at BM research universities than at DL universities. I am also satisfied that the masses of dissertations at BM universities are not "better" than those I have personally read from Walden and Capella.

All purely anecdotal, I understand.

 

I agree with your post--I studied a pile of dissertations while preparing for, and doing mine with Capella.

I found few to be noteworthy, and many to be worse than mine, as well as others I have seen from Capella, Nova, etc...