I've been dealing in company administration for 18 years. I have vast experience and now operate as senior management level. I don't have the money nor the time to any form of study towards an MBA or BSc - my wife's expecting our first child and my parents are both old and need some looking after - and as I'm the only child it falls to me to do the lot. To my shame, I didn't try to study too well during the senior school years. When I started college I nailed down and got the highest possible results in NVQ levels 1,2,3,4 in business administration. I consider, and so do my managers, my experience in administration to be far vaster then someone who's just skipped out of some university with their new 2.1 degree. If I can use my experience in adminsitration to gain an MBA based on life experience, and that in turn helps me better myself with a better paying job...where is the crime?
It may or may not be a crime, depends on the state. It is called academic fraud to pretend that one has a degree that was not really earned. Life Experience credits are the primary scam that separates diploma mills from real schools, IMHO. It is a scam because the diploma mills only pretend to use life experience to grant degrees or credits. The truth of the matter is that they are just trying to get the victim's money. For a detailed description of the difference between Life Experience credits and getting credit for already obtained knowledge I suggest that you read the articles on the DegreeInfo article page. http://www.degreeinfo.com/article18_1.html http://www.degreeinfo.com/article17_1.html As a bonus, here's an article on warning signs that the place might be a diploma mill. http://www.degreeinfo.com/article20_1.html Where it gives one warning sign as, "The school offers an entire degree (or nearly so) based on lifetime or real world experience, particularly if the degree is above the undergraduate level." Regards, Bill
My personal view (combined with the addition of $1.50 -- you might get a loaf of bread) is that "life experience" credit suffers (especially past the undergraduate level) from the possible drawback that it does not necessarily demonstrate that one can repeat the feats of the past. This becomes particularly important in the higher degrees. What process was followed such that, given a new situation in the same discipline, the candidate could prove him or herself to be more than a "one trick pony"? If it can be demonstrated that method and process were followed (rather than applied in assessment in a reverse engineering fashion), then I have no objection to such. But then -- what would my objections matter? ;-)
