Help!!! A&M Commerce vs Liberty University

I've been surprised by how many people in academia know about Liberty University. Liberty has a large online presence, but even people who know little about distance learning often know about the school. Their opinions are usually negative stemming from Liberty's teaching of Young Earth Creationism.

 

You'll see I said "for fun" and that's all it is. That said, I talk to people all the time- I'm sure you must too?

 

Liberty as an "online school" isn't really the whole picture. Liberty, standing alone, is very well ranked and regarded- admission is considered selctive. Since I have a subscription to USNews, I'll copy/paste some content from their profile- which doesn't even mention Christian affiliation.

Summary
Liberty University is a private institution that was founded in 1971. It has a total undergraduate enrollment of 49,744, its setting is urban, and the campus size is 7,000 acres. It utilizes a semester-based academic calendar. Liberty University's ranking in the 2016 edition of Best Colleges is Regional Universities (South), 80. Its tuition and fees are $22,000 (2015-16).
Fall 2014 acceptance rate 20.2%

For what it's worth they do rank online programs over there (about 1200 of them), and the Liberty online MBA makes the list. Of the 142 colleges that meet their inclusion criteria for online MBAs, the rank Liberty as #93. Best Online MBA Degree Programs | Online MBA Rankings | US News

I still stand by my earlier opinion that I'd aim higher in this instance.

 

Not to be rude, but none of this has anything to do with my point. Many people in academia have heard of the school, and they've heard of it because it's known for being extremely right-wing, being founded by a bigot, and teaching Young Earth Creationism. Not only does that not sit well with natural scientists, but it also doesn't sit well with social scientists who believe in using the scientific method. This is not a school that is only known by distance learners and higher education enthusiasts. There are other regional universities with a similar ranking that are not very well-known. Honestly, I don't consider #80 to be "very well-ranked." Liberty is not that far from being in the bottom quartile of ranked regional universities in the South.

 

This is in Liberty's mission statement posted on their U.S. News profile.

Liberty University | Best College | US News

Not that this really matters. Most people who have heard of the school know its religious affiliation without having to visit the U.S. News website. If you really want to receive a higher education with a conservative Christian worldview, then Liberty is a fine school. If you don't really care for that, then I would recommend finding a school that is less controversial and polarizing.

 

Liberty not only screams evangelical/born again, but evangelical/born again of a certain sectarian stripe.

I am a born again evangelical, a Christian writ large, and even though I teach at State U, I don't mind telling my students what I believe. That said, I would neither want to teach at nor have my children attend Liberty. Same would go for Oral Roberts.

The notion of having a degree from a university founded by a televangelist or one who spent the better part of their career promoting themselves, as opposed to the one whom they claim to follow, makes many Christians queasy. Too much baggage. Ditto for the controlling nature of either university, any religious institution where attendance at anything other than classes is demanded seems to me distinctly unchristian in its approach.

 

I see tons of unranked schools recommended on this forum. LU being ranked 80th isn't amazing but just being ranked says something positive. There are 4 or 5 regions and a national ranking cat. Each cat one goes to 100. So out of all the colleges and universities (I think 3000 or close to it) LU makes the cut. That being said I would go to A&M College Station for a MBA long before I picked LU. Since I live in Texas and was raised here I will give my opinion on A&M Commerce. It may carry the A&M name but people know the difference between the flag ship school and Commerce it's not going to impress anyone in Texas. It's not a negative it just doesn't have the rep College Station does. It's like going to A&M Corpus or A&M Central Texas, that's not going to impress anyone either.

 

not to be rude, but you're trying to convince the wrong person. You should probably reply to the OP.

 

Fascinating.

Did you or your friend not know the history, and the LU convocation practice prior to joining? There was also a $10 fine for missing Bernie Sander's speech. Wrap your head around that.

 

He lived a very sheltered life until coming to Tech. He was raised in that sort of environment so I doubt he questioned anything A year in O'Shaughnessy Hall (O'Shag) changed all that. I am also talking about the early 1990's here.

He never mentioned the fines to me but I was just flabbergasted at anything being mandatory.

 

You guys are so mean. Liberty is not for everybody. As a graduate of Liberty online (undergrad) I recommend the OP go in another direction.

 

But, I replied to your reply to me, but this post that you quoted was, technically, not a reply.

:biglaugh:

 

I am way mean--just ask my students. Hooey on Jerry Falwell. God Bless him, but hooey on him.

 

Being ranked #80 is better than nothing depending on what you're looking for in a school. The thing is that I had this biology instructor go off on this diatribe about Liberty. I also had a couple of criminal justice professors make some slightly negative comments about the school. When I mention that I got my bachelor's degree from Thomas Edison State College, no one's ever heard of it, and I kind of like it that way. I don't have to hear anyone go into this long-winded political discussion.

 

Even if a person heard of TESC it is unlikely that TESC is going to evoke a political discussion. Liberty University is always going to be controversial. It invites controversy.

You would invite the same sort of discussion (potentially) with a degree from Hillsdale. And a degree from Patrick Henry College is likely to turn either religious or political (or religiously political) long before you ever get into the nitty gritty of their TRACS accreditation.

The problem is that it, in some ways, overshadows the ranking in ways that are both good and bad. Good because people who think that Liberty University is just "telling it like it is" are going to have a favorable view of your school. Bad because people who think that Liberty is a monument to a raving segregationist are going to have a not so favorable view of the school.

Rankings can be very good. But, let's face it, lower tier rankings are unlikely to overcome regional bias. An employer in Northeastern Pennsylvania is not going to be impressed by an out-of-state school ranked #80 on a list they don't ever look at. And they certainly aren't going to bump that school higher on the list of hiring priorities than the unranked (or regionally ranked) local school where they do their recruiting.

Employers know Harvard is a good school because Harvard has a solid reputation not because of its current ranking in USNWR. USNWR can be an interesting resource, particularly for specific programs, but at the end of the day it's a magazine trying to sell copies of itself. It's placements aren't gospel truth*.

*Most definitely intentional