I am trying to decide between two programs. I did not take the GMAT/GRE, and work full time, so these programs offer a low cost option for me. Here is my debacle: Mount St. Mary's is heavily classroom based with maybe 1 or 2 classes offered online throughout the program. This is doable, but so much extra time, gas, energy. (Going to class twice a week after work and then 50 miles back home will be a lot to handle). The problem is UMUC being mainly online is more realistic for me, but I fear the stigma that comes with "UMUC". Do employers see this and think down upon it, like it is some U of Phoenix degree? I always have thought of it as not legitimate. To me An MBA from 'Mount St. Mary's University" seems like it sounds/look better to future employers and in general. Please give me your thoughts. Need help!!!!
Well . . . . .I have never heard of Mount St. Mary's University. . . . . .I have heard of UMUC. Around southeast Michigan . . . Walsh College is an excellent, top notch business school, but outside of the area, not many have heard of it. I received my MBA in Project Management through Colorado Technical University mainly because of the PMI accreditation and some other reasons. Employers know the name, maybe through commercials, I don't know. My employer paid for 20% of the tuition and gave me considerable pay raise after I received the degree. Do what is best for you. Just remember that accreditation matters. Regards, Michael
I'd be interested in knowing the method you used to narrow your choices down to those two schools. There are over 200 DL MBA programs in this country alone and neither of the schools you mentioned are the cheapest. I recommend that you do some more research before making a decision. You can certainly start right here at DegreeInfo or you can go to what is still the best comprehensive list of DL MBA programs, Jonnie's DL Pages. https://sites.google.com/site/aggietechie/
UMUC is a not for profit public college. It has an interesting name that comes from the schools history, but I wouldn't think of it as a UoP. I know their DBA requires some residencies at the main campus, but have no clue about their MBA.
If you're in the D.C. or Baltimore area, you can do better than either, honestly. Are you married to these as finalists?
I am from the DC area and am very familiar with both schools. Outside of this area I doubt it matters. If you intend to stay in the area, go with MSM. Better school, true B&M campus, great networking opportunities, etc.
I've never heard anyone speak ill of UMUC. It is very common among active duty sailors. Outside of the DC metro area employers are largely indifferent to the name. It raises no red flags but it doesn't impress. As for the for/non profit debate, as I've said before that has more to do with perceptions rather than the actual structure of the university. Just yesterday I was having lunch with a coworker who took the opportunity to mock a former colleague's MBA from "an unaccredited diploma mill." That former colleague's MBA was from SNHU. We don't get SNHU TV commercials here, at least as far as I've seen, so I have no idea why someone locally would form any opinion on SNHU let alone a very negative one. It's also inaccurate, of course, as SNHU is non-profit and RA. MSM has a decent name. But I'm going to join the chorus of "how the heck did you get down to those two?" DC Metro is a lot like NYC in the sense that you have a lot of choices within arm's reach. It would be like living in Manhattan and opting for an MBA from Empire State College. There's nothing wrong with ESC. But would you honestly walk past Baruch, NYU, Columbia a bunch of local SUNYs and countless private universities to get there?
My guess is online ads, which apparently make any school seem less reputable even than one never heard of. (Or that combined with the fact that most people's definition of a "degree mill" is any school less prestigious, however slightly, than the one from which they graduated.) Exactly. Meanwhile in the D.C./Baltimore area that list would be Georgetown, George Washington, Johns Hopkins, Catholic, American, Howard, UMD-College Park, and George Mason University. Maybe it's worth taking the GMAT after all?
Of course, let's not forget that for my own MBA I bypassed Syracuse University, Cornell (as if I could afford that. Though the MPS in Industrial and Labor Relations would have been affordable), Binghamton University, Colgate and all of the online options to prove something to myself by returning to the University of Scranton. Good school but ripe for Office jokes. I don't think either MSM or UMUC would hurt a person. But they are also not going to impress the way that all of the schools Steve mentioned would though I note he omitted my very own University of Management and Technology, the most prestigious business school in that particular office building in Arlington. No one is ever going to make a comment about Hopkins like my co-worker remarked about SNHU. Ever. If it's more affordable than all of the others or you live closer those are all reasons why you might be considering it. Convenience and cost are reasonable measures. But choose wisely. You can earn a stack of MS/MAs. But you only earn one MBA (because earning more than one MBA is dumb. _
Sure they do, by people who graduated from somewhere more prestigious, however slightly. I had a corporate training gig once at a company that really liked to hire kids who had just graduated from top schools. Showing up for initial training with them was entertaining -- watching them all try to impress one another by exclaiming how they went to Princeton, or Cornell, or wherever. Most of them realized after one day, "Oh, I'm not so special after all," and knocked it off. One didn't get it, said things like how "George Washington isn't even Georgetown". Finally I said, "Look kid, here in the real world that doesn't impress people like it did back on campus. Do yourself a favor and make friends rather than enemies." He stopped. (Well, he stopped within earshot, at least.)
I don't think you will ever find a person who, speaking seriously, will say Hopkins is a diploma mill or claim it is unaccredited. You may get some jovial elite school competitive jabs in but that's about it. Hopkins has consistently beat Ivy league medical schools in the rankings. It's top shelf. The only school that might reasonably give someone the position to lob serious insults at Hopkins would be Oxford (and they're probably too classy for that). I get your point, however, and I think a good number of the other DC schools on that list could take a little bit more heat from others with degrees from more prestigious schools. Still, I cannot imagine someone would treat GWU with the same level of contempt that they feel comfortable directing at schools with internet ads. That's pretty obnoxious. And I think you'll always find that among students and the recent grads. Just 4 years prior they were feverishly comparing rankings to see which school would be graced with their presence. But there are a handful of schools out there who draw that sort of obnoxious comment even from working adults who have been at it for decades. My colleague with the SNHU comment? She's not a rude person, normally. She just really hated the colleague with the SNHU MBA and thought it was a weak point to mock. In fact, when I pointed out that SNHU is accredited, she backed off of that argument and just went on to something else. To me that sort of thing is a separate issue from typical academic snobbery. It's an off the cuff snobbery that doesn't even require you to have a degree from a prestigious school. It's what I see and hear when a Walden grad makes fun of the University of Phoenix for being for-profit.
