Ccu

Thanks for bursting my bubble

It is not so bad for me since I plan to get my RA PhD in Business. I don't think the MBA will mean as much after I finish my PhD.

 

Hi, do you live in LA? Your 'Lakers' name suggests that. If you do, you might try the local California State Universities.

You could just try applying to them. It might work, though I'd guess it wouldn't.

If it doesn't, go to plan B.

There is, or at least a few years ago there was, small print in the CSU regulations concerning graduate admissions for graduates of non-accredited schools. (And I think that the CSU interprets 'accredited' to mean RA.)

First, go talk to the department chairman of the department where you would like to earn your degree. Tell him/her your story and kind of talk yourself up.

If the graduate department buys it, you can apply to the CSU campus as an undergraduate. That doesn't require that you have an accredited degree.

Then you petition the graduate department for special consideration. The department assigns you a semester or two of upper division major coursework of their choosing.

If you complete that work with a B average or better, you can petition the department and some assorted deans for transfer from undergraduate to graduate status, and you're in.

That was how it worked at California State University, Dominguez Hills in the early 90's, and I have no reason to think that it's changed since then.

If you decide to try this, I'd suggest talking to them first.

 

CSUDH more flexible than CSULB

My friend had her DETC credits accepted by CSUDH but CSULB did not accept mine. Some of my friends could not even get CSULB to accept credits from UCI, a California university of higher standing than CSULB. CSULB did accept each and every credit from community colleges I attended.

CSUDH has the external Humanities MA degree at a very reasonable cost, so it's worth a try to see if CCU is accepted. I live and work in the South Bay/Orange County area and the the prevailing feeling is CSUDH is more user friendly.

 

I used to drive by CCU's building on Main Street in Santa Ana in the late 70s. It was a small two-story building with a stairway in the back (I do not know if there was one inside as well). I think that the name had just been changed from California Western University to California Coast University. The CCU sign was very small (you could not see if from the street).

My institution (Cal State San Bernardino) will not accept units from CCU.

Tony Piña
Faculty, Cal State U. San Bernardino

 

CCU took the name "California Western University" after an accredited school by that name abandoned it. (That school became United States International University, now Alliant University.)

CCU was forced by the court to drop the CWU name; the ruling was that they (CCU) inappropriately appropriated the name--it belonged to the original owner. Thus, California "Coast" University. (CCU is located a bit inward from the coast.)

This behavior is found frequently in diploma mills.

Another case of a California-Approved appropriating the abandoned name of an accredited school is Sierra University. Sierra started out as, get this, "University Without Walls." This created quite some confusion, since that monniker was used by the Union for Experimenting Colleges and Universities (UECU, now Union Institute and University) and its affiliated schools to represent their learner-centered bachelor's programs. But, as it turned out, UECU didn't register "UWW" as a trademark. Hence, the very unaccredited, California-Approved UWW. They became Sierra University soon afterwards, then died off.

 

Unfortunately, I don't think your CCU MBA will mean much ever, regardless of what you do in the future.

 

Wow, you are a real ray of sunshine! Could you please explain what you mean.

 

lakers... in answer to your original question, Troy State University and a number of other schools will accept your CCU credits. This is done typically under provisional status until you demonstrate your learning ability. Attached is the TSU policy which clearly describes their requirements for unconditional acceptance:

" Unconditional Admission - Master's Degree

To qualify for unconditional admission to a master's degree program, applicants must meet the following requirements:

1. Hold a master's or higher degree from a regionally accredited university. No test score required. (Master's or higher degree holders from non-accredited or otherwise accredited institutions are not eligible for this exemption.)

OR

2. Hold a baccalaureate degree from a regionally accredited university with a minimum overall undergraduate grade point average of 2.5 (4.0 scale) or a 3.0 grade point average on the last 30 semester hours. All hours attempted in the term in which the 30 semester hours were reached will be used to calculate the grade point average.

OR

3. Hold a baccalaureate degree from an unaccredited or otherwise accredited college or university with minimum overall undergraduate grade point average of 2.5 (4.0 scale) or a 3.0 grade point average on the last 30 semester hours. All hours attempted in the term in which the 30 semester hours were reached will be used to calculate the grade point average. (See Unaccredited or Otherwise Accredited Student Admission requirements.)...

AND

4. Have an acceptable score on the appropriate entrance exam (GRE 850-verbal and quantitative, MAT 33, GMAT 450). Note: Students entering counseling programs must meet the specified GPA requirements in #2 above or the stated minimum test score requirement. "

 

Well, I state either the truth or my opinion, whether anyone likes it or not.

What I mean is that a CCU MBA is academically meaningless, and the only place that it's likely to be widely accepted is in private business. Even then, I'd be willing to bet that kind of acceptance is based more on ignorance of legitimate accreditation than anything else.

If CCU does attain DETC accreditation, then of course I'll take another look at my opinion. I've never considered CCU a degree mill, but at the current moment, it's just another unaccredited school, which doesn't place it in very good company.

 

I think your opinion apes a common perception amongst some of the frequent posters here, but as can be seen above, credits from CCU and many other similarly approved or otherwise accredited schools, along with the appropriate testing, will be sufficient to gain admission to further one's education. This is far from "meaningless" (and does refute your position) since without those credits one would be ineligible to continue.

 

At how many schools? You've mentioned Troy State as a possibility. Possible because they don't mention CCU by name.

The general rule (almost the universal rule) is that unaccredited degrees & credits are not accepted at regionally accredited schools. In my eyes, that makes them meaningless.

 

Auburn is another, ... the fact I've mentioned two right off the bat, puts a stake in the heart of the myth being promulgated above. The policy at TSU is clearly written so is Auburn's. It is incredible to propose that CCU would be mentioned by name. You are entitled to your opinion however and I leave you to it.

 

That is your opinion and that is fine. I do not agree but that is OK. I don't care to get into a debate about it; that has been done too many times here and no one ever really gets anywhere.

 

Bruce is right. CCU credits won't be accepted at RA schools, more or less period. Whether that makes them meaningless will doubtless be debated, but anybody who sees a CCU degree as other than their last degree is heading for a lot of frustration.

The "is too is not yo mama" tendency in discussions of UA schools just underlines this fact. Where ease of acceptance and universal utility obtain, there is no need to try so d*** hard to justify what one has done.

So if CCU will be your final degree, and if you're man enough/woman enough to accept the fact in advance that utility will be limited--without whining about it--go ahead, enroll, learn what you can, announce your CCU degree, and be happy whether or not others are impressed. But don't whine.

 

No, this is not correct. Perhaps partially, but not completely. The contradiction is for general information and should not be perceived as "whining". If one does a Google search on the following criteria "unaccredited transfer credit", approx. 4100 sites appear. (or if you choose "unaccredited transfer graduate" over 3400 sites appear). In a few minutes research, the following schools are shown to consider/accept unaccredited credits: Western Carolina Univ, Drew Univ, Utah State Master Plan for Higher Education, Univ of Idaho, Art Institute of Portland, Tennessee Tech Univ. etc. I don't have the time to go through all four thousand hits but if only 1/20th of the sites listed included schools who consider/accept those credits, that would be over 200 or approx. 10% of regionally accredited schools (it might easily be higher since I was getting 1 out of 7). The following was interesting from Tennessee Tech Univ:

Unaccredited Transfers
"...we cannot discriminate against unaccredited institutions by not accepting transfer work from students. This action is driven by a recently approved change in the SACS criteria for accreditation which prohibits discrimination against unaccredited institutions. In order to evaluate credit from a unaccredited institution, catalogs and course syllabi will be requested from the students..." 1998.

I think it is fair to say that most regionally accredited schools do not accept credits from State Approved or otherwise accredited instititutions or unaccredited institutions (however that may be incorrect since no one has produced a specific number); however there are a significant number who do (with stated provisions for doing so).

 

I agree completely with this last statement. It is clear that in some instances unaccredited, state approved, or DETC accredited degrees will be accepted. It will likely always be for non-competitive schools and will usually be the for profit schools as opposed to the higher ranked RA schools. Clearly there is some utility to non-RA credits. The hitch is who knows exactly what you will be doing in 10 years? For most of us choosing RA provides the greatest utility while maximizing future choices.

 

So, 4100 colleges & universities will accept CCU degrees and credits (relax...I'm just busting your chops )

In all seriousness, my undergrad degree is from a very small, very generic, very non-prestigious college. However, it is regionally accredited, which allowed me to apply to any graduate program that I wanted.

I applied, and was accepted, at Anna Maria College, Boston University, Suffolk University, UMass-Lowell, and Western New England College. AFAIK, none of those schools would consider a graduate of a non-accredited school for admission.

As veteran members here know, I don't consider CCU to be any sort of mill. However, students and/or graduates should realize that the utility of their degree is severely limited.

 

Thanks for all the info guys. It seems to me that some schools will accept CCU credits and some won't...I'll just have to take my chances with some of them.

Question: Any word on CCU's DETC accreditation?

 

WHAT???

SACS says that schools can not "discriminate" against unaccredited institutions? That's new to me.

One thing to keep in mind is that, if this is true, many of these institutions might have had these procedures because they were required by SACS.

But note (thanks, Rod, for including the date) that this statement is from 1998. The "Criteria for Accreditation" that were referenced are no longer in effect. These guidlines were replaced last year by the "Principles of Accreditation." I've looked over the "Principles" and there is no mention of unaccredited schools at all.

 

Some will/some won't gives the appearance of perhaps a 50/50 chance. My hunch, which is based on Rich's research and the personal experience of others, is that most RA schools will not, while some will. Keep in mind this is in reference to RA schools, and while RA is indeed the gold standard in the US, RA does not encompass the entire degree landscape. CCU Ph.D. grads qualify for CA licensure, while many of their grads serve in industry and business. So, to assert that CCU credits/degrees are "useless" or "meaningless" is without substantiation. Will they have RA utility? Certainly not! Will they have some utility? Indeed.