so how good is UoP and UMUC in the eyes of the employers?

i've read nothing but BAD reviews for university of maryland university college (don't know why i'm still considering them) and mixed reviews for university of phoenix and i was wondering what employers these days think of them. is it a good thing or a bad thing if they see on your resume you got your degree from one of those RA schools?

thanks...

 

found this reply:

bad, bad, BAD! is this really what employers think of an online degree?!?!


EDIT: just found this thread -> http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=20063&highlight=phoenix+OR+uop <- and so far, my assumptions of an online degree is turning out to be right. very disappointing...

 

Don't make assumptions about all online degrees just because of what you find out about a couple of schools' programs. That is just as ridiculous as me saying the University of South Florida is just as good as Harvard because they both have brick-and-mortar campuses.

My opinion is that UoP is over-advertised. I try to avoid any school that bombards everybody with adverts touting their online programs. I know tons of people that don't even know UoP has a real campus. I think you will pay a lot of money for a degree that will get a lot of giggles from hiring managers. I feel for the UoP graduates that went to the brick-and-mortar campus.

UMUC is not as well known outside of the Northeast the way UoP is known nationally, but it is slowly gaining a reputation with HR departments as an "online school." I'd avoid both of them like the plague. Like someone else said, find an online program from a state university. The reputation of big, state unis is a bit more settled than places like UoP and UMUC. You might not even get asked if your degree was completed online if you got it at, say, Penn State.

 

scotty, thanks for your reply. that's exactly what i'm going to do from now on - drop these online schools and start looking at state universities that offer distance learning.

i am glad i did my little research before spending a dollar on these schools...

 

I guess you can take one (anonymous) person's advice based on absolutely no science and run with it. But you do it at your own peril. At least let me add a second opinion, and its source is not anonymous....

Most employers won't make a distinction between the two. Not because they cannot discern a difference, but because they won't try.

UoP is a dual-edged sword. On the one hand, there are many employers out there now with UoP degrees, and many more who are positively impressed with someone who goes through such an effort to get their degree. But there are others who think the idea of going to night school is bunk, or who have developed a bad impression of UoP (rightly or wrongly), etc.

UMUC is like any other school no one has heard of. In fact, you might get some extra play because of the name.

If I had a choice of having a degree from one or the other, I'd take the one from UMUC. But there are many other factors to consider, the largest of which is the schools' delivery systems. UoP requires you to be on a learning team, and that is a unique process not everyone likes. Check carefully before making any decision.

(No slam on Scotty; his opinion is just as good as anyone else's. My caution regards jumping to conclusions.)

 

Rich's opinion carries a lot of weight with me and the board; however, my opinion (which carries much less weight) is that I agree with Scotty. Based of my discussions with HR managers (I design and build HRMS systems) UMUC, UoP, AIC and the like are not as well respected as state universities. Based on their business model, I doubt they ever will be. I believe that in general you can't go wrong choosing a distance learning program for University of <insert state name here> or <insert state name here> State University. I also follow my own advice (see my signature!)

 

Of course, you don't have to defer to me or anyone else when it comes to opinion. We have different observances and experiences, and you--like Scotty--are sharing yours.

I agree that there is little difference between most of these schools when it comes to degree acceptance. But my comments about UoP stand--I think it is both a positive and a negative. But UMUC? Does it have a reputation--one way or another--beyond the DC region?

My dissertation research certainly backs up JoAnn's observations about state universities. This is why HR managers responding found degrees from Columbia State University to be more acceptable than any other school I included in the survey, save one (another school, this one legitimately invoking "State" in its name).

 

IIRC, UMUC isn't The University of Maryland. It is a subsidiary. It would be as if one listed "University of California" on one's resume, neglecting to indicate it wasn't Berkeley, but Irvine.

There was a time when this and another board were riddled with posts by someone adamant about making this point.

 

It's important to note that UMUC is part of the University System of Maryland. Although it's reputation might not be high, it's still a state university.

 

Scotty said:

Based on advertising? Speaking of State schools they often have athletic scandals in sports that are highly promoted. Is this a reason not to attend their engineering program? And who cares what an HR dept thinks? Does this mean they will not hire a UOP graduate? How shallow can you get. Buddy of mine worked for big firm and he hated HR dept. Said all they did was gossip and spread rumors including one about him that made working there unbearable.

 

If I had the choice, I would go with UMUC. As many have said, UoP has over advertised and does not have the best rep. I prefer to go with a "no-name" school than an over advertised school with repect to DL degrees.

 

If graduates did this then they would be lying.

The University of Maryland is a separate school from the University of Maryland University College.

One is ranked 56th by USNews.com for National Universities (top schools) while the other is not.

 

Hi Joann,

I take it by AIC you mean AIU (American Intercontinental) lol

 

But Irvine http://www.uci.edu/ and Berkeley http://www.berkeley.edu/ are both part of the University of California.

Luis

PD: UCI is ranked the 12th best public university in U.S. News & World Report’s 2004 annual rankings. Among both private and public colleges, UCI ranks 45th. (UCI tied with UC Santa Barbara and the University of Washington in both rankings.)

In its most recent ranking of doctoral programs (1995**), the National Research Council ranks UCI 11th among public universities in overall quality of doctoral programs. Among all public and private universities, UCI ranks 27th. And eight UCI doctoral programs were ranked in the top 25. Two of these – comparative literature and French – ranked in the top 10.

In a survey by Chemical and Engineering News, UCI tied with Harvard University for 15th place nationally in conferring doctoral degrees in chemistry. Both universities awarded 25 doctorates in chemistry during the 2001-02 academic year. UCI finished ahead of the California Institute of Technology and Stanford University. UCI also awarded 97 bachelor's degrees in chemistry – good for second place nationally.

 

I went to UoP on the advice of my then boss. He had his MSCS from Princeton but said that a BSIT from UoP was good enough to allow me to be promoted to a Senior EE. I figured it would take me an additional 5 years and putting up with snot nose twenty somethings to complete my BSEE so I opted for the easier BSIT. I was already an EE so the degree was a mere formality.

 

Well, my guess is that the two main reasons people get college edumacashuns are to gain knowledge and to gain employment. Since HR departments are the gateway to employment, I'd say that many people care what an HR department thinks of a particular school.

 

Both UoP and UMUC are regionally accredited. There is no reason for an employer to look down on that.

Also, as several have already mentioned, UMUC is a state school and they do have a very large B & M campus in Maryland. I've had nothing but good experiences with UMUC as a student and will in fact be teaching there beginning in the January term.

According to administrators that I've spoken to, the only reason they do not earn their AACSB-accreditation is because of their ratio of part-time faculty vs full-time. Also, the school is geared toward ADULT students who may have been out of school for a long time. If they were accredited by AACSB they would have to make the GMAT mandatory for enrollment. They don't want to do this, because it would greatly limit the number of students who would be able to attend.

I transferred 9 credits from UMUC into my Texas A & M Commerce MBA program. For an AACSB-accredited school to recognize the UMUC credits says something, in my opinion.

Also, I think most of the negative information found online about UMUC comes from those attending the campus in Europe. I don't know why, but there seems to be problems with that particular division.

 

Maybe, but one thing a prospective student has to think about when choosing a school is how that school will be viewed in relation to other schools that an HR manager will see. In other words, how will your school stack up against other schools in the hiring manager's eye? For the money one will spend at UoP, I think there are much better options, not only for quality but also for reputation. I just get the idea that UoP puts its financial bottom line ahead of its students' skill development and that comes through in its advertising blitz. UMUC isn't quite that bad, but it is gaining a rep as an online school, which is just a hair better than a degree mill in some people's minds.

Besides, accreditation reveals little about a school's ability to teach students. It merely shows evidence that the school meets some minimum standards. The school's reputation is built on how much it exceeds those standards.

 

"HR manager" and "hiring manager" are two different roles. HR is HR, hiring managers are line supervisors.