Is ITU A Diploma Mill?

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Danny Ng, why don't you just shut up as being told my some senior member of the forum and spreading baseless rumours about good ITU university.

 

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Is ITU A Diploma Mill?

You may be right but there is a considerable difference in teaching and learning model of the Universities you mentioned and the Universities like ITU and many others unaccredited universities.

While universities like Herriot-watt and Portsmouth might have lax entry requirements but then it is not easy to complete the program requirements and drop out rate is high as the academic delivery is controlled by the University themselves and not left in the hands of local agents. So their lax requirements could be offset by their stringent completion requirements.

In case of ITU, firstly it seems to me that their EDBA program carries no accreditation or approval and secondly their EMBA program is not the same as their MBA program being offered in USA. See the program details at their catalog;

http://66.102.7.104/search?q=cache:_qPBEwS98rsJ:www.itu.edu/docs/ITU%2520Bulletin%25202004-2006.doc+EMBA,+ITU&hl=en

Limits on Transfer Credit

The specific number of credit hours accepted for transfer is determined on an individual basis. No transfer is automatic. For graduate degrees, no more than 25 percent of the credit hours can be transferred. This limit includes courses taken as a non-degree student. Transfer credit is accepted only for courses in which the student received a grade of B or better. For undergraduate, a maximum of 15 credit hours with grade C or better within the past 10 years may be transferred beyond the associate degree or equivalent from a community college, or beyond the first 60 semester credits from a four-year college or university.

To be considered for transfer, work must have been completed in an accredited institution and must meet the quality and content of courses offered at ITU.


Master’s Degree Admission Requirements

The minimum requirements for full status degree admission are as follows:

•Except for seniors at ITU, a baccalaureate in a related field from an accredited college or university is required.

•Official transcripts or their equivalent (e.g., notarized copies) are required from institutions where the applicant earned credits or degrees that are relevant to admission at ITU.
•An overall grade point average (GPA) of 2.50 (A = 4.00) is required.

•The Graduate Record Examination (GRE) general test or GMAT for M.B.A. applicants is preferred, but not required.

•Applicants whose native language is not English must meet one of the following requirements:

(i) Take the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) within two years prior to admission. The minimum admission score is 550 on old or 213 on new grading system.

(ii) Have completed at least thirty credit hours (30) of full-time study in a country where English is the native language and in a school where English is the language of instruction within five years of the date of enrollment.

(iii) Have completed the required ESL courses at ITU or other ITU approved institutions


Double standards are obvious here. The above looks very different to the EMBA programs being offered in Malaysia and Vietnam and even the course offered in MBA and EMBA are different!

Here is how Minerva and its gang celebrates after cheating a large number of students into enrolling for their Diploma mill MBA and DBA programs;

http://web.archive.org/web/20040106111732/www.minervavietnam.com/newsb.asp?NewsID=4

 

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Is ITU A Diploma Mill?

In fact, the degree programs of University of Portsmouth and other UK/USA/Australian universities by distance learning is very easy to complete now! As I said before, MSc in IT of University of Portsmouth may be completed by online coursework without examinations. Many accredited UK/USA/Australian universities distribute the examination papers via local agents, if the course has examinations. Such policy in fact encourages to provide examination tips to the students. I donn't think there may not have any cheating exercises in such process.

Furthermore, almost all universities over the world will provide mature student entry to override above admission requirements. So, no double standards can be existed!

If you really want to earn a degree from a university with rigid admission requirements and course assessments, you should consider those that are still controlling students' performance by public examination systems, i.e. examination through reliable 3rd party like examination or educational authority of a country but not via local agent. There will be a few still for your consideration, e.g. University of London, University of Heriot Watt, University of South Africa etc. They all are still evaluating students' results by examinations only. All examinations are arranged by 3rd party of independent and reliable authority.

Therefore, I donn't think ITU is selling degrees if it has coursework for students' to do. You may say it may not attain requirements of your own standard. If you can find out evidences it really is selling degrees WITHOUT any coursework done by the students, your view may be accepted.

 

ACICS Schools offering DBAs

Besides the Northwestern Polytechnic Univ, there is only one other ACICS scholl that is authorized (by the ACICS) to offer DBA-the University of Northern Virginia.

 

Re: ACICS Schools offering DBAs

It look to me that the person selling the program with the strategy of offering legitimate accredited degree and meantime if a person can not complete or not qualified then it will feed them for un-legitimate or degree mill university.

I think most of the Agent doing such way to promote the degree mill university otherwise how they advertise their program. This exactly like what happen to Malaysia. Some of the operator selling good university advertise heavily in the paper and eventually they promote the degree mill.

 

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Is ITU A Diploma Mill?

ITU is ACICS accredited university and therefore one would assume that all their programs are accredited and to be honest I was enrolled with ITU in Malaysia on the same assumptions. However, I suspected the foul play when their agents informed me that no need to worry about assignments and no examinations required and even dissertation can be arranged. All these matters rang alarm in my mind and I was proven correct when I was informed by ACICS that their EDBA program is not accredited. If ITU EDBA program is not accredited then I feel it is waste of our time to even discuss the content, admission requirements, assessment standards and it is totally unfair to compare them with Portsmouth, Herriot-Watt or other accredited university. There programs are worthless just like those offered by Southern Pacific, Columbia Commonwealth, and many more diploma mills.

ITU is furthermore causing double damaged, firstly, the programs are worthless, unaccredited and perhaps ITU is even not authorize by California Post-Secondary Board of Education, secondly they provide local agents a marketing platform to advertise and attract potential customers for courses such as MBA and DBA and later diverted to diploma mills like SPU, CCWU and Paramount.

I have personally send at least 10 emails to ITU requesting information about their courses in Malaysia but would you believe that there is no reply at all from them and a pi-drop silence is maintained at ITU. I wonder why?


I also heard that EMBA (Extension or Executive) is not an actual MBA but it is considered as half of MBA course requirements and if one want to obtain an accredited MBA they will be required to take additional courses upon completion of EMBA. This deceiving act of many ACICS accredited universities has lured a greater number of enrollments onto EMBA in Asia.

 

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Yes. The typical Meinerva are involve in selling PCT and PCT will divert it to PUT. See this link:

http://www.kolejparamount.edu.my/affilation.asp

 

I visited the campuses of both ITU and NPU in 1999. They are managed mainly by Chinese-American educators. They have real campus and classrooms, no distance learning programs at that time. I chatted with the President of NPU once about their PhD in Electrical Engineering program, which NPU dropped later in order to get ACICS accreditation. The president told me that it is very hard for NPU to get regional accreditation because NPU employs mainly part-time adjunct faculty, who are also hi-tech engineers in the silicon valley. Both universities are career oriented, teaching practical skills to be used in the real world.

 

NPU's doctoral programs in ACICS' newletter

http://www.acics.org/Publications/documents/criterionsummer05_000.pdf