Frustrating hidden costs

I just started my first two MBA courses and right away I can tell that it's gonna be a bumpy financial ride. The interaction with the university is fine so far, but I already had to pluck out for some things that I wasn't expecting: a subscription to the Wall Street Journal, purchasing e-books as opposed to paper books because that's the "approved" medium and now the course instructor wants us to purchase the additional subcription to the PLUS component of his class textbook. It's added about 250-300$ of unexpected expenses to my first courses and I'm wondering what will happen with the 12 others.
Is this something to be expected or is it usual in MBA courses to pay for addditional resources?

 

Hidden costs and academic hoops are a reason I have left several programs before I even completed a class. When costs go up, an inexpensive program puts itself in competition with better programs. I figure that if I have to pay more or if I have deal with a lot of excessive red tape then I'll look elsewhere. I recently left a program due to a new requirement of having to purchase similar access as you describe, in addition to buying textbooks because not all professors used the same system. One school also charged similar fees as on ground students despite me not using the facilities. None of these fees were mentioned up front. Lesson learned.

Only you can decide if the additional costs are worth the program. Most of the classes I take now are for me so I'm not putting up with anything that detracts from the enjoyment or adds to the expense.

There is a good bit of competition in the DL market and I would rather see a flat rate per credit (regardless of what makes up that rate) and make a decision based upon this rate as opposed to other programs.

It is not unusual to have to pay for extra things in MBA courses, check with the professors or do a search for previous syllabi at your school. I used a course number and restricted the search to the school in question.

for example: MBA 1234 site:bignameskool.edu

I paid for access to different electronic libraries, including Proquest etc... for research while doing my MBA. I also had to purchase some software for several of the classes.

Best of luck with your program.

 

I'm sorry, which school did you choose, again?

 

I know several people who studied for and earned an MBA at schools that included CSUDH, Pepperdine, Phoenix, and USC. All purchased subscriptions to the WSJ at the student rate since they thought it would help them in their studies (and at least one also subscribed to the Financial Times).
I found that I could access the WSJ online though E-libraries at some schools including during my brief sojourn at NCU.

 

I just realized I can access the WSJ through UMUC's library databases. Interesting; thanks for the tip!

 

I'm studying with Florida International University. I chose their program because it's a) AACSB accredited b) good reputation according to many friends that are from FL including a current one teaching at UCF 3) they gave me a $20,000 scholarship for being an Active Duty Military student. (the scholarship is prominently advertised on their site).
With about $7-9K from Army Tuition Assistance, I might end up paying only about $13-14K on a $ 42K program. I don't want to take up another loan (aside from my new car and home loans that are already burdensome), so it's gonna be a bit tight fitting all that in the budget. This is why it was frustrating to find out about these purchases because some of them (the WSJ subscription) are required and not merely suggested and no one from the admissions office mentioned anything of the sort when i was asking all my questions.

As was mentioned here before and is a fairly legitimate point for online students, it is hard to justify paying almost the same tuition as a resident student when you will not use any of the university facilities, walk in their campus, eat in their cafeteria or park on their land.

 

Which is why so many B&M schools are starting to offer DL; it's more profitable for them. Not fair to us.

I'm sorry to hear of your troubles with the extra costs. I'm not surprised by that either, though. I run into them in my program too. Some classes have no extra costs and some have a couple hundred dollars extra when you are required to buy software or other extra resources.

 

Free (in GA) Proquest, EBSCO access and more...

In the State of Georgia local libraries can give residents passwords for the University of Georgia's Galileo site. The site is an excellent resource for the online learner/researcher. Other states may have something similar.

Welcome to GALILEO

 

Oh boy, I chose the same school for my MBA, and for the same reasons as well. My program starts in September, I'm also in the military and paying $250-$300 out of pocket, per class, well it's a bit much right now, specially that my wife is not working. Thanks for the info SildierinGA, I have to give FIU some serious thought, maybe I will look somewhere else. Go Army!

 

Dakota State University is offering a new MBA program. I don't know much about the program details but I know their tuition is very manageable. Check 'em out if their name is big enough for you.

 

Have a look at REGENT.ac.za - Business School MBA and BCOM degrees in South Africa to see Regent Business School in South Africa's fully accredited MBA program which should work out pretty affordable in comparison.

 

Thanks Luke, but I'm gonna stick with this MBA as I'd like an American degree. I might branch out internationally for a doctorate when the time comes.

Ron, I'm not in GA at this time and don't have a residence there. I'm currently stationned in Germany. The nick comes from when I lived there for almost 17 months of wonderful military training back in 07. I'll be there again next spring and summer. Southern summer, hot and humid...fun!

 

KoolCypher, I hope that I didn't scare you needlessly away from the program. I've been in a couple of other programs where no other resources were required. I was just taken aback by this first experience in this MBA. Now you know! and you can make your decision. I believe though that FIU's reputation is solid enough to stick with them.

 

HI SolderInGA, no problem at all. Thanks for bringing it out, I would have reacted the same way. I'm originally from Miami, and I can tell you for a fact that FIU has a great reputation in S. Florida, and in Latin America. While I was doing my undergrad, I had professors rated higher than the University of Miami, and if you look at the recruiting numbers for both schools, you will see the companies in South Florida recruit from both.

Where FIU shines, I think, is in the international arena, again the Latin America region. Prior to me joining the Army, I worked for a multi-national company based in Miami, and was I was doing some extensive traveling in the Latin American region (namely Mexico, Brazil, Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Panama, and Nicaragua). While traveling, I made it a point to ask as many HR recruiters in the region as I could, about what they thought of FIU. I was surprised that most of the folks that I asked had indeed heard of FIU, and most said, over 80%, that FIU was a good school.

After some soul searching and speaking with my wife and some friends sticking with FIU, specially when you total amount of tuition hovering at around $13-$14K, well it's a no brainer. Again, I just want to say thank you for pointing it out, I will stick with FIU. I still have a couple of months before I start my studies, this will give me some time to save up for these hidden fees.

Go Army! Hooah!!

 

Have you looked into Oklahoma State University? As far as I can recall, they are AACSB, only charge $250 for graduate active duty, and can be completed totally online. I am still working on my bachelor's, but that seems like an ideal program for active duty military. It does require a GMAT though, so I'm not sure if that's something you already did or not.

 

Glad to hear that it indeed has a solid reputation on the ground and internationally.

I was initially thinking about a UK MBA (Strathclyde or Glascow mainly because of the triple accreditation) but prefer to stay local for now. I'm not as adventurous as some others here yet. Maybe for my doctorate, but I'll stick with an U.S MBA.

In retrospect, I think that it's a good idea for a business student to subscribe and read the business journals. WSJ or FT have a well-earned reputation and I hope that my studies will allow me to venture into and understand the Markets pages and all those ambiguously "scary" charts lol. FIU also encourages students to purchase the e-book version of their textbooks. It might be a good always-on alternative for many students, except when you have to travel and need to get on the hotel's wifi to read your textbook or in the field sleeping under a tree with no access to anything. Oh well, now that I'm a staff puke, I'll get at least 6 months of reprieve from the field until I PCS.

I'm still about 9 years away from retiring (15 if my wife likes the idea of staying in the Army past the 20 year mark lol) and my international post-military work preference is either France/Germany or North Africa.

 

As an instructor of DL as well as B&M, I would say the costs are the same, so the tuition / fees should be the same. Though the student does not walk on the campus, that would save perhaps the electricity of the classroom, but the building is there, the resources (like you stated you spoke to admissions), and other overhead costs are there and available. The faculty member is there MORE often, and the IT support would make the cost higher (in my opnion). Now for a pure online school, sure - but no pure online schools are AACSB accredited.

 

I've had a few courses were the instructor "required" things like subscriptions or the latest edition of a textbook.

I usually read a copy of the paper at Starbucks, or accessed through the library VPN. For textbooks I usually purchased the previous edition off Amazon for a lot less. The instructor never noticed the difference.