CCU "Spotlight"

FYI,


http://www.calcoast.edu/CCU/spotlight/Spotlight02-12.pdf

Abner :smile:

 

Following is a blatant troll, where's Levicoff when you need him to call CCU a degree mill.

 

Probably at a truck stop.

Abner :smile:

 

Until looking at this newsletter, I was unaware that California Coast was awarding the Ph.D.

I can find no reference to a Ph.D. on their website.

How long has this been going on?

 

I think they finished out the old Phd Students who were enrolled prior to the DETC accreditation. Phd's will no longer be awarded.

Abner

 

If you will notice, the Phd is from a while ago, so these students are "coasting in" on the DETC accreditation (pun intended). when I was enrolled in the CCU doctoral program, I was offered the opportunity to teach out my Phd, (after they became DETC) but I declined, and stopped at the MBA, after seeing comments on this forum about state approved schools. Not that I did not learn a great deal from CCU. I have the utmost respect for them, and I was glad when they became DETC accredited.

 

I just found this: https://sites.google.com/site/slrbiosite/Home/biographical/scholastic-background. The guy obtained his BS and MS from pre-accreditation California Coast University and was able to teach at UC San Diego.

 

Yes… to teach in 1990 for "the Hazardous Waste Certification Program" there. This may well have been something like this is today, offering short continuing education courses, not for academic credit.

Here's a more recent job posting for instructor for OSHA courses at UCSD Extension. Though "A Master’s Degree is highly preferred," the main qualification is extensive experience in the field. Pay appears to be hourly, "for classroom hours only."

 

Why would you want someone to make comments that are wrong?

 

CA State superintended of Public Instruction in 1990 published that CA State Approval is equivalent to Regional Accreditation.
I seen that publication in the 90's in our library, it was official CA State College guide.

So maybe this was sufficient at the time.

 

No. Not at all. The law for a time made this claim of equivalency, but no one followed it. Not the state university systems, not state employment, and not state licensing bureaus. (Some of the latter made some provisions for approving some programs at some schools.)

The only significant situation I can recall where the recognition of unaccredited programs served a distinguishing purpose was for licensing of counselors (MFCC primarily) and psychologists. A few unaccredited, state-approved schools had programs approved that led to these two licensures. But that's about it. At no time was State Approval ever seriously considered comparable to accreditation, despite the language in the law. Specific to this thread, there is no way State Approval of CCU made a degree from there acceptable at any Cal State or UC job where a degree was required. Uh, uh.

 

A master's degree is HIGHLY preferred. Now, even if we just purposely gloss out this preference, it is still clear that one must at least be a bachelor's degree holder in order to apply, because they are already talking about a master's degree here and a bachelor's degree is a prerequisite for a master's degree. The bachelor's degree of this person is also from pre-accreditation CCU, which means that UCSD recognized the degree.

 

It doesn't. Even if we agreed that the posting for a similar job circa 2012 strongly implies that a bachelor's degree may be required or close, we can't deduce that this "means that UCSD recognized" a CCU degree as equivalent to regionally accredited when it appointed someone to a similar position 22 years ago. An entirely reasonable alternative hypothesis is that 22 years ago, UCSD didn't require any degree to teach a continuing education course in hazardous waste.

fwiw, it also looks like the person held the position only within 1990.

 

That they did not require any degree to teach the course in 1990 is purely just a speculation on your part. You were the one who posted the link for the qualifications required of such a teacher today. I only followed your logic and, to be quite honest, I don't think that what they require today would be too far off from what they required then. To now say that perhaps they did not require such a teacher to have any degree in 1990 is preposterous. Can you show me any instance wherein UCSD hired anyone without any degree to teach a course in their university?

Now, I am not saying that a pre-accreditation CCU degree is equivalent to a regionally accredited degree. I am only pointing out the obvious. Here is a former UCSD teacher who had neither a regionally accredited degree nor a nationally accredited degree, all he had (and even until now these are all he has) were bachelor's and master's degrees from a non-accredited institution. My point here is perhaps we are the only ones who are too strict about these things, but in real life non-accredited degrees are actually being accepted as valid credentials.

 

OpalMoon, please don't say you "only followed" my logic when the conclusion I'm taking issue with was posted before I was anywhere near this thread.

I strongly believe, from general knowledge of higher education, that teaching a non-credit continuing education course, in a vocational subject like hazardous waste, through the continuing education department even of a university or college that happens to grant accredited degrees through other departments, often does not require a degree.

I also expect it was even more common for people to teach courses like this without degrees 22 years ago.

Even credit courses in vocational-technical subjects like hazardous waste, for instance at community colleges, are probably often enough taught by instructors without degrees but with extensive relevant experience, perhaps with certifications. I've read standards from several accrediting agencies describing how candidates without degrees can routinely qualify for such positions.

Not all, but a good number, of the postings for for UCSD Extension continuing education instructors today seem to ask for a master's degree "or equivalent combination of education and experience," including for posts in Photography, Human Resources, and Software Programming. (Though I didn't expect this hard line for HVAC Instructor: "Masters or Ph.D. degree in an HVAC related field is required. In exceptional cases an equivalent combination of education and work experience.")

Again, he was appointed to teach perhaps a single course in hazardous waste, almost certainly through the non-credit continuing education department, in 1990. It looks like the affiliation began and ended that year.

You seem to think it's almost certain UCSD would never hire someone to do this work without determining that they had an acceptable degree. I disagree. I don't think my position is "preposterous."

 

A "Hazardous Waste Certification Program" would have been taught through the UCSD Extension School (as it is today). The academic credentials required to teach in UC Extension Schools -- where classes are commonly non-credit and non-degree -- are much looser than those expected from faculty in the other divisions of UC campuses. I looked at the current UCSD Extension catalog and had no trouble finding instructors with no listed degree above the bachelor's level. It's not like that in the UCSD School of Arts & Humanities, or the UCSD School of Physical Sciences.

Realistically, when the UCSD Extension School looks for teachers to teach a class on (for example) Adobe Illlustrator, the priority is to find someone with lots of graphic design experience and reasonably good people skills. For many Extension positions, formal academic qualifications are a secondary consideration.

 

Yes, I can.

I took a look at some of the instructors in the UCSD Extension "OSHA Training Institute" (which is where the Hazardous Materials program is today).

The chief instructor for crane safety has the following qualifications: "XXX XXX is the Operations Manager for XXX Crane and Rigging in Phoenix Arizona. He's a certified mobile crane operator, signal person, rigger and practical examiner for the National Commission for the Certification of Crane Operators (CCO). With over 20 years of crane and rigging experience XXX has classroom knowledge and most importantly hands-on experience."

Note that there is no mention of any degrees. I looked up the guy on a social network, and he doesn't list any degrees at any level. For education, he simply posted: "Some "

Now I have no problem whatsoever with this. As the guy's UCSD bio states, hands-on experience is the most important qualification for this particular subject: crane safety should be taught by a guy who knows cranes inside and out. His degree, or lack thereof, is a secondary consideration at best. So I applaud UCSD for hiring this guy to teach crane safety, regardless of degree status.

And for all I know, the guy who taught hazardous waste handling at UCSD in 1990 may have been equally well qualified in that particular field. But I question whether this was because of his CCU degrees.

 

I'm a California native. I grew up there. I got my MBA from a school there. I taught in the Cal State System full-time for 4 years (SDSU). I've been actively engaged in nontraditional higher education since 1978. And I did a Ph.D. in this very subject. I'm claiming particular expertise on this subject to say this: at no time, no way, no how, nowhere, nobody in the UC or Cal State systems ever, ever accepted degrees from California Approved (unaccredited) schools as being acceptable along with degrees from accredited schools.

No. No. No. No. No. To suggest otherwise is really wrong, non-factual, not true, absent basis, and just silly. The only thing sillier than this notion is arguing about it. Ridiculous.

 

I agree 100% with your replies.
I do think that initially there was a period of confusion and a few people slipped in to colleges and higher degrees with CCU and similar degrees.
This was not a common practice and most likely an oversight.
As we know people with St Reges also got in to higher degree programs by mistake.

A good friend of my plaid a trick on National University in San Diego in the 90's.
They accepted him in to their MBA program based on completely faked Columbia State Diploma that he printed by him self. He mailed them transcripts from a hotel in Las Vegas.

He later apologized for the prank and almost got sued by the NU, he had to keep this quiet for long time in order to avoid legal action.
My fife a the time was studying there for her Masters in Psychology.