Ed.S. degree for business purposes

They're not. I didn't say the concept didn't exist. Sheesh!

I doubt seriously GCU grants any sort of "status" on the ABD. I'd love to see that diploma.

The lack of critical thinking on display here is astounding. It is arguing simply to argue.

 

LOL. You literally said that "ABD is not a status." when it clearly is. Nowhere did I claim that "ABD" is some form of completed degree that would result in a diploma. There must be some kind of "official" meaning of the word "status" that I am not familiar with. The whole purpose of mentioning what I did before was because I was drawing the distinction between an Ed.S. and an ABD Doctorate program. The Ed.S. degree is a completed program, and as I said, "has a different finish line" than a doctorate, so in my opinion an Ed.S. it is NOT and should not be considered a substitution for an ABD doctorate (which is what you were asserting) which is an incomplete program/degree. My key takeaways from this interaction with you are that according to you:

1. The Ed.S. is not a "real degree"
2. It's just a substitution for an ABD Doctorate program.
3. Hiring managers and human resource folks won't recognize the credential and they cannot and will not be bothered with learning about it or just...looking it up.
4. If it has any utility it all, the Ed.S. would only be of use to someone in the Education field.

I disagree with just about all of that, especially because not all Ed.S. programs have the same content- and the whole point of this thread is that I found a specific Ed.S. program that is a broad based Leadership program that is (according to the school) applicable to all business settings - not just Education - and I thought it was an unusual offering - I'm not sure that many have actually looked at the curriculum for the program (except maybe, Vicki) but instead have had a pre-programmed response to the Ed.S. credential. I also think that calling the credential "not a real degree" when it clearly is, is like trying to mock the legit colleges someone has gone to as "not real colleges" because they don't meat a certain prestige standard. In my opinion it's a bit of cork-sniffery.

Anyway, for anyone interested, here is the curriculum for the program:
https://catalog.ace.edu/preview_program.php?catoid=66&poid=5332&_gl=1*7wsyio*_ga*MTY1MTUxNjQ0MS4xNzA2OTAwMTc1*_ga_TLVMP7GLJR*MTcwOTgyNTg4MC4xOC4xLjE3MDk4MjU4ODcuNTMuMC4w

 

American College of Education

Click on institution characteristics

https://nces.ed.gov/ipeds/datacenter/institutionprofile.aspx?unitId=449889&sid=02adfebe-7e52-436e-b535-d30c94197c35&rtid=6

Here are their official award levels:

Award levels

Less than one year certificate
Bachelor's degree
Postbaccalaureate certificate
Master's degree
Post-master's certificate
Doctor's degree - research/scholarship

So which category do you think the EdS falls into, even as a degree?

 

Who is authoritative in your eyes?

 

This is arguing just to argue. Instead, I welcome you to the last word.

 

I like canonical degrees. But c'mon, this isn't a typical degree where the government has a say. In Poland (for example), there is Concordat betwen the Holy See and Poland. These degrees would fall outside government jurisdiction. In the U.S., there is a fairly complex situation with the states and educational jurisdiction, etc. I realize that. But there must be a source that you can turn to, if you want to find out about basic award levels for an institution. Why isn't THIS "Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System" a reliable source on award levels? Maybe that's a better question. After all, institutions give their own information! Are they lying?

 

Personally, I don’t like to criticize someone’s achievements. I have already said that I think it’s a perfectly fine qualification. But I also think that it makes sense to find out the level and meaning of education one is receiving with any award. I know that the U.S. does not have a national qualifications framework. But one would need to be an extreme skeptic to defend the position that a self-reported award level (provided by the institution itself), which is then placed into a central government database, cannot be trusted. If an institution reports its EdS as a Post-Master’s Certificate, as in the case of American College of Education, why should I still withhold judgment as to the award level?

The source that you’ve provided is consistent with what I’ve been pointing to. The Education Specialist can be referred to as both a degree and a certificate. Your linked document states this much:

“Education specialist degrees or certificates are generally awarded for 1 year’s work beyond the master’s level. Includes certificate of advanced graduate studies.”

But this is just how they are referred to: as degrees and certificates. You can find both of these terms on university websites. Here’s the important part: Nowadays, this Education Specialist degree or certificate is consistently reported to NCES (by the institutions of higher education) as a Post-Master’s certificate award. Unless someone believes that qualification award levels do not matter (so it doesn’t matter whether something is at certificate level, or a doctorate level, or another level altogether, etc.), it is not a completely trivial issue. At the same time, the employer will likely focus on other issues when presented with the EdS qualification.

My whole point is that what something is referred to (Degree, PhDr., Doctor of Business Administration, Master of the Universe, Micro-doctorate in Education) is kind of irrelevant, at least to me. These are all externals. This is why I have responded to Johann the way that I did. What matters is the level and meaning of this qualification within a given education system. Is the degree classified as a conventional degree? Does it mean what an ordinary degree means? Is the ‘Doctor’ or 'degree' classified as a research/scholarship degree, or “Studia podyplomowe” (case of the Polish DBA Postgraduate Studies) or a certificate (case of the EdS)? Those issues are much more important than focusing on externals, like: usage of “Doctor” in a qualification, or a mere reference to it as a degree. I don't care about these things. I did concern myself with them in the past, even on this board. I don't care about them anymore. I care about the meaning behind the qualification and the award level helps me to place it within a certain order.

 

As opposed as I am to the concept of a specialist being a degree, I'm fine with all of this. Award them. List them. Get your raise from them. No one should imply the EdS isn't a legitimate credential. It's just not a degree.

 

Sigh.

de·gree
Meaning 4: An academic rank conferred by a college or university after examination or after completion of a course of study, or conferred as an honor on a distinguished person.

cer·tif·i·cate
Meaning 2: A document attesting a level of achievement in a course of study or training.

These are the definitions of these words, and by these definitions ALL degree programs that result in a diploma ARE certificate programs, but not all certificate programs are DEGREE programs. That is determined solely by the institution. A "degree" is an academic rank conferred by the institution upon successfully completing their prescribed course of study. Since the institution calls the Ed.S. a DEGREE program and confers that academic rank upon the individual that completes the program - the program results in a DEGREE because the institution grants that rank.

With regard to the other official structures posted - Of course the Ed.S. is a "post graduate certificate" ! - A doctorate is also a "post-graduate certificate", but it is a very specific kind of post graduate certificate with a specific name for completing that course of study called a doctorate, which is the rank conferred by the granting INSTITUTION.

Perhaps the way to think of it is, "This particular post graduate certificate program results in a certificate."
This particular post-graduate certificate program is a degree program that results in a Specialist degree." (Ed.S, Sp.Ed. PsyS. S.S.P, Sp.A. SCCT, SLIS, etc.)
"This particular post-graduate certificate program is a Doctoral program that results in a Doctorate.

They are all post-graduate certificates with different academic ranks assigned by the granting institution.

 

The authorities are the states and recognized accreditors. When colleges and universities ask for permission to award a new degree, they don't go to the U.S. Department of Education; they go to their state's education board and their accreditor. The federal government has a hands-off approach to higher education. They're mostly involved in financial aid and recognizing private accrediting bodies as legitimate.

 

No employer cares about IPEDS. Not even the federal government, as an employer, cares about IPEDS. It's there for data collection purposes. The average HR specialist doesn't even know what IPEDS is.

"IPEDS is a system of 12 interrelated survey components conducted annually that gathers data from every college, university, and technical and vocational institution that participates in the federal student financial aid programs. The data collections occur in fall, winter, and spring."

This should make it clear that IPEDS is NOT an authority on what a degree is. It exists to collect statistics.

 

Sanantone,

Read my arguments first and then respond. I did not say that IPEDS are incredibly important or authoritative. Steve pointed to awarding institutions as the authority. You're pointing to states and accreditors as authoritative. Without adjudicating that, I've simply pointed to the fact that accredited higher education institutions report their qualifications through this system and they report them within the confines of various award levels. So why can't I trust their report concerning where each qualification stands in terms of awards?

 

Their reports to NCES have to follow IPEDS classifications. If I conduct a study on females and males, that doesn't mean that intersex individuals don't exist. Before there was the option to report your race as "other," "two or more races," or "multiracial," you had to report your race within the options that were available on the Census form. Just because a survey doesn't have an option doesn't mean that option is invalid or unrecognized.

 

There are people on this board that like to split meaningless hairs over nothing. And when they have an opinion, they will find “facts” to support their opinion and boost their own ego.

It boils doesn to this to me…. every college/university that offers an EdS refers to it at a DEGREE program. If they are accredited, they have to run that by an “authority” aka their accreditor. It is more familiar in educational settings since it is an Education Specialist degree.

The American College of Education is primarily targeted toward folks working in education, although they have branched into business and health care. This does appear to be a somewhat unique offering as they have made it more broad. I suspect it was born out of their own basic structure of bachelor->master->EdS->EdD pathway. Admission to an EdS does require a masters already. The time/credit is equivalent to a second masters. For someone interested in roles in corporate training, an EdS on your name could boost your image as an “educator”.

And if those silly HR people aren’t familiar with EdS, but are hiring someone to educate their staff, I suspect they could make that giant leap to assume that something with “Ed” most likely refers to “education”. My friends who work in HR are highly educated individuals usually with a masters degree in HR or an MBA, so they aren’t dumb.

@Acolyte - Don’t pay any attention to the negative Nancys here. If it fits your needs, it’s worth your consideration. If you do choose to go forward with the program, I would be interested to hear how it goes. I am still working on my MBA, so I am not quite there yet.

 

Sanantone,

Okay, so if I am understanding you correctly, these institutions don't have the freedom to truly articulate the REAL award level of their qualification (they are confined by artificial and possibly unrepresentative categories). These real categories may be different form what they report to authorities. If that convinces you and other people on this board, I have nothing more to add.