The evil "for profit" institution

Check out today's (Sunday) Boston Globe for a fairly balanced feature article on the Univ. of Phoenix's entry into the Boston metro area. I don't have a URL handy, but it's an easy search to the Globe's website.

 

Well, I guess it is time to actually do something besides scan the message base as my time has been very busy with a new enterprise south of the border in Ensenada.

In the past, I have weighed in when UOP has become the topic. My aim has been to be neutral and balanced in what I write while being pragmatic. I neither want to be a cheerleader nor a detractor.

I am happy to see that there are a couple of people here with UOP experience from the student perspective.

Since I have the time right now, well at least until I leave in a couple of hours for a mountain bike ride, I have noted some interesting topics vis-a-vis UOP:

failing grades
research
bottomline motivation
academic freedom
non-UOP faculty negativity toward UOP


Failing Grades:
In the arena of failing grades, UOP does issue them. I am aware of a student who was failed, another who was discharged from UOP for rampant plagerism and another for writing fiction instead of reality in personal papers (false references, false websites).

Others have pointed out that they could not see an employer putting pressure on UOP to change sub-par student grades. In fact, it was said that had one person done so (earned bad grades), his manager would have had a few choice words for him behind closed doors. That makes better business sense than the "urban legend" charges bandied about.

I certainly would, as an employere paying for a student's tuition, or any part thereof, be very concerned with why my employee was not making the grade, not with UOP's issuing a low grade.


Research:
UOP does not stress academic research because their facilitators are not academacians, they are business people -- professionals with other lives and concerns. If one does author a book, I think the norm is a token $200, a pat on the back, attaboys/girls, and being recognized at a semi-annual all-faculty meeting. Conference support? Right. UOP's standard is not what the "teacher" gets into print, but how well they run and manage their businesses. (Apologies for the business approach, but, hey, that is what I am). That is a far greater indicator of what the program delivers than academic papers.

Bottomline Motivation:
Lean and mean? Not keeping a program functioning at the public expense? What's the problem? The acid test is whether or not the business/student perceives it/they has/have received the proper "bang for the buck." Being successful just creates envy in a lot of traditional state-supported institutions who have to fight with one another for their share of the public feedbag and then lose student's to the much more efficient private, for-profit institutions. These traditional schoools are in a turf war and they do not realize it, yet alone understand that the rules of the game have changed. So they bitch and grouse, instead of figuring out how they need to compete, the change structure to getting there and all the other real work to competing in the new academic arena.

Check this: as far as I can tell, the first of these private schools to make an impact with the short-term class session agenda was National University, here in San Diego. The founder, Dave Chigos, perceived a need for a class scheduling system which would allow military officers to get their degrees without tying them up for semesters and years. These were people who could be gone at the drop of the hat, back again in a month, in town for four months and gone again. So he devised a class scheduling system based upon their particular needs. Traditional schools sucked at handling this situation.

UOP merely upscaled this and went public opening access to a funds unrivaled anywhere in education. (Remember, I am not saying they are the best educational institution, just more successful). That success has created a lot of the resentment. I recall a note here, well back, when I replied to someone directly about this point. He said: they are not the best, so howcome everytime something is written about distance education, they always go and talk to UOP, yada, yada, yada . . .

Anyway, I have a hard time separating what UOP does from these new "executive" MBA's being offered lock, stock and barrel by every tom, dick and harry university who bemoans UOP's program. Sounds like a big case of penis envy to me.


Academic Freedom:
Your point is that UOP faculty, with professional credentials in a given topic area, talking to industry professionals in that precise field and designing coursework to meet industry's needs is wrong? Horse puckey! CHE has had several articles about how the traditonal brick and mortar schools, including the much vaunted Harvard, were being found very short on delivering students which meet the needs of industry. Get it right, folks, you haven't a clue. You are repeating urban legends cretaed by institutions with penis envy.

When UOP sets out to design a new course, it is professionals (in the topic area) who design the course work, not some idiotic ivory tower academacian who has never walked the streets he teaches about. UOP designs its coursework to meet the needs of industry using professionally qualified faculty (read design group, not just some loner who never sees the light of day, because all he does is read textbooks) in the area to do the work. Real professionals. Real time. Real world. Reality applied with a bit of theory.

Try this: go to some company near to you which hires a lot of functional computer people to actually work with computers. Ask their HR peole who they hire: computer science degrees from that big traditional four-year college or from the computer trade school down the street. If it is workers they want, the answer will be the trade school because those graduates actually know what they are doing and can do it, not just theorize about it. Here in San Diego, Coleman College places more people in day-to-day computer jobs than does anyone else. Trade school. You want systems design? Be careful, the answer may shock you.

Well, back to academic freedon for a second or two and give you a rant break before the final round. UOP designs a course module which spells out the outcomes wanted (and fitting the need of industry) as well as the flow and toipics they SUGGEST be followed. It is like a musical score. How the faciltator (conductor) interprets and gets to those outcomes (performance) is up to that person. There is freedom, although it is restrained by desired outcomes.

Compare that to traditional schools where the teacher, first, may not have a clue about what industry actually wants; second, does whatever the hell tickles their funnybone; and, finally, has tenure so could care less.

Case in point, I took a business class at San Diego State (College at that time - 1964). The instructor, whose name I fortunately cannot recall, spent 80% of the time talking about how he could save any major corporation in the US at least a half million dollars a year in wasted communications costs, 10% on his personal philosophies and the final 10%, were we lucky, about the actual topic. Pragmatic me: if he could save my company that much money, I could pay him $100k and bank the rest in profits . . . so why is this clown here? Needless to say, I left the business program and went in another direction at the bachelor's level.


Non-UOP faculty negativity toward UOP:
Above there was a bit about an accounting teacher who was down on UOP. First relevant question in my mind is: did this person try to become a UOP faciltator and fail? As has been pointed out elsewhere, Accounting 1 is Accounting 101 everywhere.

Have I experience with this phenomena? Yes, and so do you, if you have been aorund AED long enough. Remember that teacher who taught one class at UOP and bitched and griped about the program based upon experience gained from ONE class? My questions are: why wasn't that person asked to teach further classes; did they initiate the separation or did UOP? Elsewhere, in my personal life, I know someone who applied and did not make the cut as faculty. They left (actually the univeristy just did not give them any classes to teach after a certain point -- they do not usually "fire" anyone except in extreme cases) and they went from cheerleader to grouse overnight once it had sunk in.

Oh well. That is enough for now. Understand that I am neither cheerleader nor grouse. They do a lot of things I like and quite a few that I do not. But, that is the case in a lot of other areas of my life. Some good, some not-so-good.


jim

 

Jim - a couple of reactions. I taught for UoP for several years. I have cut my relationship with them, however, because of concerns about the quality of their program. I won't argue that they don't require some academic effort of their students. I do maintain, however, that they are so student and for-profit centered, that the resulting academic process is just above the minimum to be credible.

As for grades - I've taught at a lot of schools, but I find many UoP students to have unreal expectations for high grades. For too many students it is as if to say "I paid for my A now where is it!". I was told by administrators that this was a known problem with some faculty. Indeed, it is easy to teach a course and give all A's - no one complains and UoP gets its tuition dollars.

Research - There is a precious balance needed in education today between theory and practice. Too much in either direction is bad news. The problem I have with an all "practice" institution is that faculty teach students for the moment - they don't instill underlying theory so that the student can begin a lifelong path of learning. In computer networks, for example, a student can study for Microsoft certification and can get a job managing an MS network. This is great until, as recently happened, Microsoft changes its networking approach from NT to 2000. A more theoretically grounded student is more likely to make the transition. In all likelyhood students need an element of both theory and practice. A faculty full of practitioners and no academics is just as unbalanced as a faculty of all academics. As for research, it is vital in the life of a university to revitalize the "intellectual capital" of its faculty. How else are faculty supposed to keep current? Work experience is good - but scholarly work is too.

Bottomline Motivation - My concern is this - UoP's bottomline is profit. Too many of their students have a "bottom-line" of getting a piece of paper as fast as they can. What a shame! Education should be about changing lives, opening up horizons and learning new tools and skills. When I listen to UoP radio ads here in the Detroit area it really makes me sick. They focus on how "My son Johnny thought that when I went back to school Daddy wouldn't have any time to play basketball with him. But I'm at the University of Phoenix and I have time to play with my son...". They're selling easy degrees. A number of Detroit area employers have learned this. In fact, one of the big 3 no longer gives tuition reimbursement to compressed courses (such as UoP's) that meet for less than 8 weeks. Sorry - education that is meaningful is hard work. It takes sacrifice and effort. Further, change doesn't come about in a short time - it takes elapsed time.

Compression - I find 6 week compressed terms to be too short. I know how much material is in UoP's six week courses. I know how much material is covered in comparable courses at local universities. There is no comparison. UoP is at the absolute minimum.

Thanks - Andy

 

Quite so. I've taught accelerated classes compressed as much as one semester in 16 clock hours, four meetings in five weeks -- which is patently absurd. We covered -- granted, in some detail -- about one-seventh of the material my traditional, residential students did that semester. (The same place did foreign language classes -- from scratch!! -- the same way. Suffice to say, I only taught for them the one time.) I've also taught an accelerated world history class (seven three-hours classes) where we covered only slightly less material than in a traditional class.

There is a limit to the compression/acceleration of classes; that limit varies depending on material.

My half-groat's worth.

jon

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J. M. B. Porter, PhD
Lecturer in World History

 

As many people here in degreeinfo.com and from aed know, I am a UoPhx grad. I received my BSBM from the San Jose campus.

I then went on to San Jose State U. for my MBA. This was an accelerated program- 8 weeks/course, 10 class meetings.

I am now at University of Sarasota (soon to have their name changed to.... yeesh- Argosy University). While it isn't set up as an "accelerated" program, it has a reduced residence format, and the school does offer a variety of ways to get the full 40 hours of contact time needed. These include 1 week intersessions, a 2 weekend format, or a 4-day weekend format. One of my cohorts works for Ford in Detroit, and they are reimbursing her tuition.

I have as yet to find a perfect school with perfect programs and perfect students. I started my schooling at Illinois Institute of Technology in 1970, and found a few skeletons. I had one professor tell me he would pass me on a course only if I promised NEVER to take another class from him.

I am not against "for profit" schools, nor am I pro non-profit or not-for-profit schools. While everyone mentions grade hanky-panky at UoPhx, there are community colleges that will not let their instructors fail a student for not showing up (or even mark them absent too often) because the school receives state/federal funding on certain groups of students that go through certain classes. Also, I've been in classes with 200 students that did not have the smaller meetings- and this was at a non-profit. From my vantage, there is as much corner cutting at the public or private-non-profits as there may be at the for profit schools.

I will be the first one to admit that many of the students at UoPhx are there just for the piece of paper and their employers are paying the tuition. However, this isn't much different than many students in traditional programs with their tuition paid by their families. I've found a heightened sense of entitlement with the undergrads I teach, which isn't much different than my UoPhx classmates or my IIT classmates.

So, inherently a for profit isn't necessarily bad- just as a non-profit/public or private isn't inherently good.

 

Interesting. I didn't realize you taught at UoP. I took classes from three schools while earning my MBA: Chapman, National and Webster. I didn't notice a significant difference between the three in terms of course content. Classes at Chapman met for 11 weeks; Webster met for 8. Classes at National met for a calendar month, which would work out to 4 - 4 1/2 weeks. But all three had you in the classroom for 40 hours. The difference was that students at National tended to take one class at a time, while the ones at Webster and Chapman typically took two per term. That practice effectively compressed their studies to the same level as National: cramming about 10 contact hours into a week. This is comparable to a full-time graduate school schedule of 9 s.h., BTW.

The main effect I experienced from a compressed calendar was that one didn't have as much time to formulate concepts and ideas for term papers and projects. But the level of experience and knowledge possessed by the working professionals taking the courses more than made up for that. I was in my early 20's then (I graduated in 1985). I had no problem keeping up with the material, but my classmates were another story.

Rich Douglas
National University (MBA, 1985)

 

Jim - There are differences between 18 year old and mid-career folks. However, there are limits to compression, even for mid-career folks. For one, compressed classes don't allow time for very many rounds of homework. Secondly, mid-career folks have time pressures - jobs and families - that make if difficult for them. It isn't just the class hours. My colleagues and I believe that students need 3 hours of prep time for every hour in-class. In a fifteen week term that means 3 hours of class and 9 hours of prep per week. In a six week format - there is no way a person with a job can spend the prep time.

As for executive programs - the ones I know of take a lot of time. Chicago, Michigan State and Vanderbilt, for example, operate on an alternate weekend format for two years. Given their selectivity (GMAT and gradepoint) and world class faculty (PhD's with strong real-world connections), such programs are truly in a different league than the run of the mill DL MBA programs we talk about here.

Thanks - Andy

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Andy Borchers, DBA
NSU (1996)

 

Andy, sounds like you believe in the "one size fits all" philosophy. While the 3 for 1 rule is a good general guideline, my experience has shown that some people need less time, some a little more time. But to retard one's progress because of some broad guideline that must be followed seems like a disservice to the students who don't need the extra preparation time.

Further, there are scores of Community Colleges offering intensive 3-week, 3 credit hour classes in between fall/spring semesters and between spring/summer semesters. These course time offerings were a big benefit to me years ago while working full time and going to school part time.

Bob

 

Ok Bob - Let's say you only need two hours of prep for one hour of class instead of the norm of 3. When you compress a 15 week term with 45 hours of class and 135 hours of prep into 6 weeks with the same 45 and 135 hours, you get an impossible situation for working folks with families. Such students simply can't spend the same amount of time learning in compressed classes. Hence, faculty compromise their coverage of material. People can say the courses are equivalent but they aren't.

As for one month compressed classes - you have the same problem, unless you are talking about full-time resident students that take one or two classes and work full-time on them.

I'll be frank and say that I don't believe in shortcuts - whether you are talking about physical exercise or the intellectual exercise of college work. "No pain, no gain".

Regards - Andy

Thanks - Andy

 

Obviously you are "Old School," as expressed by the 3-1 ratio at the bachelor's level. Don;t forget the 6-1 for the Master's level and 9-1 for the doctorate. That standard goes way, way back. I first heard it, when it was obviously not new, in 1963 when I entered my bachelor's program. That was way back when when all you had was a text and the library to work with out of class.

Time for you to step up into the second millenium and get with the program. Using a computer, I can find hundreds of times more information on the net than you could in a traditional library and in a fraction of the time. Using find commands I can cull through that material hundreds of times faster than you could in any traditional text and locate those bits and pieces, edit them together and so on.

I estimate I could have finished my dissertation writing in a fifthieth of the time it took using what I have on my laptop today.

Further, mid-carre people have the abilit to prioritize correctly. They are not distracted by night-clubs, hot bands and the party next door. For every possible detraction you cna mention there are equivalent benefits for that station in life vis-a-vis eduction.

Alternating weekends over a two year run. Tell me how much different that is in terms of hours spent. How many hours each weekend? Ten class room hours? Fifiteen? Twenty (right)?

I don't know that you can see the numbers parading before you. The faculty? Certainly it is different. Does that make it better? Whoa! Talk about a question without an answer. The business people teaching at UOP could care less about being world-class academacians. The student's could care less. They want to know what works, when and where. Something a lot of the ivory tower set just doesn't get. Number of rounds of homework may not be relevant. The last set of studies I saw said time in the text was far more important than homework and that really rigorous take home exams beat any classroom testing.

How much of this is about a faciltator not being able to handle the workload, not the students?

Apologies for being so hard nosed with you, but the bs you are putting out is the rationale which flies in the face of reality.

Compare the hours in the executive MBA with that institution's own traditional MBA requirements. Apples to apples in the same system. Want to tell me the exec MBA is putting in the same hours as the traditional student, in class or otherwise? In a pig's eye.

I'd call you a dinosaur, and that may be a compliment.


jim

 

Did you fail math:

45 hours of class and 2-1 is an additional 90 for a total of 135. NOT 45 plus another 135 as you have written.

Sure shows me how well the traditional system worked for you. As far as impossible? Only for those who are easily defeated and think in terms of impossibility. Don't burden us with your personal limitations. And if you don;t think there's pain in an accelerated schedule, you are naive at best. A normal class looks like summer vacation after working in accelerated environments.

Those who can, do. Those who can't, keep grousing.

Your post, although in the sheep's clothing of talking about student's, is about the wolf you fear eating away at your personal comfort level.

For you, the accelerated environment is just too much to handle. I'd suggest retiring to your rocker on the porch, well wrapped in your traditional academic robes and a kava to relieve the stress of reality.


jim

 

Well back on AED, I posted some information related to this short-course and distance education and the resistence it was getting from a paradigm shift perspective. I guess, based upon some of what I have read here recently, it is time for a recap of sorts.

Essentially, the "detractors" I have been reading are redolent of their contemporaries in the business world facing a paradigm shift.

Can you see the parallel between those saying, "we need to stay with the 3-1 hour ratio of study to class, compressed schedules don't work" mentality with those who said, "what's wrong with our current delivery schedule and who would pay such high fees for overnight delivery" mentality? Or better yet, with the "why would anyone want a watch without jewels, gears, levers and springs and buy one powered by a battery?"

To me, it is clear as crystal that those who have posted those and similar educational sentiments are reminiscent of those in the business world who made similar statements and now are either on the bandwagon or out of business.

The fact is that the educational paradigm has changed to such an extent that the traditional school may be on its way out. Not only in terms we have seen here, but in terms of the physical campus. It seems to me that the only traditional campuses which have opened in the past few years have been state-supported, taxpayer funded. The private schools are using other paradigms: freeway accessibility, office environments and the like. I readily acknowledge that this is what I have seen where I travel and may not be representative of happenings where you live.

I have seen traditional two-year community colleges graduate to four-year. I have seen a new four-year state school open a traditional campus in Ft. Myers, FL. I have seen San Marcos grow, All state and tax funded. The newer private schools do not seem to have a traditional cmapus.

No ahletics? Why carry the overhead? No green pastures to lie upon? Who sees all that when it's dark outside? Classes over the internet? Why bother with a cross-town commute when I am in town and that is almost never? Submit a paper from the battle zone in??? Hey, I answer to my country's need for me to be there, and ain't email great?

Yep, the educational environment has changed and, despite your 3-1, in a traditional classroom needs, the genie is not going back in the bottle to suit your personal preferences. Those who can adapt to the new environment and figure out how to use it effectively will make it better.

I used to teach for a four-year, grown-up from a communiity college, college and the department had a conniption fit when I let a student complete her coursework from South Korea because her company had called her home to do some work for which she was uniquely qualified. They didn't get it. Now they do, although it took them five years to figure it out.

Will the traditional campus die off? Not for a very, very long time if at all. What we will see is these schools beginning to offer a wider variety of delivery systems and styles (any traditional school's distance learning program is ample illustration of this occurance, televised or over the net).

One interesting question is where dis the quarter system come from? As far as I know, it was becuase someone, somewhere figured out how to compress a traditional semester into a shorter time period of, first, 12 weeks, then 10 and so on. Or, being the devil's advocate that I am, they figured out the revenue stream and then convinced everyone that 10 weeks was a good thing.

Side note: what is my favorite length? Eight weeks for ground or distance.


jim

 

The "dinosaur" responds:

Ok - I'm old school. Here are some replies.
Regards - Andy

------------------
Andy Borchers, DBA
NSU (1996)

 

Sorry about the dinosaur comment, nothing personal meant. Your reply keeps the system from pulling your commentary up into the quote, so I've copied it below. . . With some new math for you.

jim

Obviously you are "Old School," as expressed by the 3-1 ratio at the bachelor's level.
<snip>

** Yep - you have to spend time studying to learn. Old fashion? Perhaps, but no one has ever demonstrated an alternative that works to me.

??Are you predisposed to a self-fulfilling prophesy that automatically rejects anything contrary to what you think?
.....


snip

** But it is only part of the story. The bigger story is knowing what to do with the information. The Internet contains many worthwhile sources and a lot of junk. Knowing the difference and knowing how to synthesize and apply all of this information is the essance of education. While technology (including the Interent and PC technology) is a wonderful supplement, it hardly replaces interaction over time between students, their peers and faculty. Perhaps you might argue that grammar checkers replaces learning to write. But this is hardly the case. The best grammar checker can't turn gutter slang into Shakespeare. In like fashion Google searches of the Internet won't create a doctoral dissertation without an intelligent (human) agent at the keyboard.

Let's not get caught up in the internet junk factor. Even seasoned pros get taken in occassionally. With some of the new tools less and less of it gets through searches and relevancy increases.

As far as interaction goes, there are some who cannot get beyond needing face-to-face and that is their psychology. However, that has little to do with those who can adjust to shorter interactions handled via a variety of communications media. They multitask like you or I cannot do. Comes with the territory of having grown up with these tools and mastering a lot of them before they were 10 years old. You can find some government studies, for example, dealing with increased hand-eye coordination as a result of video games for a jumping off point and its implications for future combat personnel.

What you are forgetting again is the difference between a student who has come directly out of high school and try to draw a direct parallel to the working adult in mid-management attending a UOP or other short-course university. Apples and oranges. Next time, I'll whack you hand for that.

snip


** I'm sure a PC would have sped up the process of writing the words - but what about the more significant part, the thinking part?

If you have been in mid-management for three to five years and haven't learned the rudiments of thinking clearly, then there is something clearly wrong with the business which hired you. Do you imagine for a single second that the world of business is not an educational experience in and of itself? That you do not learn how to think, to prioritize and the like? Wow, no wonder you are stuck in academia. Got news for you, the school of the real world teaches quite a bit along the way as you have indicated yourself below. Or are you interjecting a double standard here?
. . . .

snip


Alternating weekends over a two year run. Tell me how much different that is in terms of hours spent. How many hours each weekend? Ten class room hours? Fifiteen? Twenty (right)?

** Let's do some quick math. Traditional MBA students with no business background at a top MBA program (Michigan, Chicago, Vanderbilt, etc.) take 50-60 credit hours of work. With fifteen weeks per term, that works out to about 750 to 900 hours of instruction. Second tier program typically require only 36 credit hours (plus perhaps 15-20 hours of "pre-core" work for folks without a business undergrad) or about 540 hours. In the EMBA world twelve hours of class per weekend for 25 weekends per year for two years is about 600 hours. Considering the business experience requirements for entering students in top Exec MBA programs, this isn't too far off.

Okay, here are the numbers you forgot to run:

UOP requires 17 courses for MBA. Assuming all are nearly identicle:

17 X 24 hours class contact = 408 hrs

PLUS

17 courses with hard documentation of study group meetings, 20 hrs each = 340 hrs. This is probably a new requirement since you left the system.

Total: 748 hours.
.....


I don't know that you can see the numbers parading before you. The faculty? Certainly it is different. Does that make it better?

** Well, yes. Let's introduce an external measure. What is the starting average salary for grads of a top MBA program taught by PhD academic/practitioners? What is the average starting salary from programs like UoP that use non-PhD, pracititioners? If you think the latter make more than the former, you're dreaming. What do people see in Harvard and Stanford MBA's? I'm not sure, but it must be something - because they earn a lot more than the programs you're supporting.

First you have made an error in your assumptions. You are trying to equate the traditional student with one who is already in the workforce. These people are beyond the starting salary stage. What they get is a promotion and more rapid advancement afterward. Where UOP and similar students are at is in terms of performance in their current job. Not starting salary. Come to think of it, consider your knuckles whacked. You keep trying to make the students equivalent and they are not. It would be equally as silly to ask how many Harvard bachelor's or MBA students have their education paid for by their companies compared to UOP. Get the point?
.....

Whoa! Talk about a question without an answer. The business people teaching at UOP could care less about being world-class academacians. The student's could care less.

** But what are the students looking for? Do they understand the value that a more rigorous academic program can provide them? I don't argue for all theory. I believe, and teach, on the basis of "theory and practice". In fact, it is the motto of my institution. All one or the other is bad news.

What the student understands is the acceptance of the degree, its accreditation regionally, the fact that their company will pay for it, that UOP is well known and that they can be moved from one location to another professionally and still chase their degree.

Keep in mind that some lazy ones get through the programs you tout. I have met blithering idiots with big school MBAs. Also remember that any student can make the process as rigorous as they want. There is no limit to how hard a properly motivated student will work for themselves.
.....


They want to know what works, when and where. Something a lot of the ivory tower

** I'd suggest that there are folks that can be both practitioners and scholars at the same time. The world needs such folks. As for knowing what "works" - what happens when what "works" changes due to changes in technology and economics? That's were more folks with deeper theoretical roots win.

Right! And they get all their information from the professionals in the trenches who are working out the solutions on the fly. I have never seen someone write an academic article on new practices which came before business professionals were working it out in the field. In fact, a lot of the academacians merely turn what the professionals did into a case study for others to learn from. What was their actual input into the situation which was not a day late and a dollar short? Try nothing.
.....


set just doesn't get. Number of rounds of homework may not be relevant. The last set of studies I saw said time in the text was far more important than homework and that really rigorous take home exams beat any classroom testing.

** What about "really rigorous classroom testing"?

Really rigorous testing has amounted to control-alt-delete. They have discarded the information on the way out the door. That was part of the study. Want people to learn? Get them into the textbooks and give very rigorous take home exams (which drives them back into the text again).
.....

How much of this is about a faciltator not being able to handle the workload, not the students?

** this could be a problem. Lowly paid adjuncts are certainly not in a position to spend the time that full-time faculty spend.

As opposed ot the full-time faculty member who does not teach? Where the actual instruction day-to-day is a TA? Where the esteemed faculty member spends nine hours in class, if at all, three in the office and the rest in meetings or on the golf course (or maybe the private faculty club)?

If the adjunct wants to be available, my bet is that they would be far more accessible than the traditional teacher. How many students have both an office and cell number for you at which they can reach you over the weekend? Weekend, night access; tell me about your situation personally.
.....


Apologies for being so hard nosed with you, but the bs you are putting out is the rationale which flies in the face of reality.

** I suspect there are multiple realities here. UoP and schools like it draw a lot of students. They certainly do some educating - a UoP experience certainly beats none at all. But such programs have some real problem in their acceptance. Take a look at US News and World Report. Is UoP even there? Of course not - they aren't in the same league.

Unfortunately, I do not think that US News is set up to properly evaluate these newer programs. Too many of their consulting experts are traditionalists. Check the references out for yourself.
.....

Compare the hours in the executive MBA with that institution's own traditional MBA requirements. Apples to apples in the same system. Want to tell me the exec MBA is putting in the same hours as the traditional student, in class or otherwise? In a pig's eye.

** see my calculations above.

And they confirm what I said: the exec MBA meets far less than the regular MBA from the same institution. The point is that the comparison between a UOP and a traditional school's mba program would be in terms of the executive MBA, not the regular MBA. That was my point. Thank you for acknowledging it.


jim

 

As a follow to my last note, this topic has been a bit off-topic and has not dealt with, except in passing, distance education. I apoplogize to all who have put up with my rants.

When I ducked out, I found an email from someone who knows me and they said that no one knows who I am or what I do and they felt that was an unfair advantage. Well, they were partially right. Some time ago, I exchanged notes with John Bear detailing some of my background. So, I guess I should put some of the cards on the table for you.

BS Radio-TV Production
MBA Marketing
DBA (International Marketing)

Teaching (no names for the most part)
Community College (one class. . . couldn't handle the drill and repeat drill endlessly mentality)

Four-year:
one RA
one RA, AACSB
one new to four-year RA

Mexico - one of their private national systems and one private, in-state system elsewhere

UOP -- lead faculty, well over 150 courses, ground and (no longer) online.

Consultant:
Competitive Intelligence
US-Mexico Business (maquiladoras)
Curriculum Design (Asian university)

And yes, I could walk away from UOP and not be concerned with the income loss.

Some of us can multitask.


jim

 

Everybody's talking about time spent in class, prep, etc. Why not compare results? UoP tests incoming students on the knowledge base expected at the conclusion of the degree, and then tests them again at the end of the process as a requirement for graduation (graduates must take the test, there is no pass or fail). They use those results tomeasure how well they are doing - what's the quality of the delivered product, knowledge in the student's head. Let's compare results. Oh, so sorry, the state institutions don't actually measure their results, do they? I wonder why not.

I went to UoP primarily as the easiest way for me at that time to get some sort of recognized four year degree. I was quite surprized by the difference in my before and after scores.

Geoff Withnell

 

Nice point, Geoff. When I was teaching for the graduated junior college in its first year as a four-year, I pretested and posttested the class. It really came in handy when some students who did not want to do any work wrote evals that said they didn't learn anything. Every student showed a significant rise in knowledge by testing. Forced the administration to back off, that's for sure. They began discouraging pretest-posttest as it gave faculty a weapon to combat these particular evals by lazy students.


jim

 

Jim - We could argue endlessly on this. Let me make a few final comments, and I'll let this go. Regards - Andy

"??Are you predisposed to a self-fulfilling prophesy that automatically rejects anything contrary to what you think?"

** No - I've embraced a whole of new things - the Internet, e-commerce, DL (in some forms) and others. Technology helps - but can it totally replace traditional educational instituions and the relationship between a faculty member and a student? As far reaching as DL may be, I don't see major universities shutting their doors. Each has its place. Blended programs - part on-line and part on-ground are particularly promising.
-----------

"If you have been in mid-management for three to five years and haven't learned the rudiments of thinking clearly, then there is something clearly wrong with the business which hired you. Do you imagine for a single second that the world of business is not an educational experience in and of itself?

** Of course one learns in the business world truly valuable lessons. Some folks learn more effectively than others, however. I'm reminded of the person with 30 years of experience - the same year 30 times over! Why do you think that industry is the only place one can learn to think? Can't academics do the same?
----------------

"That you do not learn how to think, to prioritize and the like? Wow, no wonder you "

** I'm hardly stuck in academia. I spent 21 years in a successful career with two major Fortune 500 firms. I chose to move to academia because I love to teach. I continue to involve myself with area firms.
-----------

"are stuck in academia. Got news for you, the school of the real world teaches quite a bit along the way as you have indicated yourself below. Or are you interjecting a double standard here?"

** not at all. The school of the real world does teach, but why do you insist that academics offer nothing to students? Remember, my theme is balance - theory and practice. You seem to think that practice is the only valid way to learn.
------------

"Okay, here are the numbers you forgot to run:

UOP requires 17 courses for MBA. Assuming all are nearly identicle:"

** according to their website there are 16 courses - one of which is only one credit.

"17 X 24 hours class contact = 408 hrs"

** so let's make this 15 * 24 + 1 * 6 = 366

"PLUS

17 courses with hard documentation of study group meetings, 20 hrs each = 340 hrs. This is probably a new requirement since you left the system."

** I'm aware of the study group concept. But no - make that 15 * 20 = 300.
----------------------

"Total: 748 hours"

** I figure 666 and nearly half of these are student study groups. I don't question that a group of students could get together and learn from each other, whether they do or not is another question. But the point I made earlier is still an issue. If I take a course that at most schools takes 10-15 weeks (depending on whether the school uses quarters or semesters) and compress it to six weeks, there is a shortage of time for students to absorb material. For one, students end up with four hours of class per week and 3-4 hours of study group per week. Ok - but what student has 20-25 hours of additional prep time (assuming 3 hours of prep for 1 hour of "class") to support this "in-class" time? Few working adults can spend 27-32 hours per week on a course and keep a job. What happens? You don't cover as much material. I know - I've taught for UoP (and another compressed schedule school) and I've taught at traditional on-ground institutions. There is no way I can cover (and students can absorb) in 6 weeks the same material that gets 10-15 weeks coverage in traditional schools.
----------

"First you have made an error in your assumptions. You are trying to equate the traditional student with one who is already in the workforce. These people are beyond the starting salary stage. What they get is"

** Really? The average starting salary for a Harvard MBA in the class of 2000 is $130,000. Do you mean to tell me that the average salary for mid-career graduates of any DL program you choose to name is $130,000? Sure it takes two years of full-time study and a bunch of tuition dollars to earn a Harvard MBA. But the payback, not only in starting salaries, but in future earning is pretty compelling. Note again, the average Harvard MBA student has four years of work experience prior to starting his/her MBA.
****

"a promotion and more rapid advancement afterward. Where UOP and similar students "

** This is probably true. Mid-career folks often pursue advanced degrees in order to enhance their careers. Folks can do this on a part-time basis at a lot of schools, including UoP. But what sort of credential from what school do you want on your resume? A degree from a top 25 MBA program commands respect that a DL MBA doesn't. If I again had the choice on where to pursue an MBA, I go for the best school I could attend. If I couldn't go full-time, I'd look for the best AACSB school in my area that had a part-time program. I believe that too many of our DL programs are focused on the "easy way" not the "best way".
-----

"are at is in terms of performance in their current job. Not starting salary. Come to think of it, consider your knuckles whacked. You keep trying to make the students "

** I don't agree here. I teach mid-career folks at my institution, and I understand there are differences with 18-22 year olds. However, increasingly full-time MBA programs are requiring folks to have work experience. Harvard MBA students on average have 4 years of experience. I see similar situations at many of the top MBA programs.
------------

equivalent and they are not. It would be equally as silly to ask how many Harvard bachelor's or MBA students have their education paid for by their companies compared to UOP. Get the point?"

** not at all - a number of Harvard MBA students are in fact financed by their employers.
----------

"What the student understands is the acceptance of the degree, its accreditation"

** ok - so let's talk about acceptance. How do DL programs compare with traditional on-campus programs? John Bear's study at AACRO is one data point - DL suffers in comparison. The lack of ranking in US News and other ranking lists is another indicator.

As for accreditation, UoP is RA. But UoP isn't AACSB, ACBSP or IACBE accredited. Why not? Likely because they aren't qualified. To the extent that AACSB, ACBSP and IACBE know something about business education, UoP stands a notch lower in my mind. Why won't UoP take the steps that are required to be professionally accredited in business? I don't know, but I have to wonder if the profit motive is part of the equation.
------------------

"regionally, the fact that their company will pay for it, that UOP is well known and"

** yet some prominent employers won't pay for compressed or on-line education.
-----------------

"that they can be moved from one location to another professionally and still chase their degree. And they get all their information from the professionals in the trenches who are "

** Give me a break! Academics do learn from practitioners, but practitioners can learn from academics. It isn't all one way.
----------

"working out the solutions on the fly. I have never seen someone write an academic article on new practices which came before business "

** Perhaps you need to expand your reading list. Take a look at Peter Senge's Fifth Discipline and system thinking, the concept of the Balanced Scorecard
or Business Process Reengineering. Academics were certainly deeply involved in these developments.
--------------

"As opposed to the full-time faculty member who does not teach? Where the actual instruction day-to-day is a TA? Where the esteemed faculty member spends nine hours in class, if at all, three in the office and the rest in meetings or on the golf course (or maybe the private faculty club)?"

** Jim - there may be some faculty members that are lazy, but your characterization is far too broad. TA's may be common in some undergraduate programs, but they aren't at the graduate level. I've worked in industry for 21 years and I've taught adjunct for 20 years and full time for 4 years. I've seen lazy folks in both venues. Good faculty members work hard. 9 hours a week in class? Yep. And untold hours in preparing course material, grading papers, advising students, developing curriculums and conducting research to keep current/advanced the discipline. Who does these roles in a DL program made up of adjuncts?
--------------

"If the adjunct wants to be available, my bet is that they would be far more accessible than the traditional teacher. How many"

** I can only comment on my situation.
On my syllabus every student has my office number, home number and email address. Students find me much easier to find than adjuncts at my school that show up once a week. I typically have 15 office hours a week - and student frequently drop by. I'm also available via email and phone. Ask my wife -I take a ton of calls and emails on the weekend.
-------

"students have both an office and cell number for you at which they can reach you over the weekend? Weekend, night access; tell me about your situation personally."

"Unfortunately, I do not think that US News is set up to properly evaluate these newer programs. Too many of their consulting experts are traditionalists. Check the references out for yourself."

** This is an interesting argument - DL schools can't be compared because they are different. But what do employers look at? Sure mid-career folks can earn degrees from DL schools and have them accepted. But do DL schools carry the same weight?




------------------
Andy Borchers, DBA
NSU (1996)

 

Well, Andy, been a pleasure. I hope that you have gained a bit of appreciation for the changes UOP has made since you left. Seems the program in good position in terms of the hours spent by students, not nearly as dire as you would have had everyone here believe.

snip

Blended programs - part on-line and part on-ground are particularly promising.
-----------
Yes they are. And I like the DL concept that a given educational institution can use a faculty person from almost anywhere in the world to teach students almost anywhere in the world.

.....


** Of course one learns in the business world truly valuable lessons. Some folks learn more effectively than others, however. I'm reminded of the person with 30 years of experience - the same year 30 times over! Why do you think that industry is the only place one can learn to think? Can't academics do the same?
----------------
See my comments well up about the faculty member who has not been teaching for 30 years although in the classroom daily. Six of one, half dozen of the other.
.....

** not at all. The school of the real world does teach, but why do you insist that academics offer nothing to students? Remember, my theme is balance - theory and practice. You seem to think that practice is the only valid way to learn.
------------
Excuse me, where did I ever say academics do not offer anything? Are you lowering yourself to putting words in my mouth? You chose to denigrate the non-traditional, non-academicly-oriented teacher, I chose to denigrate the traditional academic who is equally as bad. No more, no less.

As far as applied versus theory, it is business which has been making those charges as well reported in CHE and other sources. They want more applied and less theory. They are the ones saying that the B-schools are graduating mba's who cannot function in the workplace.
.....

No matter how you reduce the number, the fact is there are a whole bunch of hours you did not consider because you posted based on out-of-date information. Regardless of your reduction, there are far more hours in the UOP program than what you thought when you posted. 666 mas o menos. That is a far cry from your original position and not really very far from mine. You migt have been with UOP but your information was out of date (like your teaching style ;-)))))) 0.


jim