Accreditation

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FN

Yes I did try yesterday a first set of several posts to you, not one went through. They all were "timed out." Then later I tried a second set of two attempts. These appeared. Then when I tried to edit, they disappeared. Last night I tried a third set with no luck. My post above finally went through today OK.

I think I did make the same two points in all former attempts. But they may have been expressed abrasively, I don't recall clearly. But FN, you, yourself, are acting very confrontively here too.

No, I've not read your work on ducks. I'm sure it is good. I don't know that anyone here denies its virtue. That is not the issue.

As an aside, There is a spot in the middle of our city with many, many wild ducks and geese too. At times they cross a busy street and impair traffic. While I like guns, I'd not likely shoot a duck or probably a deer either. Well, I might. But I don't mind eating either, so I guess I'm a bit inconsistent or something.

But anyway, as I look at this thread, the issue of your "opponents" is not your thesis on ducks. It is rather , I gather anyway, that you are a proponant of unaccreditation. I myself believe that there are a very few US nonaccredited theological schools which are good. One of these is BJU although its PhD in Theology / Bible is not as substantial as some other schools as Dallas Seminary. Dallas and some others require much, much more.

But, FN, I don't think you've answered above how BJU supports your position. First,you cannot well argue from a specific instance as BJU to substantiate a general conclusion about the quality or utility of other UA schools, can you? Perhaps if you could inductively gather a list of 20-30 good USA unaccredited schools which provide students with utility in the workplace and academia you'd have a foundation from which to argue. Do you think that possible?

Second, you seem to be failing to note very important distinctions. The BJU program is substantive. The BJU program is approved for governmental licensing as teacher education. The BJU program is coursework not dissertation. . The BJU program is residential not (mostly) DL. And, as I said above, the BJU dislike for accreditation is not because it could not get accreditation but is purely for religious reasons. These distinctions, FN, IMO, make void your appeals to BJU. It is an unsound and illogical argument.

Consequently, your appeal to BJU to evince the virtue of unaccredited higher education has serious flaws and should be abandoned.

 

Bill,
You obviously know far more about BJU than myself, but what Bob Jones III wrote seemed to be of interest/value to this thread.
And all I've said about BJU is that they are one of the acceptable unaccredited DL organisations in the USA.
Some DI members get their knickers in a twist every time I mentioned an unaccredited DL facility, and rapidly get side-tracked into tirades of personal abuse. French, Suhar, James,
plcscott, Henrik & Jimmy (to name but a few) have also all suffered
extremist attitudes towards them. All of which has nothing to do with Distance Learning, or the promotion of DegreeInfo as a leading internet discussion group. Yet these people have a vast wealth of knowledge about distance learning which should not be ignored.
I earlier suggested that the unaccredited forum should perhaps be eliminated if contributors are being banned for supporting other than 'the establishment' mentality/philosophy.
I'll give some serious thought to the production of a list of 'unaccredited' educational groups, that I believe have gained widespread acceptance. The only detractor being that I would expect to be the subject of mindless personal attacks from the
RA Extremists.
Dr Anatidae

 

I have been reading this amuzing thread for some time now and I have my own conclusion. I have a very peaceful and open-minded personality so I shouldn't step on anyone's toes with my response.

I feel first off, their are probably many unaccredited schools which are good and are not Mills. Unfortunately since Mills exist and accreditation is one of the ways to separate true legitimacy from fraud, accreditation is a trusted method to show a school as being legit. I do feel bad for the UA schools who are new and can't fulfill accreditation standards due to finances or size because unfortunately, the bad apples can spoil the few good in the bunch. Also I guess there must be some poor quality accredited schools out there as well. In this case they have the gold standard, but are lacking the quality that's expected of an RA School. Also what's the accreditation agencies history as there are many who create new agencies to prove legitimacy.

So what's the final answer on what's the right thing to do? I guess it all comes down to using your brain!!!! If the school has unbelievably easy entry and graduation requirements(pay VISA, get BA), chances are it's not cool to go there. It's just become so confusing but I feel if you use common sense, you won't get burned!!!! My test is go to their website; the minute I hear degree for $1400 after evaluation of life credits and no mention of academic credits, I run like I'm in a Haunted House!!!! I would say all real schools will never issue any degree based on life experience alone, you must have some academic credits. I figure the Big 3 are about as good as it gets as far as acceptance of multiple forms of credit.

 

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FN

Probably BJU is of very slight importance in the shape of this discussion because it is rare that other unaccredited schools have credibility. In contrast BJU having substance in its programs and utility both in the job market and in transfering to accredited schools seems credible. But that only proves the quality of BJU.

By saying that all RA extremists should read again Jones III article, which you say in this thread, you are implying that there is something in that article or in the BJU condition that these RA adherents are not admitting. Something is there to confound your opponents. But there is nothing there, FN! This syllogism simply will not work:

If BJU is good, many other UA schools are also good,

BJU is good,

Therefore many other UA schools are good.

There is , I'm sure you'll agree, something amiss with that conclusion because the major premise is too generalized.




As for personal abuse , I think we'd all do better if we focus on judging the soundness of ideas rather than slander. That is what I'm trying to do with the BJU thing! I'm evaluating your argument, not condemning you.

Curiously in some recent AED posts, a forum I've never posted on BTW, I was slandered because the poster thought I had agreed with Rich Douglas on a thread re his dissertation on degreeinfo. I don't recall that I expressed such an opinion. Nevertheless, I was criticised along with 6-8 others: I am a nobody. A nonachieving individual of unknown background. I have no right to give advice. I am wrong for daring to do a degree not related to my employment.

The personal abuse is done by both sides, it is not unique to accreditation supporters here on this board, FN.

Do you in fact have clear evidence that anyone is banned because that one is vocal about UA? If you do , what is that evidence?

I don't know why amassing support for UA schools by assembling a list of these which provide utility both in the workplace and in academe should worry you about the "personal attacks from extremists" anymore than providing the solitary example of BJU did. I'm not sure that you can develop such a list of 25 schools. If you cannot make such a list, then it seems to me that is an argument against going UA. If you can, then you've done a good work. I will help you with 2-3 theology schools for your list if you like. But these resemble in no way most UC millish schools.

It is the rarity of the exceptions to the corollation between accreditation and quality which proves the rule!

 

Thanks for that Bill.
I've just resurrected the "Banning ...." thread - covering the ban on Richard Suhar and Peter French.
From my personal perspective I have never looked on myself as anything more than a "enthusiastic amateur" in the waterfowl scene, but 30+ years involvement with the NZ Brown Teal and between 250,000+ words written on brown teal, together with my long involvement with the creation, enhancement and management of NZ wetlands, has given me a degree of respectabilty on the subject - in NZ and in most other countries.
Dr Anatidae

 

This surprises me Hayes. After all, if you have a PhD then you should think of yourself as more than just an entusiastic amateur. I have a proposition for you Hayes. All of your "PhD credibility" is based on your brown teal research. Your manual is one thing but what about your dissertation? I'm making you an offer Hayes. Name your price. Ten cents a page? Twelve cents a page? Name your price and I'll buy a copy of your dissertation. NOT THE SELF PUBLISHED MANUAL, but the formal, academically oriented PhD dissertation that you submitted to your university in order to obtain your degree. Anyone who is confident of their "qualification" would be willing to do this deal. Anyone who refuses is a fake.
Jack

 

Jack,
The published material is close to being identical to the dissertation presented to TCU. The main differences being that the quality and number of illustrations were considerably enhanced and expanded, (particularly those relating to brown teal habitat) together with a section on waterfowl diseases, a Foreword (from the NZ Department of Conservation's top waterfowl biologist) and an expansion of acknowledgements section.
Preparation of the TCU dissertation was based on their ten page dissertation guidelines, which I'm also happy to send by email to any interested DegreeInfo member. The dissertation took nearly ten months to write and a further five months to prepare the manuscript for publication. Publication costs were over $7,000NZ, all of which was finance by the Brown Teal Conservation Trust, with the Trust received a charitable grant of $3,000 towards these costs.
And as already posted, my involvement with TCU has already been discussed in depth on DegreeInfo.
But I would be the first to agree that a TCU PhD could perhaps have been gained without such a major input of work, but again I reiterate that something a value came out of the whole exercise.
I should perhaps also mention, again, that TCU (South Dakota version) ceased offering PhD's soon after they awarded mine.
Dr Anatidae

 

Bill,
I have asked Peter if he knows why he was banned, but we can speculate that he, James, and possibly Henrik, were most likely banned because of their long held views about unaccredited degree granting organisations, and for their audacity to question the 'gang of three' at DegreeInfo. I believe that Jimmy was once banned for similar reasons?
Will report back if Peter can enlighten me further.
Dr Anatidae

 

I have read the entire statement above and did not see any instructions on how I might purchase a copy of your dissertation. I do not believe that the published material "is close to being identical to the dissertation presented to TCU." Dissertations worldwide are presented in a format which is virtually universal. This format is not designed to be "readable" in the classic sense and so many scholars who have submitted their dissertations for general publication have faced substantial rewrite requirements. If your dissertation IS the duck manual then it is substandard and generally unacceptable as a PhD dissertation. You stated in the DL forum, "I never claimed that the TCU PhD had credibility..." yet every time you log in here at degreeinfo and call yourself Dr. Duck and refer to your dissertation, you do more than simply suggest that you are a PhD, you declare it with some emphasis. So, put up or shut up. Provide a copy of your dissertation or stop calling yourself Doctor. BTW, in case you're wondering, this issue will NOT go away.
Jack

 

Quite obviously Jack you have very limited experience with PhD requirements and have never read the TCU PhD requirements. And, as posted elsewhere, having been called a liar and an academic fraud you would be the last person in the world that I would allow the privilege of reading either my dissertation or the published manual.
It's also obvious you have never seen a dissertation in published form, or many of my earlier posts on the subject.
Dr Anadidae

 

Mr. Anadidae,
Jack's point is well taken. Quantitative dissertations are universally the same. Five chapters, statment of problem, review of literature, statement of research methods, results, conclusions. If your manual does not follow this form, or if Trinity's standards do not follow this form, serious questions are raised. I have some awareness of dissertations having reviewed over 100 and having served on doctoral committees at two universities.

 

It appears that by stating that the published manual and the dissertation are almost identical, Dr. Hayes has already admitted that his dissertation does not follow the standard format. This is not the least bit surprising since from Bears' Guide it doesn't appear that a dissertation is always even necessary at TC&U.

 

Even more speculative and subjective nonsense Bill, which shows you know nothing about TCU and their dissertation requirements.
On numerous occasions I've offered to email these to you, but you are simply not interested in reading factual information. Instead you choose to waffle on, pretending to be some sort of DL 'expert', when in fact your low level qualifications and obvious very limited DL experience make you an expert in nothing!
Dr Anatidae

 

And on and on go the rationalizations of the degree mill Dr. Everybody is wrong who doesn't agree with his illogical pontifications. Very funny indeed.

 

This is just plain stupid....

As the guy who started the post in the first place, only to have it hi-jacked by Dr. Hayes, or whatever his name is (the brown teal duck guy?), I find this entire thread to be entirely stupid. The discussion is NOT about the article that was posted, and in fact has become a low-brow name calling fest by all involved.

I might as well weigh in with my own opinion on the ARTICLE.

It sounds to me like rationalization by someone who feels they deserve a degree (and probably do), but can't get one the traditional way so they opted for a diploma mill/life experience option, and now are left trying to convince others that this is all OK.

That might be simply said, but I hope others will find it more intelligent than these personality clashes that so frequently dominate this discussion board. Guilty parties are on both sides. Yes, there are 37,000 posts with Bill Huffman's name in them on "google groups", which leads one to the question "does he have a life?", and yes Dr. Hayes appears to be a desparate diploma mill defender. Enough already!

Slams in both directions are my specialty, especially when stupidity dominates on both sides....