Are all unaccredited schools degree mills

RJT- I think BillDayson just vlounteered to take your place in the frying pan.

 

Pretty good lacrosse team though... I agree on the categories... insightful.

 

Bill:

You have a right to your own opinions, but when libelous statements are made about the present operation of K-W, it is worth countering.

First, the business choices K-W made in the past could have been different. But before they are soley singled out, and the K-W bashing begins, let us not forget, that a nationally accredited school, which maintains an RA program partnership, claimed false accreditation up until the point it was accredited. K-W had even ceased a claim - prior to this other institution doing so. Also, I believe that even CCU, at onetime, claimed accreditation by an organization not sanctioned by the US DoE. In addition, another CA approved school made false claims on recommendations in literature, which Dr. Bear publicly stated are untrue. Yes – schools and their marketing promotions change – thankfully, overtime, for the better.

Like it or not:

K-W is a legally operating, WY State Licensed post secondary educational institution who has the legal authority to grant post secondary degrees, based on meeting the Private Schools Licensing Requirements in WY, which are regulated by the Wyoming State Department of Education.

As K-W meets the postsecondary licensure requirements of the state of WY, it requires the completion of coursework by every student. The amount may be a lesser number of courses than you would like. Nevertheless, genuine coursework must be completed and tested upon, via online/proctored grading methods. The degree must be earned, and it is not awarded upon experiential credits.

K-W requires an original Final project/Thesis form EVERY Student, for a BSc, 75 pages beyond abstract, first chapter and bibliography; for an MSc, it is 150 pages; a PHD 200 pages plus. The school will NOT pass any student unless ALL requirements of the paper are met. The school also submits all papers to an anti-plagiarism service; papers whose works are not properly referenced or plagiarized, subject the student to expulsion.

The minimal timeframe for the K-W student is NINE Months, this CANNOT be bartered on, I know, as I finished my requirements early and I tried. K-W WOULD NOT BUDGE. Even an RA MSc program, at AIU, a RA School, can be completed in 8 mos.

Is K-W an illegally operating institution? I think not.

Will you Bill ever be a K-W Student? I think not.

Will it ever stop raining in the North East? I think not.

 

RJT,

I for one don't fault people on their educational choices as long as it was ethical and legal, they did the work, learned from the experience, and can do something productive with it. I think too many people get hung up on the degree itself rather than what is done after it. As long as you can say that you are better for it, and your work demonstrates high quality, then good on you for having done it. And by god, you can spell and reason! ...which is more than a lot of other grads (regardless of accreditation)

 

If any of those upper-class twits from down the peninsula ever thinks of comparing Stanford to Cal, just remind them of the time that all of their idiotic band's trombone players couldn't block one 600-pound steroid-maddened Cal ball carrier.

And after 344 consecutive laterals, it's a miracle that any Cal players still remembered where the ball was. (I guess that's why you Cal guys have to have such high SAT's.)

I don't know whether a roomful of Nobel Prize winners or Larry, Curly and Moe drew up that play, but it was the greatest moment in the history of college sports.

You won't forget it. And neither will Stanford.

 

Any school whose team cheer begins "Oski wow wow! Whiskey wee wee!" shouldn't be listed in the same category as Stanford.

oxpecker
(Who was at the Big Game in 1982.)

 

Another Cal cheer

Who's he?...Drop dead!...Turn Blue!...Orange Juice...SQUISH!?

 

Actually I like the tier system that U.S. News and World report uses. Interesting point...K.W., SCUPS, CCU, etc. do not make any of the tiers.

 

Sorry Bill, I just thought that you were comparing the Cal Bears against those rich little cry baby mama's boys from Stanford and I just lost control of myself for a few moments.

Thanks for reminding me of the time those cry baby's sent their whole band onto the field to try and stop the Cal Bears. Those dirty cheaters, especially the tuba players on the goal line using their tubas like batering rams, big mistake. Everyone knows that saxes and percussionists are the best tacklers.

 

Bill, I believe you have fallen into the same trap that many on degreeinfo (and in the world at large - including myself) do. That is, commenting on your thoughts that have been gained from mostly individual situations, rather than data.

TESC (they do grant an ungodly amount of credit for easy-to-beat multiple choice exams) Unless you had taken these 'easy-to-beat multiple choice exams, before you completed the level the exams are supposed to test for, I don't understand how you can make this statement with a straight face. I understand that some (many) have stated that they passed these exams with little if any study. What we need to remember is that this is largely a self selecting group. This is true in at least two ways. First, I would guess that many people who take the time to read and respond (usually after doing their own research) to the varied posts here, as well as obtaining their degree(s), are self motivated individuals that are drawn to dl because of their internal drive to learn on their own and the flexibility and promise dl offers them. Second, because there are occasional posts documenting how easy a particular test was for the poster, in no way proves the ease of the test for the aggregate student population. In fact, this is how ETS norms the test for credit recommendations. In other words, if you score higher than the cut (C or higher) score, you are scoring higher than the average score of the students who passed the course in a regionally accreditted school. Please note that half of the students in the broadly based control group who earned a 'C' or higher score failed these "easy-to-beat standardized exams.

Perhaps this would also be of interest. I attended a residential(NA) school and, even after an eight week class, I would guess that >90% of the students wouldn't even make the pass rate on a CLEP or DSST exam. If most students can't remember the difference between the supply and demand curves, and can still 'earn' A's and B's, I feel most safe in opining about this. Although I haven't attended any other NA school, I have a big problem with you even suggesting that NA schools are possibly higher, and probably equal to a regionally accreditted assessment college like TESC.

Tony

 

Okay RJT, in your zeal to try to prove that a K-W diploma is worth more than one helping of toilet paper, you've twisted the truth and ignored the facts for the umpteenth time.

In order for a statement to be libelous it must be untrue, also opinions cannot be held libelous. So point out where I've said something untrue about the degree mill known as K-W otherwise cut the crap because you're telling a lie about me and we don't want to make this personal. Do we? (insert evil grin here)

I would like to remind you that YOU were the one that inaccurately argued that the best indicator of a degree mill was claiming bogus accreditation. At the time I said that you were wrong and gave a few examples of more important criteria. Further down, I'll try and be more methodical about describing what these far more important criteria actually consist of.

Now in your post that I'm responding to, you seem to be claiming that another overly important fact is that the institution is operating legally. This is a very weak criteria to use because it is really extremely difficult to evaluate the legality of a place without knowing things that are not readily apparent. It has been mentioned to you on many occasions that the majority of the degree mills that have been successfully prosecuted have superficially appeared to be operating legally. After all a degree mill is generally going to try to obscure, obfuscate, and hide the fact that they're operating illegally. This silly argument of yours is like saying that just about any scam artist you see should be trusted because he's operating legally.

So here's more important and useful criteria than your
A. apparent legality of the institution
B. whether or not the institution claims bogus accreditation

1. If the institution is accredited according to GAAP then it is not a degree mill.
2. If the institution does or has done any ONE of the following then it is almost certain (99.99%) that it is a degree mill.
a) It will not admit students from the jurisdiction that it actually operates from.
b) Its primary mailbox address is in another jurisdiction from where the institution actually operates from.
c) It has moved its mailing address from one location to another without physically moving the actual administration office.
d) A large percentage ( > 20%) of the standard work usually required for the degree can be life/work experience but this experience is not applied against specific courses required for a degree but instead just reduces the general requirements for a degree.
3. If one and two above have not yet determined whether or not an institution is a degree mill then there's a whole bunch of tertiary considerations that can be evaluated. RJT, I believe that your two items would fall into this category.

I hasten to add that K-W fails the first primary test and satisfies ALL four of the secondary tests proving that it is indeed a degree mill.

 

I see from the posts that no one changes their mind about something, they simply look for ways of supporting their own views, so much for useful debate. I suppose I'm as guilty as anyone else. It just seems wrong to get so bitter and all uptight over a piece of paper on the wall. When you die no one will build a shrine to you or me and display our wall paper. My diplomas will get sent to the dump along with my hard won amateur radio license-KF5K. If RJT gets something from KW why would anyone have to try and tear him down. You won't be a better person, smarter, richer, more respected, by trying to reduce his efforts. What he sees in KW is different than what you see, so be it. Let him keep his vision and you keep yours, but these heated attacks are unseemly. Legal, unaccredited schools exist. I believe it's possible to say you don't like them without always treating the people who select them like criminals. Dr. Bear sold L.I.A.R. degrees from a non-existent school. He helped start Fairfax University, and was President of Greenwich University. None were ever accredited or approved/authorized. They operated in states that were less demanding than some. I do not question his motives and even looked into using Greenwich. I believe Fairfax and Greenwich were honest attempts to provide alternative education. The people who earned these unaccredited degrees deserve just as much respect as does Dr. Bear who sold them. Again, I'm not saying don't speak your mind or keep quiet. Just remember who you are talking about, and possibly, just possibly, give them the benefit of the doubt. There are many ways of saying something isn't what you want without trying to lessen another person.

 

Okay looking at it again, it probably makes more sense to include RJT's "legal" test in the second category but it just must be kept in mind that it will rarely come back positive.

1. If the institution is accredited according to GAAP then it is not a degree mill.
2. If the institution does or has done any ONE of the following then it is almost certain (99.99%) that it is a degree mill.
a) It will not admit students from the jurisdiction that it actually operates from.
b) Its primary mailbox address is in another jurisdiction from where the institution actually operates from.
c) It has moved its mailing address from one location to another without physically moving the actual administration office.
d) A large percentage ( > 20%) of the standard work usually required for the degree can be life/work experience but this experience is not applied against specific courses required for a degree but instead just reduces the general requirements for a degree.
e) The institution is operating illegally.
3. If one and two above have not yet determined whether or not an institution is a degree mill then there's a whole bunch of tertiary considerations that can be evaluated.

 

Biil:

Then this where we disagree.

I say that a US based Degree Mill is an illegally operating institution with no State Authority to grant degrees, no courses, degree based on JUST Life Experience.

Under my definition, K-W is NOT a mill.

However, please remember that even some accrdieted schools of today calimed unrecognized accreditation; in addition, you claim that K-W is a mill becuse it successively moved. However, several respected schools have also picked up and moved their locations to either obtain Accreditation/State recognition. Just because K-W has it's Administrative Offices, out of CA, does not mean it doesn't have an office in WY. In fact, K-W does have an office in Cheyenne; I have spoken with office personnel there.

 

I believe that someone made a distinction between a "diploma" mill and a "degree" mill. KW might fit in the later one but I think it is more about respecting the person that completed a legal program.

I believe that the efforts against holders of degree mills should be directed towards the authorities like WY state where anyone with at least one "full" time employee and rented faculty can open a school with little investment and no education quality control.

 

Really? Which ones?

 

I think somehow, someway, we are all getting carried away with all these self implied tiltles and definitions due to our assumed knowledge. These titles or definitions, I think, are confusing your general audience. My question is:

What is the difference between a degree and a diploma?

Hopefully, the answers from the juggernauts will help us undesrtand the relationship of a degree and diploma to a mill. Thank you.

 

Columbia Southern claimed unrecognized accreditation right up until it was accredited by the DETC, according to Dr. Bear. But, to Bill H. this doesn't matter, because they are DETC.

The king of DL RA schools, moved it's operations to NM to gain RA. This caused much constrination.

 

As I was unfamiliar with the term, I ran a Google search for “constrination“. It asks me: “Did you mean: constipation”

I don’t know; did I? More importantly, did you?

 

A college grants you a degree, like a rank in the army/Captain/Major/General. This degree is represented by the paper they hand you, the diploma. The paper with all those fancy words and letters is what you frame and put on the wall.