Century U: Who's right, Dr. Colleen or the New Mexico Public Regulation Commission?

Yes, or at least the dissertation is made available at the institutions library (not UMI or in addition to...). As such, without unaccredited institutions making their dissertations public it would be very difficult to even obtain one through inter-library loan. In addition, the unaccredited dissertations we have seen posted to the net and referenced through this board have typically not been of high quality.

John

 

Well, my personal view is that unaccredited Ph.D. degrees such as yours, Dr. Colleen, are what they are. I wouldn't call it bogus or fake. From my view, they are definitely not research degrees because the unaccredited research is not likely to ever be used as a reference for an accredited dissertation. They are just simply unaccredited degrees. Degrees that generally have unknown and an unproven value.

 

Bill,

Thanks for your comments. I certainly respect your view and am not looking to try and change it. I was and am happy with the course work and challenge provided by Century and to me that is what matters.

 

How many do you think....?!?

Bill:

How many RA accredited dissertation (be they in the US, UK or anywehere else) do you realistically think get quoted in some other person's doctoral work?!?! Lets get real here! I have seen some unaccredited doctoral theses (and unpubslished general work) quoted in RA (or their equivalent) doctoral dissertations and I read these things week in and week out! I also know many doctoral theses/dissertations sit on shelves and never see the light of day (for all sorts of reasons) once the candidate has been awarded the doctoral degree.

'telfax'

'telfax

 

Re: How many do you think....?!?

I'll probably be quoting at least two in mine; the best single-author work ever written about my topic is an unpublished 450-page dissertation from NYU. (Which is not to say that this sort of thing always, or even usually, happens; but clearly it sometimes does. I have on my desk a 250-page dissertation from Columbia on a closely related topic, and it also cites the NYU dissertation.)


Cheers,

 

Re: How many do you think....?!?

Your point is unclear to me.

I feel I can add some noise related to the second half of your post though. From the Computer Science point of view, if a CS oriented dissertation is not referenced, it doesn't mean that the research hasn't contributed. From what I've seen, it is frequently very much a team effort and the individual contribution is sometimes just documented in a dissertation. It is reasonable, in my view, to assume that the team goes on to make additional contributions that are then referenced and built upon.

 

Forgive me for asking the third time, but:

1. How was the Century coursework designed?
2. Were the exams proctored?
3. What was the length of your dissertation, i.e., number of pages?

My purpose in asking is to give us an idea as to Century's program.

Thanks,

 

Re: How many do you think....?!?

For what it is worth.. I quoted from the dissertation work of Jack Middaugh of Ohio State and Kevin McFarlane of Nova Southeastern in my work. But what the hey.. I am not RA.

Regards,

Dick

 

Maybe unfair but.....

In response to Mr Huffman's question about reaction about degrees from Century or other schools.

I am definitely not an expert on PhD programs. I have and do sit on a few Infectious Disease Committees at a couple of hospitals. I met a nurse with a doctorate from Century University. She definitely was not a shining endorsement of the college.

The physicians and professionals tended to laugh about her degree (some openly some privately). Some slips that could have been quite human were even laughed about more. Her department on the first JCAHO inspection I was involved with I believe got a 30 out of 100. It is, in my opinion, quite wrong to use a sham degree in a clinical setting having anything to do with patients. Less so in pure administration, JCAHO regs, etc.

Respect is earned folks. As far as quoting doctoral dissertations, it is one thing to quote bright and respected people in a paper. It is quite another to have them quote you. Let me ask, would Wharton even consider modeling a class after this school? Would any research paper at Harvard quote Century Univerity PhD candidates? Funny, the New England Journal just doesn't list anything from these schools.

 

Re: Maybe unfair but.....

This mirrors similar situations that I've seen involving unaccredited degrees.

The problem is that unaccredited degrees cover a huge range from total scams that have zero instruction and just sell diplomas based on life-experience to RA quality schools that generally get accredited within a very few short years. The majority of the unaccredited institutions are closer to the "total scam" end of the spectrum. There's no good way for us to know where on this scale a Century, for example, fits. (especially when graduates don't seem able to answer very simple questions asked about their alma mater) The normal response from the general puplic seems to be to consider all unaccredited institutions to be degree mills and their degrees to be jokes.

 

Re: How many do you think....?!?

I had two in my dissertation and researching dissertations was an important component to my overall dissertation research effort.

John

 

Re: Re: How many do you think....?!?

Telfax, it seems that some others have interpretted your post to say that you felt it was rare that dissertations referenced other dissertations. Was this actually your intent?

From your post, perhaps you review dissertations as part of your job? That being the case, I would assume that you are associated with a specific school. What school are you associated with?

 

Since the Century PhD appears to fit neither the American nor the thesis-only model, perhaps some of the dubiety could be cleared up by the adoption of a different nomenclature. Only some, though.

 

Asked and answered

Russel,

Please forgive me, but I have already explained this at least twice in other threads. Please use the search function for this information. It does take some time to explain the program and I do not want to go through it all again.

 

Re: Asked and answered

Coleen,

Thank you for responding. I was unable to find the number of pages in your dissertation. Would you mind responding with this information?

Thank you,

 

Russell,

I'll need to get it out and let you know. I believe it was about 300 pages (I used to know the number of words!) with about another 150 of appendix/source. As discussed in another thread it had the same five chapters, primary research, research tool, that is used in any other doctoral dissertation. My advisor had her Ph.D. from the Unions Institute and indicated the same amount of work was performed for her dissertation.

 

Thank you, Coleen.

 

A general problem that I've seen in the past when it comes to unaccredited schools (I have no familarity with Century inparticular), is that there seems to be a general lack of consistency. Some people can work very hard and do work almost equivalent to an accredited degree (sometimes perhaps even greater than the minimum standard) and then others can just buy a diploma without investing any significant effort at all. It is the accreditation and oversight process that assures us that this is not the case for accredited schools.

I have no familiarity with Century so I can't say whether or not it is the case there but, I do understand that Century fled California to avoid being closed down as a fraudulent school. If I'm correct on that then I would have to be very skeptical about any credentials bestowed by Century.

 

I know I am a little late to this thread, but wanted to follow-up on the use of other dissertations in building dissertations. It is very common practice. I cited two other dissertations in developing my dissertation. Because my dissertation included an on-line research tool, it has been used in several other dissertations to justify their on-line effort as part of chapter 3. I completed my dissertation at Oklahoma State University, where my chair, Dr. Gary Conti, has created a couple of pretty innovatve study groups for disserations (community of scholars). Members of the groups help keep other members focused. Often one member will discover something very interesting in thier dissertation and another member will use that as part of something to generate entirely new research. I have spoken doctoral students at two addtional universities who have cited my dissertation and Dr. Conti's dissertation from 30 years earlier. It is a common practice. I think this may be one of the more important features of dissertations, adding new knowledge to the field and creating new questions that cause new research.

 

If Telfax frequently reads real dissertations, I'm sure that he would understand this and his post has just been misunderstood. The other possibility is that he works at (or even owns) a degree mill and has a totally warped and incorrect view as to what a dissertation actually is.