Century University

I especially liked where the article said, "Non-traditional qualifications can be earned as "degree completion programs", where credits are added to existing credits to finish the scheme. Fully-recognised Thomas Edison State College of New York is a good example of this."

Obviously, despite his incessant apologia and the multitude of messages that have appeared in several forums about "the big three," the author still does not know that Thomas Edison State College is in Trenton, New Jersey. The New York school, in Albany, is Excelsior College.

 

I understand your point, but I also have to say that this is *precisely* the Capitol/Earlscroft/Trinity/Columbus/Cambridge State (etc) argument. That the degree "meets the personal and professional needs" of the holder. It's basically saying "I was seeking a fraudulent degree. I got one. I'm a happy camper."

I just don't see how such a measure could *possibly* be expected to have any validity whatsoever -- particularly given the "mill-denial" mentality that many go into when their credentials are questioned the first time.

Hence, I really can't in any way support Century's position, and I have a really hard time placing any meaningful value on research that uses degree holder satisfaction as an indication of the efficacy or worth of a degree.

 

I don't support anything Century does, nor do I feel they are a legitimate school. My point remains, however, that it is useless and futile to do nothing but bemoan the fact that these schools exist. It is much more enlightening to explore WHY they exist, HOW they exist, etc.

I know you're not doing this, but it is common for people around here to immediately take sides on an issue, making it "black or white." That's fine, in and of itself. But once we've decided (individually or collectively) that a school is bad, that's not the point to end the discussion and/or examination. Century has been in business for about 25 years. They claim to have awarded more than 10,000 degrees, which would represent tens of millions of dollars in revenues. Whether anyone likes it or not, it's happening, and will continue to happen. And their just one of dozens (hundreds?) of schools that have, are, and will operate in similar fashion. When I said schools like Century satisfy their customers, that got twisted into the idea that customer satisfaction equated to quality. Far from it. Schools like Century seem to satisfy their many customers WITHOUT academic quality! To me, that seems interesting.

Without multi-faceted examinations of the issues involved in distance education, we might as well just post a set of criteria for what is and is not a good school/program, then list the schools that do and do not meet that criteria. No debate necessary. But if we want to talk about these schools/programs, let's look at all the issues. We might find there's some good and bad in most things.

Rich Douglas

 

I disagree. Educational institutions (mills, State-approved, RA) cannot sit behind some ivory tower (real or virtual) and NOT consider why its students chose this path - was their experience satisfying, how are their graduates perceived in the marketplace, and how do they fare in the marketplace based on this perception. Perspective students choose a RA school based on their needs, professional goals, schools’ reputation, etc, all the time. Likewise, perspective mill students do the same. Why? Is it the lack of good watchdog groups identifying and exposing these mills? Lower-costs? Easier? Ease of receiving credit for life experience? Is it ignorance on the part of employers? Do employers really care what school as long they can say "64% of our employees hold PhD's"?

We have a Century PhD at Bryn Mawr, a SGIU PhD at Mercer, and so on, and so on, and so on… Should one's lifetime accumulated knowledge suddenly be deemed null and void by the marketplace because one hold's a mill degree? Good bad or indifferent, these degrees are in the marketplace and are marketable. The holders of these mill degrees appear satisfied. WHY?!? What can WE do about it? Should we do something about it? What's the Federal/State government’s role? DOE?, DETC?, Regional Accreditor’s?

These questions can't be addressed adequately until we have some good data upon which to work from. I think Rich's research is more than warranted - it's needed for the industry to understand the issue from a "market" perspective. Let's not hide our heads in the sand because we view these mills and mill holders with great disdain and indignation. Perhaps if educators (particularly k-12) understood market dynamics a little better, they would find and develop better ways to compete against Sega, Nintendo, MTV,…(the real competition), for their audience's attention. The same holds true for higher education.

 

Based on what I read and thru your contribution to this link, I admire what you done Mr. Tom Head, but pls. fix your website's deadlink before promoting or include your url on your signature.

Thanks,

nolix