Concordia University Ukraine

LOL! How did I not heard this pun before? Perhaps because MAUP mostly sticks to regions where Russian language is still dominant.
My wife's boss years ago was a MAUP grad. Not a great boss, so a bit of Kyiv Polytekh snobbery was a welcome respite. MAUP is basically a local University of Phoenix (almost exactly the same business model, with a gazillion branch campuses), plus anti-Semitism.

BTW, I was right about Estonia Concordia: it is mentioned on the Wikipedia list. I forgot that WIU-USA was initially named "Concordia International University". Estonia school is older, and was always named "Concordia International University Estonia"; it has merged into something called "University Audentes", which eventually merged into public Tallinn University of Technology (becoming it's business school). They had a good sense to sever ties with WIU back in 1996.

 

Actually, you did - once, quite a while ago, from me. You have been courteous enough to laugh twice and I appreciate that. "Maupa" is one of the first Ukrainian words I heard, as a kid. When I was 10 or 11, a Ukrainian family we knew had a little boy, about 4. He, Roman, had a toy, furry monkey and he taught me the word.

When I read on DI about MAUP and its anti-Semitism, I just HAD to ridicule it somehow, for that very reason. The more one mocks and deflates such institutions, the better, as I see it. Takes power away. And when I heard the school was David Duke's alma meretrix ("nourishing whore" - a phrase coined by the late Uncle Janko, famous here at DI) ...well, I just had to stick my oar in somehow.

 

This is quite the interesting bunch of schools you've mentioned here, Stanislav.

Is there any chance we could get you to start a thread on English-language distance programs out of Ukraine? I wouldn't mind seeing the wealth of programs in different fields (business, education, religion, etc.).

What do you say?

 

Regarding MAUP: I considered to do the "propio" PhD but the feedback to my E-Mails regarding my questions about the program was so extremely not helpful that I stepped back from this plan. Only prepared Copy and Paste answers without adressing my questions.

Also I'm not sure whether it is fair to reduce this school to anti semitism, the newest incidents mentioned on Wikipedia are more than 10 years old.

"There's the whole business with private Academies selling official-looking titles"

What do you mean with this, non-accredited fake instituitions that sell titles from their own fake institution? Or fake degrees with the name of real schools?

 

Three things, Johann766:

(1) Stanislav is an expert on these schools - and affairs Ukrainian in general. If he says it's a concern at MAUP - I believe him.

(2) Unfortunately, there has been a persistent thread of AntiSemitism among (at least older) Ukrainians for a long time. It has its roots in history, during the occupation by Polish Pani - overlords. These "aristocrats" employed exclusively Jewish bailiffs and estate agents to do their "dirty work" - evictions, rent collection etc. so pretty well ALL Jews were hated by those Ukrainians who worked land etc. for foreign masters. I don't think the hatred has really ever completely stopped.

Jews have been present in Ukraine since the 6th-7th Century BCE. They have likely been persecuted for most of their 25-2600 years there. I wonder, sometimes, at their tenacity. How did they hold out so long? I'm hoping this "tradition" is dying out here - but I'm not sure. Even some younger people of Ukrainian descent here show evidence of it - taught by their parents, I guess.

(3) Since when is there a 10-year Statute of Limitations on Anti-Semitism? Will there be one on Genocide next?

NOT A PENNY FOR THIS SCHOOL. NOT EVER!

 

Both are possible in Russia and some former Soviet Republics. In Russia there are "provedannyi" Diplomas that are from real schools - and there's backup in the school's records to "prove" the holder attended and achieved whatever marks. These are the work of corrupt school officials. I think these cost $7500 to $10K on average. Schools selling their own non-State-recognized diplomas? Sure. I know Russia itself licenses private schools that grant unrecognized degrees. One such in St. Petersburg has threads here on DI.

A known good school in Ukraine recently opened an unauthorized "wing" under a slightly different name to grant DL degrees to foreigners, dual awards with a Swiss Cantonal School. They quickly thought better of the idea and regretted the partnership. Unauthorized "schools" come and go - pretty well everywhere.

 

There's a class of title factories peculiar to exUSSR, and most prominent in Russia. These are "non-governmental Academies", private membership groups trading on the prestige of "Academician" title. If they stay in their lane, it's quite legal. The best known of these guys is "Russian Academy of Natural Sciences", or RAEN. Another, less fussy outfit with a similar name (RAE, also meaning "Russian Academy of Natural Science" using a synonym) - their prices are lower, they sell "doctorates" and all kinds of "awards", but also hold conferences and publish easy-acceptance journals. The latter are apparently in high demand among busy university instructors seeking to get items for mandatory research productivity reports. The third well-known outfit is "ABOP"; they got shut down for selling officer ranks (you could become a "Major General ABOP") and selling medals similar to state awards.

There are a few of these outfits in Ukraine, of somewhat lesser profile. Eg., many academics get into the "Academy of Higher Education", if they don't quite up to the real National Academy of Educational Sciences, NAPNU (or the main National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, NANU). Example: a President of my alma mater, who is also a de jure head of my department, is Mykhailo Zgurovsky, a very enterprising and connected guy who is an elected member of both real NANU and NAPNU. His deputy at my department is not of the same caliber, so he gets himself an Academy of Higher Education membership. Just to avoid being "merely" a "DSc., Professor".

 

Sorry, I inadvertently "smeared" RAE. They don't sell Doctorates, at least not "earned" ones. They sell Professorships. A "real" Professor title is government-awarded, so, yeah, shady too.

Having said that, they do offer "Doctor of Science, Honoris Causa". They do make sure to distance it from official degrees, and their DSc Hon. does NOT qualify one for their own Academician and Corresponding Member titles. So yeah, there's that.

 

Good to be shown all the details, Stanislav. Thanks for explaining everything. I remember the "Potemkin Academies," as I like to call them, from your revelatory post that mentioned the late 'Academician' Prof. Evreinov some time ago.

I can usually spot bogus schools and accreditors. With your help, I'm getting a bit better at spotting bogus Academies - but I've a way to go, yet.

 

As long as they don't partner with the one in Liberia they should be OK.
You remember the Concordia from Liberia with incorporation in US.

 

Yeah. I remember it, Lerner. Really well. Liberia, Virgin Is. Delaware and points east. This one here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concordia_College_and_University