Funding a PhD from Faulkner University

Hey all,
I have recently been in contact with Faulkner University and their online/distance education program in Biblical Studies (PhD in Biblical Studies Online | Faulkner University Online). I have been on the phone recently with the head of school, a student officer and been in a few emails with other people from the university and I must admit I am pretty impressed. PhD lecturers from Harvard and Drew University, and a PhD student already working at John Knox Seminary, I was pretty help happy to see what I found. Also the program does really great work with biblical languages, helping students with the basics to get to the PhD level. Being fully online is what I was looking for as well, so all ticks. I also expressed my concern about the university's tag line, "a Christian University" as I am an agnostic, but the whole staff were supportive and said, "We are all Christians but with a variety of views and beliefs but we are all scholars and educators first and foremost." Also there is no statement of faith to sign, and lots of students come from a wide background of experiences and faiths, and they said I would be welcome so long as I was invested in scholarship and truth seeking. Which I am.

The one problem was the price.... The whole PhD would equal about $28,000 across four years full time. Not a bad price tag compared to some of the others out there. But the big, big, big problem is that there are no scholarships, awards, or funding via the university for students. There is government funding open, but as a Permanent Resident, this is very limited. I have begun looking at external funding, but finding stuff for online PhDs that is open to non-Christians, isn't easy at all. I have gone through all my schooling without getting into hardly any debt, and paying it off very quickly. Being newly married, I do not want to start know.

I am a bit at the cross roads and not sure what to do. I am really excited by this program, as it seems to tick all the boxes and seems to be exactly what I am looking for. But the money is a concern. I am not sure I want to get into debt like this and I am not sure if I could pay it back at the rate I would want. I am unsure.

Does anyone have any advice? Any insight? Any idea on funding a PhD in Biblical Studies online? Any insight into Faulkner University that I should know and don't? Anything would be great.

 

Universities commonly grant scholarships/awards/funding to traditional residential graduate students, because they can play useful roles in the department as teaching assistants or research assistants. Even with the funding, grad students are cheaper than hiring teaching or research staff.

Unfortunately, distance graduate students don't have the same value in those respects. In general, the most valuable function that distance students can serve is as cash cows. Giving them funding would defeat that purpose.

 

It's a relatively small and obscure school by US standards, with little reputation outside the (relatively small) State of Alabama. This doesn't necessarily mean that Faulkner is a bad school; however, it does mean that a Faulkner PhD may have limited value on the academic job market, which is generally very competitive.

You may be pursuing the degree out of personal interest, rather than for professional purposes. If so, there's nothing inherently wrong with that, except that $7000/year for 4 years seems like rather expensive recreation. Would it be more affordable if you enrolled only part-time, perhaps $3500/year for 8 years ?

 

My nephew is on full scholarship at Faulkner ... academics and baseball. :fing02:

 

Seems to be that way. I have spoken to a few of my academic friends who work in the field most of the responses are akin to "You could do better, you could do worse." or "Its not Harvard or Yale, but its not the University of [insert bad university here] either."

It is for academic and career reasons. I do want to be a scholar and professor in the New Testament and Christian Origins, and one of the reasons why Faulkner University of standing out to be is that it is Distance Education, because if you ask me and my magic crystal ball, so many divinity schools, seminaries, and just religious programs are going online. So I am figuring an online PhD from a good university, might help get me a job at a mostly online university/seminary/divinity school. I could be wildly wrong on this but it is a prospective I am looking into.

 

It's certainly true that the online education sector has grown dramatically in recent years, and that this has increased the demand for online instructors. But consider the following points as well:

(1) The growth of online education has also increased the supply of qualified instructors. To date, the growth in supply has more than kept up with the growth in demand. Since there are plenty of qualified applicants on the market, the compensation for online instructors is generally quite low. Online instructors are typically hired as "adjuncts", on a temporary part-time basis, commonly for around $1500 to $2000 per class.

(2) Many (perhaps most) of the potential employers in this field are divinity schools and seminaries; such schools commonly favor members of specific denominations when making hiring decisions. If a suitable member of a preferred denomination is not available, they will probably favor members of other Christian denominations over non-Christians. You appear to be a non-Christian (based on Post #1 above), which would likely put you at a significant disadvantage in this respect.

(3) Online schools do not necessarily prefer to hire graduates from other online programs. On the contrary, they may feel that hiring traditional residential PhDs will provide their program with greater credibility and prestige. This should not be surprising, since you previously indicated (in Post #1 above) that you were impressed that Faulkner's staff included graduates of Harvard and Drew. Those aren't online schools.