Is it deceitful, dishonest, unethical, or lying by omission to list on your resume...

Your post brings up an interesting question. PSU's world campus doesn't really have a home. The address for the world campus is University Park, PA. My degree is only offered through the world campus and specifically housed in the College of Medicine. Am I not allowed to wear Penn State gear, or claim to be a Penn State student because I don't attend courses in University Park? If I tell people I'm a student at Penn State is this lying? I'll tell you how I address it because I've been asked about it several times. I explain to them that I'm a PSU student through the world campus, my professors are PSU professors located in the Penn State Hershey College of Medicine in University Park, and come graduation time I'm travelling to University Park, PA to walk with my fellow PSU students. None of this is false or misleading.

So is telling someone I attended Penn State similar to what you call people out for in the Auburn vs. Auburn- Montgomery debate? I'm just trying to understand where you are coming from...</p>

 

PSU is an interesting beast because as you mention, the World Campus isn't housed at any one campus, it is it's own entity. Auburn has no such gray area, distance programs are housed at Auburn (AUM may have some as well, I don't know). Because I like you I will grant you permission to say you attend PSU and leave it at that . In fact, anyone excluding iMBA students and Thomas Jefferson can just say they attend PSU with no further distinction and I will let it slide.

 

My understanding is that the World Campus doesn't exist as a distinct PSU "College", or as part of any one of the PSU Colleges. Instead, it acts a "delivery system" for different Colleges.

So if you earn a PSU-World Campus diploma, it probably has the name of one of the PSU Colleges on it. The exact College name would vary, depending on the specific program that World Campus delivered.

In the case of the PSU-World Campus "iMBA", it is actually a cooperative program of four different PSU Colleges, primarily Capital College (= Harrisburg, with 21 faculty) and Behrend College (= Erie, with 13 faculty), with smaller contributions from the School of Graduate Professional Studies (= Great Valley, with 5 faculty) and Smeal College of Business (= University Park, with 2 faculty).

My guess is that an iMBA diploma is technically issued by one of these Colleges. It is most likely issued by Behrend College, since the iMBA program is housed at the "Knowledge Park" at PSU-Erie, and since the Chair of the program is a faculty member at PSU-Erie.

If this is correct, then a "World Campus" iMBA diploma may be no different from a Behrend College B&M MBA diploma; both would be issued by Behrend College of PSU. In this case, it would not be deceitful, dishonest, unethical, or lying by omission to list the iMBA on a resume as a degree from "Behrend College, Pennsylvania State University".

However, ethical questions might arise if the "Behrend College" detail was omitted. The Penn State system has many different business programs at different Colleges, with different levels of selectivity and different forms of professional accreditation. It may be difficult for a reviewer to evaluate the degree if this information is lacking.

 

Any reviewer with sufficient sophistication to know that there are multiple business programs within the Penn State system. Some reviewers would be aware of this, others would not.

In the case of business degrees, the distinction would be particularly important in the subfield of accounting. Smeal College of Business (at the University Park campus) offers business degrees with AACSB accreditation in accounting. Some other PSU Colleges offer degrees with AACSB accreditation in general business, but not in accounting specifically. And other PSU Colleges offer business degrees that are not AACSB-accredited at all.

State licensing laws and regulations commonly differentiate between degrees with different types of accreditation. So a state licensing board (e.g. for CPAs) will explicitly require full details about a degree (typically under penalty of perjury), so that this information can be ascertained. And it turns out that some professional employers in the private sector are equally sophisticated, and have similar expectations.

Even if accreditation is not involved, some employers will perceive a distinction between degrees from different Colleges. It probably wouldn't surprise you if an NBA recruiter perceived a distinction between "Penn State" basketball players, depending on whether they played for Penn State in University Park (in NCAA Division I) or for Penn State in Altoona (in NCAA Division III). So would it surprise you to learn that some corporate recruiters perceive similar differences in "Penn State" MBAs?

 

Haha ok well look for me at the LSU/Auburn game wearing Penn State gear....

 

After the asswhooping your team received at the hands of Alabama last week I don't think I'd wear anything resembling a Nittany Lion anywhere near SEC country....unless you want to be laughed at. I especially wouldn't do it at any LSU game. I literally got into a fist fight at the LSU/Auburn game every single year from my freshman year until my first year out of school. It didn't matter which school was hosting the game, who won or lost, after the game those Cajun fans will find a reason to fight you.

 

I'll accept that so long as you have to say you attended "some online Alabama school no one's ever heard of".

 

But Auburn isn't an online school and we haven't set up an entire "campus" devoted to online study. I'll tell you what, I'll say "I attended the best school in the state of Alabama that very few people in the state of Pennsylvania are aware of, based on the results of a survey with a small sample size at Thomas Jefferson's place of employment".

 

I think my description was more accurate and parsimonious.

How about we both put whatever we want? Then you can call me a misleading liar and I can call you a graduate of some unknown Alabama school's online program (accreditation status unknown as well).

Everyone's happy.

 

If that makes you feel better, so be it. And if that's how you choose to describe my school, you'll be proving my point, as it will be a lie.

 

Not a lie to me. I've never heard of the school nor do I know its accreditation status.

 

Fair enough. Let me enlighten you, we're the team that is going to beat the team that decimated your precious Nittany Lions last week.