Jim Lane - Where are you?

Are your statement based on experience or conjecture? I am not disputing what you said. Rather, I am just registering my disgust for statements that are based on abracadabra.

 

If you look at the WASC accredited schools they run the gambut from Stanford, Cal, Cal Tech to Bethaney College and California College of Arts and Crafts.

You can get a liberal arts BA from all (haven't checked Cal Tech thou). I doubt if the programs are as deep and rigourous equaly in all of them.




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M. C. (Mike) Albrecht, PE

 

Andy,

Your point is well taken. Try out this idea to extend the analogy. Would you rather have a Harvard MD who did three procedures in the past two years do your CABG or an FMG who did 133 with no adverse consequences?

 

I'm not acquainted with Bethany College, other than knowing that it's a small Christian college near Santa Cruz. I know of no real reason to insult it though.

On the other hand, California College of Arts and Crafts is one of the best regarded art schools in California. Its faculty and students have included names like Richard Diebenkorn (painter), Michael McClure (poet) and sculptors including Robert Arneson, Manuel Neri and many more. CCAC is accredited by WASC. It is professionally accredited in art, architecture and interior design. In recent years it has opened a new campus in San Francisco's South of Market area that emphasizes stuff like computer art.

If you aren't even sure what the respective schools offer, then how in the world can you justify your relative quality assessments?

I'm going to say this flatly and categorically: California College of Arts and Crafts is a much better choice for an art student than is Cal Tech. That's just a fact.

CCAC might actually be a better choice than either Cal and Stanford, but that's a little more debatable since the latter schools at least offer degrees in studio art.

 

How in the name of heaven can you teach 10 courses (10 courses * 2 c/h per course = 30 hours) and provide meaningful instruction to the students. I once taught 6 courses and felt as if the students were not receiving proper and effective instructions. 30 credits hours, wow!

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Howard Rodgers

 

I will extend it even further by talking about something I mentioned in another thread:

Willie Gary graduated from an small, obscure law school in North Carolina, and became one of the wealthiest attorneys in the nation. Go to www.williegary.com to see his story.

UoP is NOT Harvard. If I were competing with a grad of the Harvard Business School, I would think he would have to be pretty sad to get beat out by me. My undergrad from UoP has provided me tremendous opportunities. Believe me, I did not think they were running a sham, except for their financial-aid office, which did a good job managing financial floats (get paid electronically, but hold up checks as long as possible).




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Darren Cross
BSB-Management, UoP
MBA-Fontbonne College

 

You have to take this point on an "all other things being equal". If the FMG (foreign medical graduate?) really had more experience in a given procedure - of course I would go with him. But if the FMG and the Harvard medical school grad had the same level of experience and there were no other apparent differences - I'd go with the Harvard guy first. Why? Well, to get into Harvard is far tougher than most FMGs. In all likelyhood, the guy (or gal) is probably brighter.

As for the wealthy lawyer - sure, there are exceptional people that come out of less known schools. But try this experiment - take a random sample of 100 grads of Harvard Law school and 100 grads of a small, less known law school. Calculate their average income or their bar pass rate or any other measure you choose. Who wins? My bet is on the Harvard bunch.

As for a UoP grad having career success - I'm sure it happens. But how much did UoP contribute to the success? And how much was due to individual effort? The same argument can be made about Harvard - but then Harvard is so selective that only really bright folks get in.

Regards - Andy

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Andy Borchers, DBA
NSU (1996)

 

Good point. The normal graduate teaching load for a full-time prof at a "teaching oriented" school is 6 courses per year (or 18 credit hours). If UoP has adjuncts (which I assume is what this person is) teaching 30 hours a year, they are overloading them. Bottom line - academic quality must surely suffer under such a load.

Without getting into the individual's personal finances - what do you imagine UoP paid the fellow - versus what full-time faculty earn? I bet a whole lot less.

Again, we see what for-profits do. They hire adjuncts for peanuts to teach overloads. What do you think students get in such an equation?

Regards - Andy

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Andy Borchers, DBA
NSU (1996)

 

Which was wxactly my point. And I was not trying to insult Bethaney! Just for a liberal arts degree you would not go to Cal Tech. At the same time if you wanted to study planetary science with a goal of working for NASA California Arts College would not be my first choice.

Each school has a specialization, and would appeal to different students. So making catagorical statements that covers everything equally is absurd.

And just because a school has a regional accrdidation does not make it good at everything.



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M. C. (Mike) Albrecht, PE

 

10 courses at 3 shrs for the 30 hours was my load. The courses run 5 weeks for undergrad and 6 weeks for graduate level. My class schedule ran twice a week 6-10pm when there was some overlap in the schedule.

It's not that difficult to give student attention when you did the courses previously and have the class size from 10 to 15 students. My class size varied from a low of 7 students a high of 22.

Students stay pretty focused since they only take one class at a time.

My end of coures evaluations from the students did not lead me to believe I was short changing them in the quality of instruction. The typical complaints are usually related to homework load.

Regards,

Dick

 

This is not necessarily a defense of University of Phoenix, but I've heard a fair amount of anecdotal evidence suggesting that many low-end, RA MBA programs are not particularly rigorous in their workloads or their standards. This comes to me primarily through lawyers who decided to pick up an MBA on the side, so it's not a terribly scientific survey.

One factor that may have a depressive influence on quality control in MBA programs is that there is no licensing exam after the program, such as those for lawyers or psychologists. Now, I'll be the first to say that bar exams bear little relation to the practice of law (umm, a charge that can be lodged against much of law school as well), but they do serve as a minimal indicator of whether a school is turning out graduates who are capable of comprehending a basic body of legal material. Thus, even someone considering an unaccredited law school can check to see if its bar pass rate is at least respectable.

 

Doesn't this speak more to the standards of the lawyers in chosing a school to obtain their MBA than it does to the many programs available?

 

In that they (apparently) were looking to the MBA as a "supplemental" degree, that might have something to do with it.

 

If outcome assessment and continuous improvement activity ever become a serious reality, this may change some. I know that the ACT people have an outcome assessment exam for MBAs that is starting to be used.

Regards - Andy

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Andy Borchers, DBA
NSU (1996)

 

I received my BSBM from UoPhx. As I have said here, on a.e.d, and on my website, the school isn't perfect, but then no school is. I had my share of bad professors at UoPhx, but then I did at IIT, SJSU, and anywhere else I've taken classes.

The degree helped me get into an AACSB accredited MBA program (SJSU). Both helped me get into my DBA program. I also teach at UoPhx.

I teach ststs, and like Richard, I test my students. I hate taking tests, hate giving them, but I still give them. I facilitate other courses, and I keep the workload challenging. As for grading, I am fair, but there are no "give-aways." Not only do they need to provide the right level of content, but also need to use proper grammer, structure, and MLA formats. I haven't failed anyone yet, but I have come close. Usually, I have a talk w/the student and see what can be done to help them out. I take this route to be balanced. Though I am only an adjunct, I do try to give my students their money's worth. That's why I usually keep them till 10 or very close to it! There isn't much time to let folks out early if one goes through the prescribed material.

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Only if you take the most liberal interpretation of your outdated, inaccurate and bogus information, Andy. You were so far out of contact, you might as well have been posting from Mir. Your hourly analysis, for example, applied in an annual report, would have resulted in your being jailed for inaccuracies and falsification of data, and that is a fact.

While this student says the meetings were a joke (and he is not the only one who has made that charge) most groups are very functional and do do what is set out. There is ample evidence of that in this forum from other students. I have seen groups in classrooms adjacent to mine start their meetings at 5:30 and are still there when I have exited at 10 pm. Ity is up to the students to make the system work. Occassionally, the system breaks down, like those tenured dust catchers haunting every university.

That is a fact and your classless japing at UOP cannot change it.

Just admit it, borchers, you couldn't cut it as UOP faculty, shut up, move on and make something worthwhile of your life.

Whoops, did I make a personal attack? Been gone from here for far too long, but I see the clown is still here.


jim

 

You are a little confused if you were referring to my post in this thread. Haven't done so as I haven't been here for awhile and my one reply, just sent, was in response to Borchers, who takes every opportunity to jape at UOP as he couldn't cut it as UOP faculty.

I hope you do a better job of teaching than you do in figuring out who posted what as you are so far off base with this reply to me, that you are not even in the ballpark.

Suck? Your post is the ultimate example of suck.


jim

 

Thanks for trying to straighten this out. I did not graduate from UOP.


jim

 

You have a problem with ten courses in a year? Pathetic.


jim

 

Still confused by the facts, Andy? Where did he say 10 graduate courses a year? Or are you just taking your proverbial license to bash UOP yet again? It may have been all UG or a mix or all grad. Those who can do, those who can't, merely jape from the sidelines.

And I thought your class hours fiasco taught you how to run numbers and get facts straight.
Evidently not.


jim