Online MBA Programs grow in popularity (news)

You exhibit all the signs of a superbly educated person. I've always wanted to interact with "greta" minds, but my financial situation always prohibited me. Another thing that always held me back was the "mth" of the working adult.

I don't know about you, but I "leapt" from my Bachelor's program into graduate school, not "lept".

And, I always believed that "law school" was two individual words.

Given you astonishing ignorance of basic English grammar, I find it hard to believe that you've even graduated from high school, never mind an advanced degree.

Bruce

 

The myth of the working adult? Makes me think that being an attorney must not be that hard after all. Seriously though, don't sell us working adults short. (I hope you'll to take my word for it: we do exist. There's a lot of imperical evidence that suggests our existence. We're the ones who defend the country, build houses, treat illnesses, drive trucks, sell cars, etc. The list is much too long to include here everything that working adults do. In general though, anywhere you find someone accomplishing something, you find a working adult.) At any rate, I'll ask you to assume, for the moment, that we do exist. Many of us need DL. I suppose it is a matter of priorities. My priority is to provide for my family, but I also need an education. Therefore, DL works for me, and many others. Some who share my priorities are able to provide for their families and attend school traditionally. For me, however, it just doesn't work.

Okay, I'll concede that there may be some benefit to spending time with great minds; but I can't see how it possibly compares to the added benefit of using DL to allow you to spend time with people who are expected to be productive, and accomplish great things (from my perspective, whatever your boss is willing to pay you for is a great thing)while you earn a degree. That contact with doers helps me keep my perspective, my edge. I think that you and I look at education differently. It appears that you believe academic pursuit is the end itself. For me, though, education is simply a tool that I hope will help me leverage a career change when I leave the military. Once I've made the change, I hope that my education will help me accomplish work for which someone is willing to pay me (in other words: I hope it will help me accomplish great things. Although, there is nothing wrong with a great thought every now and then.)

Tracy Gies<><

 

Hey bruce, how the hell did you become an "Administrator" of this BB, considering a large portion of your posts display the personality of an absolute ASS, particularly when someone does not agree with your myopic worldview. You would think those in charge of this playground would have at least a bit of class. You apparently lack the social skills; time to get out of your mother's basement & join the human race!

 

You don't get much value from a f2f course in a traditional program in which the instructor responds to written work with even less -- a partial sentence -- or in which the instructor can't or won't lead the discussion, allowing the glib students to take it wildly off-track. (personally experienced in graduate courses led by tenured professors at a regionally-accredited land grant university)

I've observed some stunningly good -- and stunningly bad -- courses in many different media.


------------------
Kristin Evenson Hirst
DistanceLearn.About.com

 

And I think that it is getting too haughty and condescending.

Ike posted something innocuous about the growing popularity of on-line MBAs. Se94583 tried to create some heat, wondering why there aren't opportuniies to study "at a real school via DL rather than Capella or Walden". Lewchuk took the bait, telling us that foreign degrees like H-W are growing exponentially in the US because they offer "real degrees from real schools". Se94583 popped back in to say that compared to Harvard, Rutgers and "even" UCLA, all DL schools are fake schools.

Bruce complained about degree snobbery and pointed out that ivy league graduates can be clowns and those with no higher education quite competent. The intent of his remark seemed perfectly clear to me, namely that it is what you do that ultimately counts, not the name on your diploma or the letters after your name.

And now "EsqPhD" is taking exception to that.

Having only a low DL-level IQ, this is all making my head swim! It seems that every post introduces new issues, which subsequent posts fail to address, preferring instead to change the subject yet again.

But the one constant seems to be maintaining some kind of hierarchy, and making sure that most American distance education remains on the bottom:

*DL from residential schools is "real" compared to DL from DL specialist schools. (With the poorly-informed assumption that the US doesn't offer the former.)

*DL from schools outside the US is "real" compared to American DL.

*Residential instruction is "real" compared to DL in general.

*Prestige "ivy-league" instruction is "real" compared to proletarian programs for the inferior masses, including DL.

I'm not sure that high school GPA or SATs are as relevant in the case of a 35-year old, but this remark does illustrate my point rather well.

Translation: don't you even DARE to compare yourselves with us.

It may be the case that most ivy-league graduates do have superior accomplishments. But it is not a given. It is something that has to be demonstrated over and over again, in each and every individual case. That's true even when an ivy-league graduate is being compared with a high-school dropout. Which was Bruce's point, I think.

But am I putting too strong a reading on "EsqPhD's" perhaps off-the-cuff comments? Am I interpreting them as arrogance where none was intended?

I guess the key to that lies in "EsqPhD's" position on this thread's "real"/"fake" distinction. Are DL programs "fake" when compared to "real" programs from 'top' schools?

If not, then comparing those programs with top schools is justifiable. If so, then how des he characterize DL and what function, if any, does it serve?

 

Don't short reading either. Aristotle has been a tremendous influence for more than 2300 years, but he has been dead most of that time. His influence has been through his writings. That's true of everyone remote from us in time or space.

But there is no reason to assume that distance education is all unguided reading without exchange of ideas with others or intellectual feedback. You are just kind of slipping that assumption in.

Let me assure you that working adults are not a myth.

Education is not a rite of passage. I agree with you to the extent that a person will have to do whatever is necessary to achieve his or her goal. So the issue becomes, can the goal be met by distance education?

I'll ask you a question you dodged once before: Is it your intention here to attack distance education in general?

So far, your position has been rather incoherent.

 

Negative. The point of all that was said above is that someone should not delude themselves into thinking a DL (just for argument's sake) JD is the same as a JD from a residential college. For example, both degrees may qualify you to take (assuming CA) the CA bar exam & practice in that state, but the QUALITY of the credential (and ability to use the credential in the real world) is much different. In some cases, could easily be malpractice.

And yes, a lot of residential education is impersonal & boring. But a lot is not, and as consumers of education, in every sense of the word, we should be aware of that & pick and choose appropriately. Real world example: many years ago, I took an advanced Biblical Hebrew course at Harvard with Frank Cross, who is arguably one of the greatest Biblical scholars of this century. The course was the most intense experience of my academic life, including law school: it consisted of 3 hourly meetings and one had to sight-read the day's portions of the Hebrew text, translating and justifying why you translated it that way. All with no notes and only with a clean BHS in front of you (you theological types can appreciate this). Much harder than it sounds, coupled with the fear of peer-rejection and offending perhaps the sharpest person I'll ever meet.

What's the point? I could have sat at home & read a textbook and in theory, learned the same material. But the practice, discipline, feedback, etc. of such an environment certainly made me learn and maintain the material to a higher degree of competency than by self-study or even in a course elsewhere. Not to mention gleaning insight from a great scholar. All that would be important if I expected to actually use those skills in the real world.

Does DL have a place? Certainly. I, for one, will study psychology via DL largely to indulge my interests. But I would not for a moment walk up to a Berkeley, Rutgers, or "even" a Univ. of Florida grad (all just examples) and state with a straight face that my preparation is equivalent. I would be much less inclined, even with a DL PhD, to offer clients/patients counseling or therapy. I would also be disinclined to put a DL degree on my resume. And I study DL Psych fully aware of those limitations.

In addition, given the state of DL delivery today (which really has not progressed much from correspondence study), the perception (and I feel reality) that DL degrees are inferior will continue. My original rant, which started all this was a lament that traditional, established schools in the US have not fully embraced (and exploited) the US DL market. presumably, their infrastructure, faculty, and resources would provide a much greater product than Walden or Sarasota could provide. If, for example, the Univ of Calif system jumped in with both feet & offered quality, recognizable degrees at an affordable cost, then much of what is discussed on this board would be moot.

So far, your position has been rather incoherent.

Can ANYONE here have a discussion without resorting to personal attacks? (This isn't USENET).

 

I don't know too many and haven't read that many books from brilliant--world class scholars and scientists who have their doctorates via DL. There may be more in the future, but most of the scholarship I read in my fields are those from the established traditional programs.

Where is the research to support this notion? DL students are older, more experienced, and more capable than traditional students, who tend to be just the opposite in those categories. This is just snobbery, and inaccurate snobbery at that.

It's true that I don't have an article documenting this--maybe it exists somewhere (I'm not going to search for one in this informal discussion). I really don't think it's snobbery to reasonably believe based on entrance requirements and acceptance that the Ivy League or top tier schools would on average have students with superior academic backgrounds than the average DL student. Call me crazy in this DL world.

Funny how these arguments are perpetuated by people lacking real names and identities....

Listen, I have no beef with you or anyone else and try not to take this personal. I don't see how my not having a name for my user ID has anything to do with this discussion.

EsqPhD

 

Well, I'll tell you what...the aforementioned posts indicate that many of you have too much time on your hands. I realize that I haven't made it into the "700 Post Club", but I genuinely appreciate the insight that is usually apparent in these posts.

Time...is certainly a fleeting entity in my home. THAT is why I am a DL student. Balancing a 50+ work week in the US Army (and all the headache that entails) with 3 biological children and 1 foster child precludes my attending a "real" school.

Steven King

 

When you claim to have attended prestigious universities, then post a message laden with grammatical & spelling errors, don't be surprised if someone calls you on it.

And, pointing out these errors doesn't constitute a personal attack, while what you posted above does. Please do not do so again in the future. Thank you.

Bruce

 

This is an example of being constrained by ones own context. What makes you think that many distance learners, while enrolled in their studies, aren't out there gleaning great wisdom and insight from their significantly accomplished professional mentors or highly intelligent and diversely experienced coworkers. Adult learners are surrounded by "great minds" on a daily basis and have regular and often interaction with remarkable people as a normal course of life. The supplement of this professional and social interaction with competent distance learning instructional models is far more than your own experiences allows you to see. For many, many working adults, the world is their lecture hall and it is filled to the brim with outstanding minds; some very close at hand. For these adult learners, the "practice, discipline, feedback," of which you refer is a daily occurrence that you constrain to a college class. For them, this rich experience is supplemented by the learning that occurs from a distance learning program.

The percentage of wholly distance learning graduates is mathematically miniscule compared to that of traditional graduates. There is no comparison that can be made relative to known scholars and how they attained that status. This would be like inferring, one hundred years ago, that whites are scholars and other races are obviously not. Hey just look at the numbers...right! The argument is not rational.

 

Your spelling errors aside on previous posts, I agree with many of your assessments. I think you are taking a realistic approach to life.

Let me take your J.D. example a little further. Because of my work, I had to go to an evening law school (work during the day, etc.), albeit accredited. I appreciated the school for the opportunity but realistically, I believe it was a third tier law school. Even had I wanted to go to a first tier law school (in CA) like Stanford or Boalt Hall, I am unsure if I would have been excepted--somehow, I don't think so. I know that I didn't do as well on my LSAT's nor had the academic strength that the average Stanford or Boalt Hall law applicant had. I accept those limitations. This doesn't mean that I don't have other strengths. I'm just realistic enough to accept the realities of life.

I think whether one accepts it or not, there are hierarchies in academia and life in general. I remember watching an ER episode where one doctor (Carter I believe) found out that another doctor (I forgot his name) went to a "Carribean" medical school. Carter wanted to press further and make fun of him...but he difused the situation by saying, "I admit that I didn't have very good grades in college. However, I knew that I wanted to become a doctor. Even though I wasn't smart enough to get into Harvard, Yale, etc., I got into a school that accepted me. I'm not claiming to be scholar...I just want to help people." Those few statements were realistic and Carter didn't have any other reason to pursue it.

I respect that type of realism and honesty but have major problems when DL people want to claim a close to equal status with even the top tier residential programs. I don't think it is equal at this junction (as perceived by the average person in academia and the public)--maybe someday in the future--but not presently.

EsqPhD

 

I don't think you'll find anyone on this board who would suggest that an RA DL degree would have the same prestige as a traditional, residential program at an Ivy League college. Such a comparison would be laughable.

However, I think if people would look past the "pedigree" of the school and actually look at the person, things might be quite different. If faced with a choice of hiring between a "legacy" Ivy League applicant who got his/her degree through his/her last name or a DL student who attained his/her degree through hard work & determination, I'd choose the DL applicant every time.

Bruce

 

I whole heartedly agree with the above statement if limited to such issue. However, two scenarios.

First, often times, the DL or lower ranked RA school applicant competes with a top tier school applicant. Though both have the same grades, experiences, etc., I know in my experience, most employers would go for the guy with the top tier school.

Second--and this is where life is more unfair--even if the top tier school applicant may not be so great, many employers I know, especially in the legal fields, would rather hire a graduate from say Stanford Law School than from a third tier law school. The Stanford person may have graduated in the bottom half of his/her class while the third tier law school person may have graduated in the top third of his class.

Do I agree with this? Of course not, since I'm the guy from the third tier law school. However, in my realism, I have to admit that on average, the Stanford Law graduates would probably have superior academics prior to entering law school than the average person that went to my third tier school.

I take no pleasure in "insulting" myself with the third tier stuff. I just want approach these discussions more realistically. In my main profession (as a cleric), I've been fortunate enough to go to Ivy League level schools--and I hope that when I mentioned those, it would not be considered to be snobberish. It's just my experiences.

EsqPhD

P.S. excepted (sic)--should be accepted in my previous post.

 

To the best of my knowledge there aren't any DL JD programs, with the exception of Concord and a few California-approved things. So your example is a bit of a straw man.

Good lord! *Another* anonymous ivy-leaguer with theological interests. They are as common here as self-proclaimed Mensa members were on the old AED.

But aren't theology programs, particularly at the doctoral level, a tiny niche of distance education? There are only a small handful of distance theology doctorates, that only appeal to a small and specialized clientele. So even if it were true that distance theology doesn't measure up, that probably doesn't imply very much about DL as a whole. I smell red herring once again.

A comment and a question:

Comment: We both know that most distance education is much more than simply reading a book. That's why courses have those quaint figures called 'professors'. Ignoring them and their essential function is to turn distance education into a caricature. If anything, DL courses resemble tutorials, which brings us to...

Question: If it is the physical classroom experience that is so important, what is your opinion of the British practice of awarding graduate degrees by research, without formal course requirements? By your criteria, those programs would be even worse than distance education, wouldn't they?

Do you guys really go around comparing your degrees like that? It sounds too close for comfort to comparing the size of your male anatomy.

In most professional conversation, don't you normally find yourself talking to people without having any idea what degrees they have or where they earned them? My admittedly limited experience is that you can go a long way by presenting yourself to others as competent and informed, and being able to back it up.

How's that? If the failings of distance education are inherent in the medium itself, as you seem to have been arguing, how does the entry of a "prestige" school into the market change that?

 

I think you're beating yourself up for no good reason. The New England School of Law http://www.nesl.edu has consistently posted bar pass rates well above average, yet they are ranked "fourth tier" by USN&WR. I would attribute this to them being unaffilaited with a university more than anything.

Bruce

 

And I have major problems with what I perceive as your attempt to dismiss graduates of what you perceive as inferior schools a-priori.

Lets look at an example. Take a Ph.D. from a prestige program. And take a graduate of a signifantly lower prestige school. Who is more knowledgable?

We all know what the jerking knee would say. But in real life wouldn't it depend on things like one's specialty and dissertation subject?

I can easily imagine that a graduate of the California Institute of Integral Studes here in SF might be much better prepared in Shankara's Advaita philosophy than a Harvard theology grad with a background in Old-Testament.

 

You do make a lot of assumptions and incorrectly at that (I hope this formatting works!):

State supported universities have to go to the state for that budgeting. If you think doing a DL program is cheap, then you are mistaken. Most university computer systems and infrastructure is not set up to do DL and the cost would be very high to ramp it up to any meaningful level. So which of 26 or 40 state universities should get this at what cost to the tax payers and the political infighting?

Remember, they cannot make a profit as State entities, only break even (although there is some margin for using the extra income from the DL to cover short falls elsewhere).

How about retraining the professors in the new technologies they would have to use to conduct something totally dl or online. That is a cost too in dollars and in time. And the time required to do the job right rivals that of doing it face to face if not exceed it. You can certainly talk faster than you can communicate by keyboarding and then add in the asynchronous nature of the dl/online communications and you can begin to see that it is not as simple as you portray it to be.

And so it goes.

Here you are very wrong. Just before I came online with degreeinfo, I was responding to a series of four questions asked the student and his very well written responses. I spent more than 15 minutes writing my response to just one question. Why? Because the media requires it if you want to do a good job.

I suppose that you never had a professor in an on ground class toss off a five-word answer to one of your questions? That happens all too frequently, no matter the delivery method. Conscientious professors will act the same no matter the delivery method. Those who do not care (dl, online or OTG) will give five-word answers no matter what.

You seem to be confusing the quality of the teacher with the delivery media.

snip