Perceptions of DL Ph.D.s

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I agree. First of all, there are RA universities, such as Union, that will provide an individual with a great deal of life experience the opportunity to develop a flexible doctoral curriculum that enables them to incorporate their extensive knowledge base into their learning plan.

Secondly, there are very distinguished people, such as Eric Erikson and many others who had no more than a bachelors degree but who excelled in their area of specialization and did not seek honorary doctoral degrees.

If one seeks the prestige bestowed by the doctorate, it should be based on dedication and focused effort, not on feelings of entitlement !

 

Nor do I Gert. I think the reason for their popularity in the United States is that we do not have the system of honours which the British have and so there are no knighthoods to be handed out to those who excel in their fields. Hence, the honorary doctorate (plus gets you a commencement speaker).

There are very bright people who do not have Ph.D.'s. One is not entitled to a doctorate because they think they are entitled. They get one because they earn one. There is often more than just a motivation for validation behind those who want a life experience doctorate. They want to be able to call themselves doctor (desperately) based on a sense of entitlement rather than a desire to earn one. What I would say to someone who feels they have the knowledge is to go ahead and work on a GAAP research doctorate. You can earn it by demonstrating your knowledge and original research (inexpensively as well).

North

 

Dayson,

I will feed the Troll

The British model is for the education to be done by a college and the validation and awarding of the degree done by the University.

With respect to the UoL external.
The programs are developed and approved by one of the b&m lead colleges of the University of London (i.e. curriculum, method of assessment, etc.).
In most cases these degrees are the same as or similar to the on-campus offerings.
The distance programs are administered by UoL external but UoL external has no academic function (administrative only).
UoL does occasionally arrange for other institutions to offer tuition (i.e. classroom instruction) but again they do not set curriculum or assessment.
In many cases there is the opportunity to transfer from the distance program to the campus based program.
The degree is awarded by the University of London.
Bottom line... you are studying for a degree from one of the lead colleges via distance learning administered by UoL external

Touro college does not develop, set, or approved curriculum for TUI nor grants the degrees.

The two models are completely different.

It is funny you should bring up Old Trinity... I suppose under your logic it would be ethical to put on your resume that you have a degree from the University of Liverpool since the University of Liverpool's name is on the Trinity degree.

But I guess you degree mill advocates will do anything you can to try and justify your degrees.

 

Yawn ... in the absence of facts, Ken starts calling others names ...

Ken,

Still no answers, still no facts, still just being Ken ... <smile>

Now you are even arguing with your own posts of the past
and claiming anyone who disagrees, is a degree mill holder ?

Tell us again please ... the nature of your own degree(s) ????

Denial must be quite the crowded neighborhood where you live.

Snore ...

Billy

 

The person calling him/herself "Ken" and others likes to engage in a tedious practice of "arguing the alternative." No matter what stance someone takes, she/he will argue an opposing view. (Unless you swear that British higher education is superior to that found in the U.S., of course.) But note the following:

Multiple identities
No true indication of who he/she really is
No verifiable educational or experiential background
No facts
Lots of hyperbole
Doesn't understand the definition of "troll" while being one.


Why bother? "Ken" doesn't exist in real life. He or she is a child playing a stupid game of peekaboo. His opinions don't matter because they don't come from a credible source.

Rich Douglas

 

After an exhaustive search of previous posts on this board, I have come to the conclusion that Ken posts using the following names:

1. Ken
2. Walter Rogers
3. Scott Henley
4. Lewchuk
5. Jacko

Are these people identical quintuplets or what? They behave and reason exactly alike. Has anybody noticed this?

Scott L. Rogers

 

Just for record, here is a short list of people/opinions I have agreed with:

Walter Rogers (most issues)
Jacko (most issues)
Scott Henley (most issues... I think I like DL more)
Lawrie Miller (re. international quality issues)
Peter French (most issues I can recall)
Business Week on value of virtual schools
The Economist on choosing MBA programs
US News on relative quality of schools (most situations)
Andy Borchers on for-profit schools
UK academic authorities
Australian Academic authorities
RFValve on some Touro Issues
...and many others.


Of course... I am actually omnipresent and constitute all of the above individuals... yes, I will come out of the closet... I am really Andy Borchers and Lawrie Miller.


Ones I disagree with... the little gang of trolls that pretend the worst degrees/programs/institutions in the US are prestigious.
Bruce... almost everything
Rich, Bill and crowd that... well, these guys actually have one opinion... RA good, everything else bad or irrelevant... (so much for depth).


Finally, for the xxxxth time. British higher ed is superior to some American... American is superior to some British higher ed. Whoa boy, lot of controversy there. Must be biased to come up with that statement.

 

I love my RE:'s

I am presently studying self-concept and perception and would have to agree. I made an earlier comment some weeks ago about how I thought it was funny that I would be required to take a "Introduction to Computing" class when I am a network engineer with over ten years experience. Some felt I should have challeneged this course. I didn't as I find that with all that I think I may know about something, I am amazed at how much I can still learn from such a course. Therefore, I agree with Gert.

Christian

 

Re: why not a degree based upon life experience?

I have personally been to many award ceremonies to watch the conferral of honorary doctorates. In regards to one such person I know who has several of them, I can say they have been awarded to curry favor, kiss ass, or because the recipient expects one in return for his personal appearance at an important university function. There is also a sense that some may have been awarded as the university wishes to "attach" itself somehow to these individuals.

Christian

 

Ken's real enough. He's an old-timer from AED, who at one time was quite friendly and made good posts. Unfortunately he's become more and more bitter and confrontational with time.

Interestingly, he was once one of AED's champions of non-RA programs, perhaps because his own degree is from an AABC Bible college. He took quite a shining to Trinity College and Seminary at one time and defended it in many threads.

But banging his head against the RA proponents and hearing over and over how non-RA degrees like his own are substandard has apparently embittered him.

Now he takes pleasure in dishing out the same medicine, attacking RA from the other direction by arguing that it in turn is substandard in comparison to Commonwealth standards. (He's a Canadian.)

If RA-proponents could dismiss degrees like his as academically substandard without giving any reasons why, he'll get himself some pay-back by doing the exact same thing to schools like Touro.

 

Generally, we Canucks are thought of as so polite and well mannered. Although, when I was in the US Army a SSG (E-6) medic who worked with Canadians during a training exercise said that the Canadians thought their #$% did not smell". I don't know about that but I know my brother who was in the Canadian Army and of lower rank than me made more money than I did.

The Canadian army may be paid more but at the time did not have the access to educational programs and subsidy that the US Army had. A Canadian Army Captain was floored when she heard that I as an E-5 was having 75% of my tution for a Masters degree paid for and still would have the GI Bill left.

North

 

Bill, you are confused again.

Here we go feeding a troll... come here little Billy troll...

A champion of non-RA programs, I don't think so.

No, I was a Trinity moderate. Levicoff was saying it was a degree-mill of the "pay your money-get your degree" variety... I thought that, considering the people involved, it had a little more credibility.
Last we heard they were applying for RA, so maybe I was right after all.
However the Liverpool arrangement was meaningless in any real/pragmatic sense... kinda like the Touro College arrangement. I wouldn't be surprised that, if we knew the details, TUI is sending funds to Touro College partly for the benefit of being able to use their accreditation.

To quote Scott Henley, you are dillusional.
It is hypocritical to look at some of the weaker schools that the RA accreditors have accredited (which John Bear has termed "less than wonderful") and claim that these are legitimate and while some strong non-accredited schools are inferior. This is not so much attacking RA as it is demonstrating the hypocrisy of your "only RA" stance.

As far as "attacking" RA from the other side. I don't know if shedding light into darkness is attacking but if it makes you feel better to characterise it that way, go ahead.

As difficult as it may be for you to understand this, my personal academic record... whatever it is or whatever it may become... has absolutely no bearing on the effectiveness of RA in assuring high academic standards in the USA.

 

Ken,

What happened to the HW MBA program. Are you no longer enrolled?

North

 

No. Not so fast. Both Andy Borchers and Lawrie Miller are real individuals. Andy's picture and info can be found in the URL below.

http://www2.kettering.edu/~aborcher/images/andy.jpg

http://www2.kettering.edu/~aborcher/

Info about Lawrie can be found in the URL below.
http://www.geocities.com/ba_in_4_weeks/mainmenu.html

The only info about Ken Lewchuk can be found on a forum that was "killed" by him.

http://www.grasmick.com/forum1.htm

Andy and Lawrie are real people. As for Ken and his aliases, I don't know what to say.

Ike

 

This utterly misrepresents what Bear has written. I challenge Ken/Scott to come up with a citation where Bear calls an accredited school "less-than-wonderful." Of course, he will not.

While there are a few unaccredited schools that approach accredited ones in terms of quality, the vast majority do not. There might be a handful of schools that could become accredited but chose not to. The rest are simply not accreditable.

And while there are some good, unaccredited schools, there are not any very bad accredited ones.

Rich Douglas

 

"Some less-than-wonderful schools are legitimately accredited,"

John Bear
College Degrees by Mail & Internet 8th edition
Page 16

I guess when Bruce was reading it to you he missed that page.

I am sure glad you I am not an "expert" with 20 years experience in the field, otherwise people might be led astray by your incorrect and woefully unreasearched opinion.

Ken... who is starting to enjoy feeding trolls.

 

A few more to consider:

Here are a few Ed.D.

Columbia University General Ed.D.
Fielding Institute General Ed.D
University of South Africa General Ed.D.
U. of South Queensland General Ed.D.
Walden University Ph.D. Educ.
Univ. of Queensland Ed.D in Teacher Educ.

 

Thanks for posting the link Ike. It was nice to see a picture of Dr. Borchers after reading posts by him for a few years.

North

 

Thanks for the opening Ken. While we're on the subject, it's quite possible that you either hold no degrees at all or hold degrees from UK diploma mills, since you won't even acknowledge my simple request that you tell us from what prestigious institutions you earned your degree(s). We're still waiting.

It's also a laugh riot that you accuse someone of not researching a subject, when you're the all-time champ of making sweeping generalizations, then ignoring requests for supporting documentation.


Bruce

 

Except that TUI is explicitly included in Middle States' accreditation of Touro College and is recognized as one of Touro's branches. Trinity C&S is not included in the University of Liverpool's royal charter, nor does the QAA oversee their operation.

In other words, if RA proponents are going to claim that "some strong non-accredited schools are inferior", then you are going to expose their "hypocrisy" by attacking what you perceive as the weaker RA schools. Payback.

If you denounce Touro as being a "less than wonderful" sham, but if Touro compares well with Western Pentecostal Bible College, then aren't you playing the suicide bomber? Pay-back is self-destructive if you are destroyed by your own blast.

Why not accept that both WPBC and Touro may be good choices for some students but perhaps not so appropriate for others? Both schools have strengths just as they both have weaknesses. There's no harm in recognizing the positive when it is realistic and leaving the criticism for when that's necessary.