Phoenix gets hand slapped

It is possible that conditional admittance was granted. Unfortunately, I don't remember. The course was actually GEN300. Given that I formally withdrew from the course during the published 3 week window of opportunity, I should not owe the "university" anything.

 

Unfortunately, I don't know that much about what happens in the front office; we are only supposed to teach... I'm sorry you didn't have a good experience with UOP.

I hope you'll have a look at it again when you complete your bachelors degree.

Best wishes,

Dave

 

To advertise that a master’s degree is required for admission to the doctoral program, and then admit some without that requirement, and a BA and graduate credits not related to the doctoral concentration, and then embellish it with 18 transfer credits is a grand problem. I believe that the USDE has the evidence and UoP will pay the fine (almost 10 million dollars). It does not take more than room temperature IQ to figure out what is going on here. UoP admission counselors also apparently maligned other regionally accredited distance learning schools in order to facilitate applicants to register for their program, and yes USDE has the information. I do agree that some institutions admit bachelor’s degree level students to their doctoral program, however, such is the exception, and usually other requirements must be met (e.g., work/research experience).

 

Actually, at a number of very highly regarded 1st tier universities, this is not the exception, but rather is the rule. For example, the prestigious University of Chicago doctoral program in economics admits those with Bachelor's degrees. What folks that see this as problematic don't usually understand is that most PhD programs that matriculate Bachelor's grads have programs of sufficient length to actually include what would normally include a Masters program within the doctoral program. In these programs, if you leave before completing your doctoral work, you may be awarded a Master's.

Admitting Bachelor's grads into a doctoral program is not at all odd. A doctoral program that admits those with a BS may be 40% larger in requirements than a doctoral program that required an MS.

As for online universities, Capella has this model. You can enter a Capella doctoral program with a B.S. However, your program will be 48 credits longer than someone entering with an MS.

 

I wonder how the North Central Association manages to accredit something like the University of Phoenix. Just physically, how do they do it? The school seemingly has "campuses" in every population center in the US, and all of these branches participate in the home base's NCA accreditation. Does the NCA actually visit each Phoenix branch?

In Touro's case, the Middle States Association ended up telling Touro to get its California operations separately accredited by WASC, who are in a better position to ride herd on them. The Art Institute branches are all separately accredited, most by ACICS, a few (like Houston) are RA.

Perhaps NCA should tell Phoenix to get all of its dozens (hundreds?) of branches separately accredited. But if that happened, it would probably sink the empire, right there.

It looks to me as if Phoenix suffers from inconsistent product. I've met a few Phoenix instructors and I respect them. I trust that their classes are good and fully RA-quality. The few Phoenix graduates that I've met have seemed competent and well-educated. But I also hear horror stories of low standards and crappy classes so frequently that I suspect that there really are flames where all the smoke is coming from.

Well, given Phoenix's huge size, its geographic dispersion, its use of a constantly changing array of adjuncts and its profit motive, I suspect both that abuses and shoddy standards may infest any number of corners of the empire, and what's worse, that the accreditors may have lost their ability to deal with it any longer.

Unfortunately, they have a tiger by the tail. Phoenix's parent is a huge publicly traded corporation with a strong survival instinct and very deep pockets. If North Central clamped down, by telling Phoenix to get its countless branches individually accredited or something similarly devastating to the bottom line, NCA would be served with a truckload of lawsuits within hours and would face battalions of expensive suits.

I wonder if Phoenix has become so powerful that it can dictate terms to its accreditor.

 

I thought that I was beyond being shockable. I was wrong.

 

I have talked to few instructors of UoP and one issue seems to be the low salaries that they provide to adjunct faculty. A good instructor normally leaves UoP after few classes when he finds out that he is only making 10 dlls an hour for his time. 10 USD for a job with no benefits and security and a master’s degree as a requirement is not exactly attractive for good instructors.

 

I know of several people who went diectly from a BS to PhD program at US universities, including my daughter-in-law who applied to do a masters degree at University of California, Santa Cruz. They asked her to sign up for a PhD program instead which she did (and now in her third year). She had no previous work experience in her field. I think the admissions interview has a lot to do with being admitted into a PhD program.

 

The last time I looked, Phoenix claimed over 120 "campuses and learning centers" in the U.S.

 

Interesting figure. How is that measured? Is that just for class time, or is preparation time included?

 

Days after posting the above I got a chance to speak to my cousin. He was actually seeking a B.S. in Marketing from UoP after completing an A.A. in marketing art and design at his local CC. I wasn't aware UoP doesn't offer any B.A. degrees in business fields. Also, the other bad experience stories on UoP are linked in the upper RIGHT corner, just above the text, not the upper left corner.

Everything else, including my cousin's low opinion of UoP, remains the same. I told him about this board and that differences in quality of education were noted to exist depending on which local UoP campus students are enrolled. Strangely enough, he came to the same conclusion as another poster on this thread and said that if that is true than each UoP campus should be required to seek separate accreditation.

Kit

 

When distance education goes bad

 

Each campus is subject to review by the regional accreditor. UoP, unlike most schools, is very centralized in its development of courses and degree programs. When I taught for Webster University, there was no structure provided from the home campus; instructors were provided a textbook and that was it. At UoP, instructors are provided the text, a structured syllabus, course materials, assignments, exercises, etc. They have the option of altering and adding to the materials, of course. But the school's centralized approach makes it simpler for various accrediting agencies (UoP is accredited by several) to evaluate UoP.