I've been thinking I should just knock out a bain4weeks type of bachelors degree, just to get the piece of paper, and then enroll in the CSUDH Humanities MA to get some actual education. You know, one for the resume and one for me. I just want to make sure that I'm not romanticising the process. I'm not interested in teaching at any level; this is just for my personal enrichment. Would the HUX alumni on the board say you had a good time (referring, of course, to nerdy academic good times)?
June Sorry nobody has responded. Tom Head did say "Above all, have fun. This is one of the most genuinely delightful programs I've ever run across ..." in the following old thread: http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=4730
One problem that we've got on degreeinfo is that we have lots of members who are seeing degree programs, lots of members who are engaged in degree programs but, unfortunately, once people finish their degree programs they have this tendency to get on with their lives. They don't always stick around so that they can help the next round of degree seekers. I'm sorry June that you didn't get much of a response. I've only heard that the HUX program is a good, quality program and so I'll bet that you'll have the exact kind of fun you're seeking. Good luck. Jack
Please don't blow off your undergraduate education. The HUX program is NOT a substitute for a sound undergraduate foundation in history, philosophy or whatever. The HUX program is old-style correspondence DL. They send you a syllabus and wait to receive the papers you mail in. You will never meet another student and will only interact with professors if you initiate the contact. I liked it. But I was middle aged and already had a BA in philosophy and religion plus about 15 graduate units in philosophy. HUX let me continue to do the reading that I was going to be doing anyway, helped me find some structure and context for it, and gave me some professorial feedback. But I have to be realistic. If I hadn't already had some background in the stuff that I was interested in writing about, I don't think that the assigned readings would have given it to me. HUX won't make you into a philosopher or a historian. But a good BA program might. What HUX does best is give somebody with preexisting proclivities in those areas some opportunity to get some feedback on his or her writing.
I've heard good things about the HUX program too, but this statement from Bill really stuck a chord with me: I was in my mid-late 20's when I went to college. My youngest had just gone to kindergarten and all I wanted was the paper so I could move on. I was well read and involved in training. I needed an undergrad to advance and since I was well read and good at what I did, I slightly resented having to go to school to get ahead. What I found was that I thoroughly enjoyed learning. I enjoyed every class I took from science to history to math to English. I know there is benefit in a fast track, but there is also value in enjoying the experience.
The other line in the orginal post that bothered me was "just to get the piece of paper." I'm afraid there is more to it than that. I don't have a degree, and I used to think I needed one "just for the piece of paper." During the course of doing my job for the past 20 years, I have interviewed scientists, presidential candidates and Nobel prize winners. I am frequently complimented on my questions. These people are used to hearing so many "stupid" questions asked by reporters who obviously have not researched the topic or the subject. I read voraciously. I watch the History, Discovery and Military Channels for "fun". To a large degree, the extent of my knowledge is self-taught. I recently started studying business with Education Direct. I thought I was going to breeze through it. Now, it's not Wharton-level business education by any means, but it has been challenging. It is taking me longer than I would like to get through the first course. But, I appreciate the fact that it is actually TEACHING me something. You can get the piece of paper, and it may get you a job or a promotion. But once you get your foot in the door, what are you going to have to show them? Are you going to have the knowledge an employer is looking for you to have? Is there going to be a "flash of brilliance" behind that piece of paper, or will you have to rely on trying to "baffle them with BS"? (and I don't mean Bachelor of Science). My suggestion: make your pursuit of a bachelors degree a journey of learning. Even if you go the BA in 4 weeks route, you may find yourself accidentally learning something while studying for all of those CLEP exams. Would that be so bad? You're obviously interested in Humanities. Why not study that as a concentration on the undergraduate level?
Interesting responses--not what I expected on this forum. I *do* enjoy the process of learning. If I didn't, I wouldn't consider pursuing an MA for it's own sake. But I am in the position of having experience that doesn't "match" my education. If not for this discrepancy, I could (and would) take classes simply to enjoy the experience. I'd like to add that I am not uneducated. I have an AAS and 90 undergraduate credits. If I went the (somewhat more) traditional route, I would try Cultural Studies/Literature at Empire State. Any thoughts on that program?
June: Sorry I didn't post earlier. I guess I should admit up front that I washed from the HUX program during candidacy (thesis) phase, and drowning in 2017 3x5 cards on armor and weapons of the Trojan War was not fun. But the classes I succeeded in - Defining the Humanities: History, Defining the Humanities: Literature, Defining the Humanities: Philosophy, Humanities Encounter: Historic Sites, War and the Human Experience, Key Individuals: Philosophy: Rousseau, Key Individuals: History: Carnegie, Rockefeller, and Ford, Key Individuals: History: Stalin, Key Periods and Movements: History: The Age of the French Revolution, and Key Periods and Movements: History: The Arab World - were a nerdy sort of fun. Each class consists of a series of 30 pages worth of papers reacting to the course readings. I wish you better luck with the HUX program than I had.
These programs may also interest you: http://distance.wsu.edu/degrees/humanities.asp http://www.worldwidelearn.com/arts-humanities/humanities-degree.htm
Why not step up and take a swing? You're quite a bit further along than I was when I started testing my way through what was to become Excelsior. After I graduated, I enrolled in a part-time B & M master's program and things went all right. Of course I don't know how difficult it would have been to take on DL graduate school, the HUX program in particular. If I were in your situation, I'd try to estimate my readiness and pick up a bunch of credits at the same time by tackling the English Lit GRE, and applying to COSC or Excelsior after I knew what my score was. I can't imagine a more pleasant way of earning 18-30 credits than loafing through the 2-volume Norton Anthology and reading a bunch of plays and novels. Then, depending on your score and the school, you might be almost done already, and you'd have an idea how some schools, anyway, would measure you against other candidates in one humanities field. If it turned out you'd overestimated your readiness, well, you would have just spent your time doing what (I assume) you like doing. I realize that there's more to HUX than literature, but if you can get through the prose of Coleridge, Carlyle, and the late Henry James, Aristotle wouldn't hold many terrors for you. I know it's hubris to offer advice without knowing you or the HUX program, but from my study and teaching experience, I believe that maturity and a love of learning for its own sake will carry you a long way. I honestly can't see any reason not to take a shot from a fairly safe vantage point that allows a graceful retreat if you miss.
First, I understand your point. I wanted to finish my BS so I could go for an MS - which is what I really wanted. I was able to test out of almost 60 credits in six or seven weeks BUT I already had a BS from Cal Coast and there was some real learning done there. To complete your BS, I would look at the BIG 3 to finish it up ASAP and apply to CSU-DH. I applied to CSU-DH and was accepted with my COSC degree. I have not taken a class yet but I keep saying, "some day..." My advice, finish the BS and move on to what you really want to do. Good Luck-
HUX experience Hello, from Vancouver Canada _______________ I've recently finished my course content for HUX... have yet to write the candidacy exam and start the dissertation process. I did this while concurrently working on a PhD in business, so I'm either very disturbed or very focused. This might explain why I've not finished either degree, yet, though I'm on track to do so. I enjoyed the content of my BA, in the stone age of early 70s, but did not apply myself enough to excell. But being a voracious, and very quick reader, really helps when one wants to read something challenging in one's late 40s and early 50s. I took HUX completely for myself, as I could not devote the time to go to the local universities but craved some structure to my reading. I'm more in tune with working in my home office and wrestling with content, than wrestling with parking and then sitting in a classroom. While the mail-outs of information are copious, the poor quality of the course listings on the web-site have disturbed me. From what I can see, many (not all) have not been updated since 1997-98. I originally printed out course info from the web-site in August 1999, to help me make my choices, so I'm very familiar with the course sites. And I challenge you to find many that are 'newer' than 1999. When the "required books" are listed on the course site at the HUX site, (eg. those listed for the French Revolution course), you cannot always count on the listing. This happened in this course. If you're going to change the books, for goodness' sake, change the web-site, so things match! When I advised him, he had no sympathy, advising that the "web site's not been updated in years!' In my school, we would make good on info published on the official web-site, or not have a web-site. So, beware about that. ____________________ With that said... back to your question. I enjoyed the intellectual challenge. You are basically on your own... so if you don't like to read, and parse the topics to best address the expectations, you are in the wrong program. But don't count on the study guides to be readable... along with the typos, the 100th generation photo-copies could bring despair. The study guide for Archetypal Criticism was unspeakably unreadable, to coin a phrase. It's obvious the staff sending them out have not looked at them since they were compiled. I literally had to purchase copies of the out of print books so I could read the "handouts" that the handouts were intended to replace! Notwithstanding some of the process glitches in that course, I enjoyed Dr. Lyle Smith in that one and in another class. I got good marks, mostly, and one not so good mark on an essay. He marked on the content, as he should, not on a 'halo' effect of past submissions. If you're tired when writing his papers, re-think writing them until you have your wits about you. His feedback was rigorous and challenging, all 'round, but consistently fair. I enjoyed all of the literature content in all my lit classes, and the lit content of the phil/lit hybrids. Dr. Gionnetti (?... I'm doing this from memory so could be mis-spelling), Dr.Kenzora (sp?), etc... very nice comments back - you could tell they read your papers! And the feedback from Dr. Cumiford in the Phil class was also first rate. So, I have more gripes with the quality of the presentation than the quality of the content; and no gripes with the bona fides of the faculty, whether they liked what I did or not. If you're up to challenging curriculum (curricula?), then sign up. But you are on your own, and better be ready to poke yourself to get things done. With thanks Michael in Vancouver
I enjoyed the program. I received my M.A. in August 2004, although it took another year to receive my bound theses copies. I was fortunate enough to find a group of fellow students on Yahoo. We basically encouraged each other through the low points of the degree pursuit, and the contact helped greatly in motivation. Other than lack of personal contact, the other problem is access to research materials. I ended up using the Internet and a web subscription library a great deal. You can use interlibrary loan, but I didn't want to do it that way.
