Recognition of DL Degrees in the Business World

I've gotta be honest with you here, both Southwestern College and Bellevue (both non-profits) and now that I think of it, St. Joseph's College of Maine relied heavily upon adjuncts. I don't think profit status has anything to do with a student's GPA and though I understand human nature and how adjuncts may be tempted to give out good grades in return for a favorable review, Ashford (a for profit) gave course evals prior to the final week of a class to prevent the final grade from impacting your eval. The final week usually required a project that was about 25 to 40% of your total grade.

Bellevue has the course eval as part of the final week's requirements.

Southwestern College sent an email link usually a week or so after the course was completed, which by then of course you knew your final score.

I've only ever appealed a final grade once and that was at Ashford where the instructor quoted a "B" letter grade criteria a paper met but gave me a "C". Ashford actually went through a whole process before changing the grade and it certainly wasn't one of those "the customer is always right" type of situations.

Just my $.02.

 

I am at South University (for profit) right now and have a 3.7. I have completed 9 of 12 of my required classes and other than my Org Behavior class the A's have not come easy. The workload is not light either; 2-3 discussion questions, and two 3-5 page papers weekly. What I have enjoyed about South vs. UOP or others I have experience with is I feel like my instructors actually care about my education. Most, if not all, of my instructors give detailed feed back on each paper and a few have taken the time to contact me be phone to coach me through some of my (mostly APA) deficiencies.

 

Of course everyone that comes to this board will claim that their school is really hard, that grades were hard to earn, blah, blah.

The reality is that is hard to know unless you can see the class average and normal distribution in order to benchmark yourself. I teach at some business schools where the average is 2.0 and very few get the 4.0 (about 1%). A GPA of 4.0 means something when only 1 or 2% of the student population gets this average but not much when 50% is graded with As, as many schools (not only for profit) see education with $ signs is hard to tell when the grades are being earned or given to encourage enrollment.

I had taken training (as an online instructor) at some online schools where the policy was not to fail students but to always give them a second chance if the work was substandard. I don't see why i have to work more if the student is bad so I'm sure most instructors would just pass everyone in order to avoid grading make up work or follow ups with lazy students.

In short, I really don't think that degrees are any better than any course taken at training institutes where everyone passes if they show a credit card. Universities seem to follow this trend (both for profit and public) and the grade inflation is now the norm and not the exception and for this reason employers just ignore them.

 

Unfortunately, I'd have to agree.

 

Actually my US degrees were easy and did not require much work except for a couple of courses (and I have mentioned this before) but maybe my perception is in comparison with UK qualifications.
My UK engineering certificate courses were really tough - students dropped out at a rate of around 25% per year.
One had to study for around nine-months then take one closed book exam.
It was common to fail courses (and one year everyone in my class failed - it was later found that we had been given the wrong exam).

 

Actually, i'd say that some courses were hard, some weren't, and the ones that I got an "A" in weren't always easy (or hard).

For my program, there was a grade distribution where 10-15% of the class can get an "A", no more than 50% an "A" or an "A-", and the rest no higher than a "B+". I don't know where I sit on the curve with a 3.71 for 48 credit hours, but I'm happy with it.

I received a 93 in one course that was an A-, and given the distribution, it was certainly fair, as it was consistently applied. In my last class I got an 89 which was a B+. Again, fair. The expectation is that in order to get a degree you need at least a 3.0 GPA, so anyone with less than a B average is in trouble - and the grading scheme makes it possible for anyone to get at least a B+ in a class, regardless of the curve.

 

I was one of only two people in my graduating class of 150 or so that got a 4.0. The average GPA, among those I talked to, granted only 6 - 8 students, was 3.2. So, while I'm sure you are right, I don't think you can generalize about every school out there. However, I earned my master's in '03, maybe things have changed in almost 8 years, even at my alma mater.

 

To what university are you referring...? Thanks.

 

Whether or not a program and classes are hard also depends on your intelligence, aptitude for school and learning skills. At AMU, I find my classes fairly easy but I'm learning a great deal and I'm interested in the subjects. Someone else might think (and they do) that these classes are very hard. I find that each professor is different and they each have their system they want followed. I'm able to quickly figure out who wants what and I do it the way they want. That, along with actually learning the material, seems to be getting me at least an A- in my classes. Those that don't have an aptitude for school, as well as those that don't give the professor exactly what they ask for, have a much harder time.

 

I always hated those type of distributions. We had those when we did employee reviews at a company I used to work for. I think it should be strictly based on the work you do. Your grade shouldn't be influenced by a distribution. In your example, if that was a Physics class in which two of the brightest and most intelligent physicists in the world were the only students, one would be getting an A and the other no higher than a B+. I know this is extreme but it makes the point.

I say tell students what they need to do and master to get an A and then give an A to all those that reach that level. Should getting an A be easy? No way, make it super freaking hard but if the whole class achieves that lofty goal, they all deserve the grade.