SMC Education - Introducing the Circle Club: 7000 courses and tuition-free degrees

Discussion in 'General Distance Learning Discussions' started by cacoleman1983, Jun 30, 2021.

Loading...
  1. cacoleman1983

    cacoleman1983 Well-Known Member

    There have been many discussions about Swiss Management Center over the years on this thread with their partnership with University of Central Nicuargua (UCN) for their DBA/PhD degrees. We also have discussed the new SMC Education program which offers another European accreditation that came out in 2019. Now SMC education is offering a tuition free platform using a subscription based program instead with over 7000 courses offered.

    Take a look at this: https://smceducation.com/circle-club/?FC5F7DAF-8146-E911-8C40-00155D0ABE01
     
  2. LearningAddict

    LearningAddict Well-Known Member

    Looks like they've hooked up with Coursera, that's good.

    According to this, SMC is fully licensed by the Malta Further & Higher Education Authority:

    https://mfhea.mt/list-of-licensed-providers-and-accredited-programmes/

    But I notice that only the International Executive MBA (IEMBA), Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA Marketing), Certificate in Business Studies, and Diploma in Business Studies have start dates. The rest of their programs listed in that spreadsheet don't.
     
  3. AsianStew

    AsianStew Moderator Staff Member

    Essentially - These are not at all "free" as you're paying a monthly membership fee to take their courses towards a specific degree. It starts at 60Euro/month for Certs, 150Euro/month for Bachelors, 220Euro/month for International Executive MBA and 275Euro/month for the DBA. If you add up the DBA for example, it's 275x36=9900 Euro. I recall they were charging the same amount a year or two ago when they were going for ACBSP, their pricing strategy hasn't changed, their marketing to prospective students have... you are not getting them free!
     
  4. Rachel83az

    Rachel83az Well-Known Member

    36 months x 150€ is only 5400€ for a Bachelor's degree.

    The MBA is 18 months x 220€ or 3960€

    The DBA is 36 months x 275€ or 9900€

    If you're not trying to get a degree now, those are pretty good prices.
     
  5. Johann766

    Johann766 Active Member

    SMC is always good for a surpise.
    The very interesting thing is that you´ve the possibility to look into the programm.
    If I e.g. want to see if the DBA is good for me I can subscribe for one month and cancel it after this month. At least that´s how I understand it:

    "You are only one step away from a rewarding career path. Your monthly membership fee will be automatically debited from your Credit Card. You have no obligation or commitment towards minimum periods. You may cancel your membership any time."

    Before I´d probably have to pay the tuition for e.g. one year upfront.
     
    Rachel83az likes this.
  6. Courcelles

    Courcelles Active Member

    Only “good prices” if the degree is actually worth anything.
     
  7. Johann766

    Johann766 Active Member

    State recognized degree from a EU state. Good enough for me. However 10k Euros is still more than I'm willing to Invest:p
     
  8. LearningAddict

    LearningAddict Well-Known Member

    I contacted them. Still waiting on an answer from them for that. I have a feeling I won't get it and will have to contact the MFHEA.
     
  9. LearningAddict

    LearningAddict Well-Known Member

    Here is something interesting from Quora:

    John Rogers
    April 1, 2020
    I have now successfully graduated from SMC University (DBA program), but the credentialing agency is on hiatus due to the COVID 19 outbreak. As soon as they are back in business, I will return and let you know how it turned out.

    John Rogers
    May 21, 2020
    I am back, as promised, with disappointing news. While I can vouch for the rigor of SMC University, ECE categorizes it as study at a non-regionally accredited institution. Fortunately, I do not need the credentials for my work.

    If what you seek is an education, I wholeheartedly endorse SMC University. If what you need is a credential, however, I would suggest another path.


    =======================

    So ECE has evaluated an SMC DBA to be equivalent to a U.S. non-regionally accredited degree. We could assume that they still recognized it as a Doctorate rather than a lower degree, but he didn't mention if that was the case or not so that part is left up to speculation, though given what he wrote I believe he would've mentioned it if he had gotten a lower degree evaluation outcome.

    He wouldn't have been able to try WES since WES has blacklisted SMC, so no-go there.

    The ECE decision is interesting and may be deeply telling because as of 2019 SMC has been under the purview of the Malta Further and Higher Education Authority. More information (particularly more evaluations from other schools under the MFHEA's authority) are needed to know if the ECE came to their conclusion on this SMC DBA because SMC as a whole doesn't meet their standard, just the SMC DBA, or any school under the MFHEA.
     
  10. cacoleman1983

    cacoleman1983 Well-Known Member

    I wonder how would IEE evaluate SMC university? It looks to me that if this is getting a non-accredited evaluation from ECE, one should stick with the original SMC program that offers validation with UCN for a dual DBA/PhD award that leads to a regional accreditation equivalent evaluation. UCN may validate SMC university programs as well.
     
  11. JustinD

    JustinD New Member

    Hi all, I am new to the forum and stumbled upon this thread while googling my own program last night. I am enrolled in the SMC Education Group DBA since October 2020. Before enrolling, I have researched SMC a lot before joining and it was quite a ride, because of overwhelming confusion. It took me a while to find out that SMC Unviersity and SMC Education Group are not the same organization. They are entirely independent. A SMC University DBA has nothing to do with the program I am enrolled in. SMC Education Group is licensed and accredited by the MFHEA. So are their BBA, IEMBA, and most importantly for my case, the DBA. SMC University (which seemingly has been discussed in detail on this forum) is a different organization with no ties to Malta or the MFHEA.

    I am a US citizen working for a global tobacco company, residing in the European Union. recognition in these regions is essential to me. My checks resulted in green flags for the entire EU and the US.

    Hope that helps. Cheers
     
    LearningAddict likes this.
  12. LearningAddict

    LearningAddict Well-Known Member

    Where did you learn of that outcome?
     
  13. LearningAddict

    LearningAddict Well-Known Member

    That's good information, thanks!

    So taking that as accurate, we can disregard the above evaluation info. But if I were SMC Education Group, I would change my name because all it's going to do is keep getting them associated with SMCU.
     
  14. LearningAddict

    LearningAddict Well-Known Member

    I'm curious, what does SMC stand for in SMC Education Group?
     
  15. JustinD

    JustinD New Member

    their marketing people are either out of their mind or geniuses ;-) I will ask my program "PA" (yes, they actually assigned me a PA) what SMC stands for. will revert....
     
  16. AsianStew

    AsianStew Moderator Staff Member

    It is interesting, I still think they're the "same" company with multiple offerings of the same thing. Accreditation & Recognition may differ, but programs offered are similar. The fact that they both partner with UCN and have similar programs/prices, makes me think they're the same company operating two or more schools. Here are their links:
    SMC BS Programs: https://smceducation.com/all-programs/
    SMC BS Accreditation: https://smceducation.com/about/accreditation/
    SMC U Accreditation: https://www.smcuniversity.com/about/accreditation-recognition/
    SMC U Tuition Options: https://www.smcuniversity.com/programs-and-services/standard-tuition-and-financing-options/
     
    LearningAddict likes this.
  17. LearningAddict

    LearningAddict Well-Known Member

    Oh yeah, this is really interesting, lol. I asked them "Does this school have a past or current relationship with SMC University?", they answered "we do not have any relationship with SMC University."

    But I noticed that they didn't say anything about the past part. Hmmm. The odds are SUPER low that all of those things match up by mere coincidence. So it appears some maneuvering is taking place, lol. Uh-oh...
     
  18. cacoleman1983

    cacoleman1983 Well-Known Member

    Ok let me clarify because I got mixed up in my post. SMC University’s Doctorate programs have a partnership with UCN which awards the equivalent of a regionally accredited PhD. SMC Education Group has the European / Malta accreditation for all programs but John stated he got the non-regionally accredited evaluation from ECE. However, looking at the previous posts, John said SMC University so maybe he should have done the UCN validation if this was the case. This is confusing.
     
    Last edited: Jul 1, 2021
  19. Mac Juli

    Mac Juli Well-Known Member

    "Swiss Management Centre".
     
  20. Stanislav

    Stanislav Well-Known Member

    Do we know that though? The person on Quora graduated in 2020; seeing how SMC-E got their Malta license in 2019 and stated "minimum" study duration is 36 months, it is entirely possible his award was from SMC-U.

    P. S.: Just opened the Quora thread, had networking issues. The degree is from SMC University. It id not even clear if this is a joint award with UCN; there is mention of it being under ACBSP accreditation. This might explain the outcome. One can argue, though, that an ACBSP degree is accredited, even if not "regionally" accredited. It is messy, hence the move to Malta.
     
    Last edited: Jul 1, 2021

Share This Page