UN-Truth in advertising: New Horizons Computer Learning Centers

My son was recently looking for work, and posted his resume on some job-posting site. He got a phone call inviting him to come for a "job interview," and when he got there the job interview turned out to be a sales pitchfor a school, New Horizons Computer Learning Center.

The school doesn't pretend to be a college or a university; they are an IT trade school, offering various certifications. They do, however, offer "student loans," and suggested to my son that he could qualify for enough to live off the loans until he got his certificate. He was also told that they offer "guaranteed job placement," but internet postings from former students claim that they just send out links to online classified ads.

 

You are not the first person to question the recruiting strategies of this particular for-profit insitution. For example:

Here's another:

Since New Horizons is not a degree-granting institution, it may be exempt from some of the laws and regulations that normally apply to colleges and universities. Also, it should be noted that New Horizons schools are franchised, so recruiting practices could vary from school to school. Many of the complaints seem to be coming from the southeast, particularly Florida.

 

They're selling their computer training programs like it's still 1999 where booger picker busboys could get an MCSE and make 60K a year. Buyer beware, as usual.

 

Does Florida have some kind of education approval board? My search revealed nothing useful...

I know New Horizons is regulated in Wisconsin by the WI EAB, and they could/would probably be ordered to stop that kind of nonsense or pack their bags. Then again, as CalDog stated, they're franchises... and the one in WI seems to be legit (or at least was--one of my former coworkers used them for training classes once upon a time, and she seemed to like them).

Tom

 

I took some live online training courses through them last year, which were paid for by my employer.

I thought the courses were good, but expensive. I think their regular price was $500/day, but purchased in quantity, it was about $400/day. So a one week course with New Horizons cost more than a typical one semester graduate course taken for credit. I would much rather have had the $$ available as tuition assistance.

I can't speak to their sales practices, though.

 

Yes they are still selling that. It's another for profit IT training mill.

 

The courses are expensive and there isn't much quality training. It's basically watching videos with a supposed mentor there who doesn't much. I've heard of people who wouldn't train with them even if their company paid for it!

 

I guess to play safe is to go to accredited colleges for these types of certificate or go to govt related companies for such IT courses. Even if it is accredited college, I will also look into forums such as degreeinfo for input, which I believed is a form of social media analysis to study on customers' online feedbacks. These feedbacks can actually be served as a way to help businesses improve their products and services. For consumer is of course help us make decision before buying the service.

In my country, it is very sad to see that many businesses (from health care to bank to sports) see feedbacks and complaints negatively, trying to cover up and not knowing how to deal with them correctly with CRM and "dealing with angry or difficult customers". I only managed to see some foreign MNCs in my country know how to deal with feedbacks and angried or difficult customers.

 

Pretty much this.

In the late 90's/early 2000s New Horizons offered something that was somewhat difficult to get elsewhere (in many places); Microsoft certifications. While I was futzing around with college I had classmates go out and earn their MCSE and land in an office, with pretty solid pay, before I was even attending Freshman orientation.

Most of them, for the record, still do well. But those who earned a bachelor's in the years since seem to be thriving while those who didn't have more mixed results.

Nowadays I can do my microsoft training online for a heck of a lot cheaper than New Horizons. Some of the lower level certs are even being offered for free (MOS, MTA etc) through state employment agencies. Tech certifications are much more accessible than they were when New Horizons had a lock on the market.

Sounds like a sleazy recruiting tactic. But I do sort of chuckle at how people seem to disdainfully identify New Horizons as a "for-profit institution." They don't even award degrees. They are a training/testing center for Microsoft, Cisco and others. The end credential is a certification from a very large for-profit company. So even if you earn your MCSE through training at a non-profit school there is very little room for snottiness around for-profit vs. non-profit.

In many areas they didn't even have to recruit. People showed up because it was the place to get a Microsoft certification. Now you have your pick of online providers, YouTube videos, free prep courses and a plethora of practice exams. New Horizons is likely to find itself going the way of ITT Tech if they are still operating off of last century's business model.