University of the Cumberlands EdD: Yeah, I enrolled

I've been a little nervous about sharing this, because I know I've enrolled in quite a few doctoral programs in the past only to decide they weren't right for me, or, more recently, that I just wasn't at the right time of life to get through such a program.

However, I've always kept my eyes open for an ideal doctoral program in educational leadership or educational technology, one that had very low tuition rates, very liberal transfer credit allowances, and that seemed to have its act together organizationally.

I decided that school is the University of the Cumberlands, and I've enrolled in their doctoral program in Educational Leadership. I applied somewhat on a lark -- actually, they sucked me in by responding to my filling out a web form that I meant only as an inquiry by thanking me for having filled out an application and saying all I needed to do was submit the materials to accompany it, e.g., recommendation, transcripts, test score, and essay. Since they did such a great job making it sound like I was already in progress, I found myself going ahead and submitting everything else. Very smooth, UC.

Now, that alone wouldn't have been enough to get me to enroll, but they did a number of other things right. Their admissions person was helpful and informative but never pushy. She offered to let me submit additional references in lieu of a test score, but since they accepted the Miller Analogies Test, which takes like an hour, I just went and took the test. They went out of their way to accept all my previous doctoral work rather than look for ways to reject it like some schools, and as a result I got the maximum of 18 semester-hours of transfer. Since the whole program is 60 semester-hours, that means I walked in being 30% done.

Then there's the money. At $375 each, my 42 remaining semester-hours will cost a total of $15,750. And those courses can be taken one at a time, six terms per year, which is the sort of scheduling I prefer.

I'm a few weeks into the first course now, and the instructor has presented the material in an engaging manner, and she's flexible about when assignments are submitted. There's a weekly synchronous component, but so far it's been about an hour each week, and it's actually been useful and fun to participate. It's decent material, but the workload is entirely manageable and the expectations are reasonable. I also appreciate they talk about the dissertation from the from course, and that their completion rate is very high -- unlike some schools, they actually want people to finish.

It's also nice to do this sort of thing on the buddy system, and since it's in his signature I think it's okay to "out" my fellow Virginian Matt Brent as having signed up for the same program, although we're in different classes this term.

Anyway, that's what's up. Questions? Ask away.

 

Now that I've said something, I'll feel like a schmuck if I don't finish this time around. But hopefully that will be motivating. :smile:

 

Or business, or psychology. Maybe others, I'm not sure. Interestingly, it's an 18 semester-hour specialization where these credits go, so people wanting to have enough doctoral level credits to teach a particular discipline can get them in this program even though it's an EdD. In fact it's almost designed like the way the original DA was intended -- one studies both in one's discipline while also taking enough education courses to be dangerous. :smile:

 

Many thanks, Dr. McDonald, I appreciate your kind words! I enjoyed my time at ATSU as well, and while I may not have finished there, I still recommend it fairly often for others who are looking for a program focused on health education.

 

No, sorry, it's not a K-12 Supervision program. But my area of interest is higher ed, not K-12.

 

Many thanks. The photos look beautiful, and I'd actually like to drop by campus and talk to people there when I get the chance, but it's eight hours each way by car and it's far enough from a major metropolitan area that flying wouldn't make sense. And since there's no requirement otherwise, I may not end up going there other than for final defense and for graduation.

 

WOW!!!! I wish you the best in your studies. Make sure you pre-purchase plenty of midnight oil to get you through!

Side note: that tuition per credit hour sounds incredible at the doctoral level. I'm surprised that I have no recollection of seeing it mentioned on this site before.

Matt!!!!! I was just thinking that we haven't been hearing from you much lately. I guess we now know your big excuse as to why.