Use of diploma Mill Credentials

Discussion in 'General Distance Learning Discussions' started by ebbwvale, Feb 15, 2013.

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  1. SteveFoerster

    SteveFoerster Resident Gadfly Staff Member

    No, but on the other hand, what else would you really expect them to do? Even if they were a real country?
     
  2. ebbwvale

    ebbwvale Member

    I don't think it will make a shred of difference to the website, however, I will watch the Hutt Province website and see if there is a disclaimer. It is up to people to check motherhood statements of endorsement in any case.

    I don't think the Hutt River entity can do anymore than what they have stated which is probably a lot more than real countries would do. I also note that a lot of these diploma mills identify with the U.S. in the fake school's name. I would have thought that that would undermine the U.S. education's export brand in the DL model. I would think that a lot of people would throw the baby out with the bath water. They would take a bad experience with a fake university and extrapolate that to legitimate universities. By "they" I mean policy makers in governments and business. I doubt if they will bother checking that much. It might be simpler for them not to employ people with U.S. qualifications unless the unversity is extremely well known like Harvard, Yale or Princeton etc.

    One of the understated outcomes of education is influence. A person who is educated within a U.S. worldview may be more inclined to identify with that worldview or, at least, be more friendly towards it because of understanding. Distance learning is a very important strategic asset for the U.S. as it is for other countries. The Brits have known that since they developed DL by the University of London in 1858. Their use of Oxford and Cambridge by use of scholarships is notorious. The alumni effect may be very interesting if properly harnessed. I am sure that there are a lot of people who would wish to weaken that. A research topic in that I think.

    One of the risks of this board is the potential to send a "skewed' view to the world that damages market potential for one or more universities offshore. You can imagine what damage fake universities do.
     
  3. CalDog

    CalDog New Member

    ACU is clearly using official paperwork issued by Hutt River Principality for marketing purposes (in fairness to HRP, it looks like their permits expired in 2010).

    But why doesn't ACU use official paperwork from a real country (e.g. USA, Australia) instead? Wouldn't that be even more effective for marketing purposes?

    Of course it would. However, it seems a lot less likely that a "real country" would have "licensed and permitted" American Cultural University "to provide Educational programs, seminars, electronic learning and similar, leading to the granting of academic and professional degrees" in the first place. That's presumably why ACU opted to seek official approval from a fake country, right?

    So in theory, yes, a "real country" might face the same problems with misuse of official approval as HRP. But in practice, a "real country" might be a lot less likely to get into this situation in the first place.
     
  4. CalDog

    CalDog New Member

    Anyone with even a superficial knowledge of the American educational system is aware that the US is a very large country with a vast number of schools, with varying academic reputations, spread out over thousands of miles. For example, the US News Rankings include over 1,600 schools, and those are just the regionally accredited 4-year institutions. Nobody -- not even Americans -- can keep track of them all. So if you deal with US schools at all, you are inevitably going to run into unfamiliar names that you have to check up on.

    I don't have any personal experience with the international acceptance of US degrees, but my impression is that "policy makers" dealing with US degrees typically just check for regional accreditation -- and this doesn't require "that much" bother, because it's easy to do at either the CHEA or USDoE websites. For example, one Hong Kong-based institute puts it like this:

     
    Last edited by a moderator: Feb 17, 2013

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