World Association of Universities and Colleges

What is your opinion in relation to the World Association of Universities and Colleges?
http://www.web-hed.com/wauc/

CFr

 

WAUC is not recognized by the USDoE or CHEA.
Not only do they accredit schools in this world (Earth), but seventeen on Mars, three on Jupiter, and 1 on Pluto. It is indeed a world association.

FBI Agents Scully and Molder, from the X-Files, have found several schools (one in South Dakota, three in Louisiana) accredited by WAUC whose administration and faculty are aliens.

I am thinking of applying for admission to the Ph.D. program in intergalactic studies at the University of Jupiter. I've heard its out of this world.

Russell

 

Personally, I don't recommend the one on Pluto. It really is a "Mickey Mouse" school.

Rich Douglas

 

WAUC was created by the great scholar and intrepid archaeologist Maxine Asher. Among her historic achievements was the single handed creation of the entire field of Intuitive Archaeology. This new science has enabled her to discover the location of the lost continent of Atlantis through the use of mental telepathy.
http://www.atlantisresearch.com

For a picture of this "female Indiana Jones" deep in telepathic mind-meld with a rock, scroll down a little bit at:
http://www.atlantisresearch.com/tapping_into_force.html

Any criticism of WAUC is motivated by nothing more than jealous traditionalist academics who can't accept that their old paradigms have been irretrievably shattered.

 

Bill,

It was the rock in this very picture which facilitated the discovery of the University of Jupiter. This small, softball sized meteor, landed in New Mexico and was forwarded to WAUC. Through the use of the telepathic mind-meld technique it was discovered that the rock was actually part of the cornerstone of the University of Jupiter. Upon discovering this fact, UOJ was immediately given full accredited status by WAUC.

 

So which one's the rock? (Sorry, couldn't help it.

Rich Douglas

 

A search of postings to this forum should find quite a few on WAUC. Among the schools they have accredited are the completely phony Cambridge State U (closed by the AG in Louisiana; fined $1 million plus by Hawaii), and Acton University (apparently run from his prison cell by the imprisoned founder of LaSalle University).

When sued by Taft University, WAUC was unable to produce evidence that they had ever visited any of the schools they have accredited. Details of this lawsuit are in Bears' Guide, 14th ed.

PS: I don't know why I bother to comment. WAUC founder Maxine Asher has written that "No one in education takes John Bear seriously."

 

You may want to check to see if WAUC is listed with the Syndicate of Collegiate Accreditation Maladministration, the umbrella organization for accreditors, also known as “the credible accreditor’s accreditation accreditor”. The SCAM (sometimes referred to simply as “the syndicate”—all lowercase, no need to attract undue attention), does not accept members per se. Instead, listed institutions are known as participants in the SCAM, or by the affectionate term “perps” by the appropriate overseeing governmental organizations.

The following membership guidelines have been set forth by the Syndicate of Collegiate Accreditation Maladministration and apply to all member accreditors. Accreditors who are members of the SCAM are monitored on a timely basis to ensure that the guidelines are followed.

1. An accreditor cannot apply for participation in the SCAM. Participation is by decree; accreditors are simply made members.

2. Appropriate materials such as catalogues, other official documents cannot be submitted by the any accreditor for evaluation, as there isn’t a viable means of reaching the SCAM, and there is no need to leave a paper trail.

3. Any accreditor admitted to SCAM will never be asked to submit to an on-site visit of its facilities by the evaluators, as the majority of the membership does not have any facilities.

4. Participation is for life and there is no way to leave the SCAM. However, member accreditors are monitored, and their relationship may lapse (the official term is expire) if they do not consistently adhere to the guidelines, rules and regulations of the organization. (For example, approval by the DOE is grounds for immediate termination.)

5. A committee of enforcers, independent of the syndicate's own membership, will be consulted on a timely basis to assist in the evaluation and monitoring of the participating accreditors.

6. All members of the SCAM must engage in self-evaluations of their programs, and review (to insure compliance) between their accreditation processes and the goal of the SCAM.

7. All participating accreditors, must provide their member institutions with a fancy accreditation acronym that approximates another, more legitimate accreditor, or barring that, a name that is sufficiently confusing.

8. A participating accreditor, must not discriminate, and must respond to all valid inquiries accompanied by a check. In addition, all efforts must be expended to cash said check on a timely basis.

9. A participating accreditor must never make its financial resources of public record and does not have to maintain sufficient capital income (either locally or in an offshore account) to sustain accreditation programs.

10. All accreditors participants in the SCAM will attempt to make an effort to try to increase the probability that they will profess to eschew obfuscation.


DISCLAIMER
The Syndicate of Collegiate Accreditation Maladministration, its officers and directors, are not legally responsible for the accreditation programs, processes, acceptability, legality, or legitimacy, or any other aspect of accreditation function offered by its participants. SCAM and its officers and directors are further legally absolved of all responsibility for the success of any institution or students enrolled in such institutions. Each SCAM accreditor is a legal (or perhaps, maybe not) entity in its own right. All complaints or concerns relative to the individual accreditors must be directed to the accreditor themselves. It is the responsibility of the prospective institution to carefully investigate a SCAM accreditor before embarking upon the accreditation process, and it is the responsibility of any prospective student to carefully investigate an institution accredited by a SCAM accreditor before embarking upon a degree program or course work.


Hope this helps

Gus Sainz

 

This is indeed the very reason to comment John. Who, of the two following options, should the Distance Learning candidate deem as credible?

1. One who has invested over a quarter century in DL research, written numerous books on the subject (many of which are in libraries all over the US), served as an expert witness for the FBI on the subject of degree mills, and is regarded by many in the DL community as the godfather of modern DL.

2. One who communes telepathically with rocks.

Russell

 

Hello, I am new to this forum and I hope to contribute to this ongoing & fascinating dialogue.

About a month ago, I emailed Dr. Asher and recommended that they start a journal for WAUC scholars. I told her that if she wanted to be accepted that she should try to give the WAUC's best talent a voice. I recommended that the journal could be published twice a year, as I offered to help her in editing, etc. - - Like I need more work to do!?

Dr. Asher responded a couple of days later and appeared very enthusiastic about the project. She stated that she would be talking to her member institutions and would get back to me in a couple of months. So far, a month has passed and I have not heard from her; although I do believe I will hear from her soon. (Perhaps I'm being naive)

Yes, I know that the WAUC is considered dubious but the larger question has not been asked: Does anyone believe that every one of those WAUC schools has at least 1 good researcher?

Besides, has anyone done any research on the kind of individuals that enroll in nonacredited doctoral programs. Yes, I know there are a portion of those students looking to hustle a degree. But I bet there are a large portion of students who are just eduphiles! The accreditation means nothing...only self fulfillment. I would hypothesize that probably more than 1/3 of the students in their doctoral programs have regionally accredited degrees. If that is the case, then we need to begin to rethink this dialogue; not so much in the sense that they will be considered mainstream - that probably won't happen, but more toward the notion that someone in that group has something to offer to the body of knowledge of their respective fields.

For example, I did some research looking up the "universities" in the WAUC and I found the web site for St. Clements University - don't ask me why their link is not live on the WAUC board. Well to make a long story short, they have abstracts and portions of the dissertations of some of their students posted to the web site. No, these are not the "greatest" works, however, they appeared acceptable. They all contained sound research questions, standard methodology and qualified conclusions. The language was scholarly but basic. In other words, the only thing preventing these works from being considered for citations would be the fact that they were from St. Clements University!

Now don't misunderstand me, none of the other sites contained such information, however, their's did. So that means at least ONE WAUC institution is trying to teach and promote the scholarly process.

Again, my motivation is to see what the WAUC's got. By publishing a journal we can get a good look as to their quality. I know there must be some talent in their "schools." And, I think it would be interesting and transformative to give a forum to those voices.

Please don't bash me as a front for Asher; I'm not. I am real doctoral student at a real university - - Rutgers.

I hope to we can engage in a constructivist revision of the WAUC, if they are serious about emerging from the fringe.

LaMont Rouse

 

She has to take you seriously now that the Good Morning America degree mill fraud broadcasts have made you a TV celebrity!

Oh wait ... I just realized a major flaw in Maxine's statement. Most everyone knows that WAUC has nothing to do with education. So she can't really speak for what people in education might think.

 

It's entirely possible that the most brilliant idea ever conceived has already been thought of by an illiterate that took his brillancy to the grave. But the best place to search for raw diamonds is in a diamond mine not a landfill.

I like your idea about the journal. I think it might prove interesting if it happens. Good luck.

 

I would be thunderstruck if anything serious ever emerged. Keep in mind that the World Association has, according to court documents, NEVER conducted a site visit or any other form of oversight of any of the schools it purports to accredit.

Also, keep in mind that Asher claims to have a large campus in Iowa for her bogus school... but she will not reveal the location of this alleged school to anyone. Not exactly a ringing endorsement for honesty and ethical behavior.

Likewise, many (maybe most) of the WAUC schools are nearly nonexistent... for example, having one or two people with a Mailboxes Etc mailbox, a website, and a way of accepting credit cards... plus, maybe, a few textbooks bought from Amazon.

As to the question of whether there is one reputable scholar at most WAUC schools, I doubt it. Some, like the awful Clayton-run Chadwick University, have a few token people with legitimate credentials, while others appear to have no faculty at all.

Also, keep in mind that one of the oldest tricks for fraudulent accreditors to use is to grant accreditation, without notice, application, or even the knowledge of the institution involved, to legitimate, big name programs. The idea is that if people see that there's a legitimate school amongst the accreditor's list, then the accreditor must be legit. I suspect that any school with legitimate people is one that has not actively sought accreditation from the World Association.

So... I'd recommend focusing your efforts elsewhere, unless you're interested in an exercise in frustration or a series of amazing charades.

 

LaMont:

It is certainly possible for a questionable school to have a student who is serious about his/her education, and who may do excellent scholarly research and writing. It is also possible for a questionable school to have members of the faculty who are serious about scholarly research. But when the degree is issued, it will still be a questionable credential, and will have to be defended, justified and explained on a repeated basis.

Russell

 

LaMont, I must respectfully disagree with you. Having reviewed several of the "dissertations" offered for review, I find them not terribly dissimilar to what a senior undergraduate student would do as a research project for a 3 credit course, at least at a competitive school such as Oberlin.

In the St. Clements papers, I see no sign of critical review of the existing literature, woefully inadequate citations (references to books, but no chapter or page references, and no footnotes in the document), extremely underwhelming statistical analysis of the data collected, a complete lack of critical review and validation of methodology, and no real indication that the research represents new, original work... one of the cornerstones of a legitimate doctoral dissertation.

In short, as is typical of most degree mills, the student does a laughably minimal amount of work, calls it a dissertation, and gets a (worthless) degree.

I'm a little surprised that you, as a Rutgers student and graduate assistant (and yes, I *have* verified this) would consider the works listed on the St. Clements site as sound academic contributions. Surely nothing remotely similar would make it past a cursory read by any doctoral advisor at Rutgers, no?

I submit that anyone with a legitimate doctorate and an ounce of common sense would *NEVER* be fooled into believing that the incredibly substandard work required of any of the WAUC schools was meaningful learning.

As for the thirst for knowledge, our own Dennis Huber has something like 11 regionally accredited degrees... so there's no excuse for going the bogus route simply because you already have a Ph.D. Further, those who are truly eduholics can simply read, write, and research with a mentor they locate... there's no need to pay a bogus school to provide little or no support, fail to critically review a dissertation, and then provide a worthless degree. The logic of that argument is simply lost on me.

 

Chip,

Thank you for your critical comments and indeed I used your lense to critically review the dissertations submitted at St. Clements "University." You have put me in the indefensible position of defending the WAUC (Ouch, what are you doing to me?)

However, let me reaffirm some of your comments. Yes, some of the dissertations are shoddy. In particuliar, the lack of citations in the first 2 on that site are a concern. Nevertheless, I want you to go back and review the dissertation by Oba (something) on TQM in Nigeria. While not giving it a close read, it does appear thorough. I do have a problem with the fact that there appeared to be no serious attempt at triangulation to truly make the study meaningful. But when you consider the institution, when you consider the lack of resources (not just from the school but the country he's working in), and you keep those variables in context, then don't you think that is a legitimate attempt at scholarship?

That's the reason for the journal. I'm hoping that if we can expose the quality (or lack thereof) then the process may feed itself in a positive generative manner. In other words, by exposing them to peer review, they will get better. Don't you think that's possible?

Again, I'm not defending the quality but I'm sure a lot of the lack of citations may have less to do with lazy research habits and more to do with not having access to a decent research library; everything isn't located on ProQuest and JSTOR.

Chip, let's be clear: the quality of academic writing varies. I've read crummy dissertations and wondered how did that fly. Likewise, I've read master level papers and been amazed at their creativity. In other words, I'm sure there is some overlap in quality (even if it isn't much).

Now I must be honest and admit that I have not perused the doggerel works of young Oberlin undergraduates. I guess you could submit one of your papers for peer review and we could rate it agianst some of the WAUC pieces.

Chip, if you have some free moments, then maybe we can do something positive other than beat up these rogue institutions. How about we set up a replication study (I know someone has done this project in the past. Perhaps Dr. Bear would know) whereby we gather a group of researchers and ask them to rate a cluster of works from WAUC and regionally accredited institutions to see how they fair? The reviewers, obviously, would not know which papers belonged to whom. I know that in the past the difference in quality was clear and perhaps it would still be the same (I'm sure of that). Let's argue we do this study: what do you do with those 2 articles (from WAUC graduates) that rate near the middle of the pack? (Arguing that there is ONE; which has been my whole premise.)

I look forward to your response. But seriously Chip, if you think I'm way out there on this project, I will cease and desist; I do value the opinions of my peers - - sometime. However, I would argue that we should attempt to prove it, like researchers.

Maybe you'd like to co-publish a paper on WAUC academic quality. This is a hot topic in higher education (a resent story was featured in the Chronicle on unaccredited institutions).

Hope to hear from you soon.

LaMont Rouse

 

One of WAUC's accreditees definitely has involvement with someone very prominent in his field. The totally phony Cambridge State University, whose "campus" is a mailbox in Hawaii, was (according to the New Orleans Times-Picayune) funded by Ronald Pellar, the now-imprisoned founder of Columbia State University, and arguably the most financially successful diploma mill operator of all time.

 

LaMont,

What you don't seem to get is that there is *NO* academic integrity at the World Association at all. The organization only exists in the minds of Maxine Asher and Lloyd Clayton, for the purpose of "accrediting" their fake schools and a bunch of other fake programs.

You could just as easily do a study on Distance Graduation Accreditation Association (http://www.accredit.t2u.com/), the fraudulent accreditor for the equally fraudulent Capitol Univerity. Yes, you might be able to find one "graduate" of Capitol who actually did some work... and this work might even be of reasonable quality. But if so, the quality of the work would be an anomaly, and not an average representation of work done at Capitol... because no work is required. And the same is true at many of the World Association member institutions.


Far more interesting would be a comparison of masters theses from graduates of DETC programs with theses from graduates of RA programs... and here, there would (in theory) be some baseline quality assurance at DETC.

 

Hi and welcome.

I'll try to refrain from comments about oxymorons (oops). Actually this is kind of interesting because of Maxine Asher herself. Although she is a complete crank, she does have scholarly aspirations and is very serious about her Atlantis "research". So your question probably kind of put her on the spot. She's certainly a lot more interesting than the usual degree mill scamster.

It may be unfortunate, but linking your name to WAUC could do your career serious harm later. If you ever develop some professional enemies, they will take joy in dredging that up.

Perhaps. Of course, one would have to ask why a good researcher would want to be associated with them. With Maxine Asher the reason is apparent, since she probably can't get traditional acaademia to listen to her Intuitive Archaeology ideas. Is the WAUC-world a haven for cranks, or is it just a phony marketing front for those who sell "life experience" degrees? If it were the former, it would be fascinating in a surrealistic sort of way. I'd kind of welcome a 'Journal of Borderland Research' kind of thing. 'Fate Magazine' for intellectuals.

To some extent that describes me. My feeling is that accreditation is not important if degrees are not involved. I would love to see DL-style institutes created for independent scholars, which could provide eduphiles and all of those many people who earned degrees in one field and then found work in another a way to communicate and to keep their scholarly interests alive. A group like that could provide all kinds of perks ranging from group discounts from publishers and scholarly library access to publishing its own journals and holding conventions. Standards could be adjusted to keep out cranks or admit them as desired, and desired levels of scholarship maintained for membership or publishing.

I think that this could easily work and would provide an affiliation and perhaps some credibility for thousands of people outside the university/research loop at present. You could create a whole Institute of Advanced Study with just the brainpower behind used-bookstore counters in Berkeley, after all.

I would totally agree if you cut out granting substandard unrecognized degrees and if you cut out the phony accreditor pretense. Turn it into a research institute for independent scholars. ('Independent' in whatever sense, it's optional.) But as things stand now, WAUC is an intentional effort to mislead that is little better than fraud.

So create an on-line journal and publish them. But don't go around granting unrecognized degrees. And don't create a bogus accreditor that accredits some pretty worthless schools, misleading prospective students into losing thousands of dollars and perhaps years of work.

If one of your legitimate scholars puts his or her heart and soul into writing a dissertation for a worthless degree, do you think they will do it over again for a real one? Or will they just go away embittered?

Why restrict your activities to WAUC members? Why not open it up?

Please rethink your association with Maxine Asher and with WAUC. It will stain your entire career and undercut all the work you are doing at Rutgers. You will always be the guy who worked for a phony accreditation mill.

 

As opposed to the guy who worked for a legitimate accreditation mill?