Avoiding the Scams: Accreditation and Diploma Mills

You’ve found the online program you want, all you to do is click, pay, and you are in! Is it too good to be true? Well, yes. You can end up not getting the education you paid for, credits that are not transferable, or course work that is not accepted by professional organizations. The best way to make sure you aren’t falling for a scam is to make sure the online provider is accredited.

Accreditation Comes First

If you are looking to earn a bachelors degree in economics and then plan to get an MBA, accreditation is essential. It gives you some degree of assurance about the organization, regardless of whether it is a distance education provider or a face-to-face institution. Nonetheless, just knowing if an online program is accredited is still not enough. Anyone can set up an organization and call itself an accrediting agency. It is not that common, but diploma mills have been known to create their own accrediting agency and then declare they have accreditation.

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Doctoral Degree: Online

The doctoral degree, the highest degree awarded, is earned after an advanced course of study that usually consists of original research, a dissertation, and extended written work. The traditional on-campus doctoral student takes four to ten years to complete the degree, but many distance learning doctoral programs are structured to streamline the process. The Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) is the most common doctoral degree; it is awarded in fields that range from philosophy to geology. Other frequently awarded doctoral degrees include the Doctor of Education (Ed.D.), Doctor of Business Administration (D.B.A.), Doctor of Engineering (Eng.D.), and Doctor of Psychology (Psy.D.).

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Graduate Degrees: Online

Online learning program providers predominantly offer master’s degrees. It makes sense. The students who need to keep up their skills in the workplace or need graduate degrees to move ahead in their professions are most likely to have jobs and families. Online learning is a great fit for their busy lifestyle.

The master’s degree is the first academic or professional degree earned after the bachelor’s degree. A traditional, full-time master’s degree student may take a year or two to earn the required 30 credits. In some master’s degree programs, students are simply expected to take advanced-level courses and perhaps pass a culminating exam. In others, original research and a thesis are required. Some online learning programs have a brief residency requirement. Students usually earn a Master of Arts (M.A.), a Master of Science (M.S.), or a Master of Business Administration (M.B.A.) degree. Many of the online master’s degree programs are professional in nature.

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Bachelor's Degree: Online

Generally, the bachelor’s degree is recognized worldwide as the first university degree you earn. Although students enrolled full-time can earn the degree in four years, many take up to six years to earn the required 120 to 128 credits.

In most colleges and universities, the course of study that leads to a bachelor’s degree consists of concentrated work in a major, such as psychology or business, and wide-ranging work in a variety of subjects, such as the liberal arts, to give students a broad foundation of knowledge. However, some bachelor’s degree programs focus on intensive study in a particular field without the broad liberal arts background. The most common bachelor’s degrees are the Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) and the Bachelor of Science (B.S.), although there are many other titles.

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Associates Degrees Online

The two most common associate degrees are the Associate of Arts (A.A.) and the Associate of Science (A.S.), with others such as the Associate of Business Administration (A.B.A.) and the Associate of General Studies (A.G.S.). Usually students in associate degree programs take two years to finish. But if they are part-time, it can take a lot longer to earn the 60 to 64 credits required.

The growth of online courses in community colleges has been extremely rapid, fueled in part because so many people who want a college degree work, have families, or lack the funds to take off four years to go to a traditional college.

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Testing Requirements for Online Programs

Applying to an online school may seem like a daunting task, but millions of people have done it and you can too. Let’s first discuss the tests you might need to have taken. You may be anxious about taking an admission test, or one of the professional exams, but if you apply to a program with that testing requirement, there is no way of avoiding it. But take heart—just follow the instructions, and you will find that it’s easy.

Some programs at community colleges and distance and online learning programs that are specifically designed for adult learners do not require a standardized admission test as part of the application process. However, policies get a bit more stringent at the graduate level and vary widely.

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Online Degrees: From Associates to Graduate

What if you are interested in learning about forensics or want to take a creative writing class for credit toward a bachelor’s degree? These—and thousands more courses that one wouldn’t ordinarily think could be taught via the Internet—are available online.

A. Frank Mayadas, Ph.D., Program Director of the Sloan Foundation, observes that asynchronous learning will drive online learning to provide classes on a breadth and scale hardly imaginable. He sees specialized courses growing and notes that it’s already happening. Online learners now have a spectacular range of possibilities, from full-fledged doctorates to classes in doll-making.

When distance learning was first developing, it was primarily geared toward working adults in their late twenties to mid-thirties. They wanted to enhance their career development or get the degree they hadn’t gotten because of jobs and families. Institutions that offered online learning catered to their interests, with professional courses and degrees in business and health.

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Transferring Credits

Adult students who have earned some college credits during the course of their careers can decrease the time it takes to earn an undergraduate degree by transferring those credits. Many institutions of higher learning accept transfer credits toward a degree. Since each program’s requirements vary, check before you enroll to make sure transferred credits are accepted.

A student going to a traditional college cannot move from campus to campus and expect to easily transfer credits. It is the same with online programs. Students often assume that they can take courses from several institutions and that all those credits will transfer toward a degree program. Although consortia members typically work together to maximize the transferability of credits from one college to another, it is still up to you to ensure that credits earned elsewhere can be applied at your new institution.

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The Personal Essay for Your Online School Application

To complete your application to your online school of choice, you will most likely have to complete a personal essay. The essays required of applicants vary widely. For some programs, you may have to explain in one or two paragraphs why you want to go to that institution. Or you may have to write on a more creative topic, such as the person who influenced you the most. For graduate business programs, the application may call for two or three, or even more, essays on different topics.

The admission committee gleans a lot of information from what you write. But committee members can also tell a lot from how you write. If your writing is clear and conveys your ideas effectively, you demonstrate your ability to communicate. If your writing is free of grammatical and spelling errors, you demonstrate your attention to detail.

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The Application for Your Online Degree

Now that you have made the decision to get your education online, you need to start assembling your applications. Most online admission procedures are fairly simple and forms can be electronically submitted. Failing to meet deadlines and following instructions trip up online learners just as easily as they do face-to-face students.

You will likely have to submit a number of items for your application to be considered complete:

• Admission test scores (if required)
• Application form
• High school, undergraduate, or other transcripts
• Letters of recommendation
• Personal essays

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New Trends in Online Learning: Podcasts

n recent years you’ve probably heard the term “podcast” at the end of your favorite television or radio program. Perhaps you are digitally savvy and know just what that means, or maybe you are not sure exactly what the term signifies; but either way, you might not have considered how podcasts have changed online learning.

A “podcast” is a digital media file (or series of files) that is distributed over the Internet. You play a podcast with either a hand-held digital device (such as an iPod—hence the “pod” in the podcast) or on a personal computer. Because you can download these “broadcasts” and listen to them at any time that is convenient for you, they are incredibly valuable in the world of online learning.

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Online Class Structure and Technology Requirements

"I’d love to take classes online! Do I need any special equipment? How are classes structured?"

Those who develop and use technology to deliver online education do not want to replace geographical limitations with technical limitations. Though there are many cutting-edge technologies to facilitate online teaching, educators do tend to use familiar technology so that no special training is necessary. In most cases, online programs have tutorials and telephone support for students. But students do need to know some computer jargon. You should know how to “post” an assignment or use a “drop box.” Another technical obstacle is low bandwidth. If you need to download graphs or photos that take hours due to a slow dial-up connection, it can get frustrating. “Most computers purchased in the last five years have the speed and memory to support online learning. Some classes require a microphone to be plugged into the computer,” notes Ray Schroeder from the University of Illinois at Springfield.

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How To Choose an Online Program

Online Learning Sounds Right For Me! How do I choose a program?

Ready to dig into the details and choose the online learning program that best fits your needs and circumstances? Since geographic location is not part of the criteria, you literally have thousands of programs to choose from. However, you can’t depend on name recognition alone. Remember, online programs vary in what they offer and how they deliver education. And price is not a reliable indication of a program’s value.

Start with Statistics

Track Record

An online program can have glitzy advertising about how easy it is to earn a degree, but its graduation and drop out rates tell the true story. If retention rates are low, it probably means students are not being taught well.

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Pros and Cons of Online Learning

Some folks wonder why they have to pay full tuition for online courses. In their minds, online learning should be cheaper because they equate online with correspondence courses; after all, you’re not sitting in a classroom. Many think online means lower quality because they’ve seen diploma mill advertisements promising a degree that is “only a click away.” Prestige and quality mean ivy-covered walls, not a desktop in the den. There is no doubt that a lot of people are still wary about online education.

As online learning becomes more popular and commonplace, the pros will eventually outweigh the cons. Research indicates that online learning is, in many ways, better than face-to-face.

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Distance Learning: A New Way To Get Your Degree

Do you long to go back to school, but live miles away from the nearest university? Are you a busy working professional with time constraints? Then Distance Learning may be the answer!

Distance education used to mean getting courses via snail mail or on videotape. Well, today you are in the right place at the right time. Distance education is a reality for anyone interested in continuing their education or stepping up their career.

What distance education now means is that you can access educational programs and not have to physically be in a classroom on a campus. Through such technologies as cable or satellite television, videotapes and audiotapes, fax, computer modem, computer conferencing and videoconferencing, and other means of electronic delivery, the classroom comes to you—sometimes even if you’re sitting in your room in your bunny slippers and it’s 2 in the morning.

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Dispel Some Myths About Online Learning

Online learning is often one of those “ah-ha” experiences. You think you know about it, but once you get into it you find it is quite different from what you expected. Online learning is still being developed and refined, so some of these myths could be realities if program providers are not offering their students a quality education.

Learning online is easier than learning face-to-face. Nothing gets students into more trouble than thinking they can coast through an online course, pick up a decent grade, and move on to the next class. Once you take your first online class, you will know this is one of the top misconceptions about online education. First-time students often assume that because they don’t sit in class for 3 hours a week they can scratch that time from their to-do list. They can’t. Online students must study the 3 hours a week they would have been in class plus the 2 to 3 hours face-to-face students normally study outside of class. That’s 5 to 6 hours a week per class.

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