Should I Go Back to School?

[Skittl1321]

then employers, looking at your resume, will not know that you did it online. Nothing on your transcript says anything about online.

I'm currently doing a Master's degree online at a school with a traditional B&M school as well. My degree won't say online, and neither will my transcript. I won't add "online" to my resume.

But when my job says "Iowa" and my college says "Cambridge, Massachusets" I'm thinking a smart employer will be able to figure out I did the program online.


University of Phoenix is gaining more credibility however. My mother works in graduate admissions at a MAJOR state university (not in Iowa) and she evaluated all my Master's programs to tell me if they would make me eligible for entrance to a doctoral program. Most for-profits did not have the right accredidation, but UoP does. (For the record, I am attending a private, but not-for profit school, not a for-profit one.)

Is UoP really open admission though? I thought they had minimum requirements you had to meet. They are just non-selective otherwise.

[GarrAarghHrumph]

University of Phoenix is gaining more credibility however. My mother works in graduate admissions at a MAJOR state university (not in Iowa) and she evaluated all my Master's programs to tell me if they would make me eligible for entrance to a doctoral program. Most for-profits did not have the right accredidation, but UoP does. (For the record, I am attending a private, but not-for profit school, not a for-profit one.)

U of P is regionally accredited. So is Devry, and Strayer, and Walden, and etc. Doesn't mean employers respect the degrees. Does mean the degrees are real, though.

Is UoP really open admission though? I thought they had minimum requirements you had to meet. They are just non-selective otherwise.

At the undergraduate level, re: academics, they are.

http://nces.ed.gov/collegenavigator/...=405997#admsns

But you normally need to be an adult learner. And you need to have work experience or equivalent (stay at home moms would qualify, for example.)

[mikey]

My work had me take a few MBA classes through U of P before I became medical director of one of our units (I have since stepped down from that position, but that's another story entirely!). I found the material, teaching, and fellow students to be marginal at best. One of the teachers even contacted me on the side to say that my work was good enough that, if I was serious about getting the MBA, he'd recommend that I go somewhere else. That told me a lot...

[PrincessLeppard]

The hospital where my mom works will no longer accept nursing students from either Kaplan or Phoenix. They found them unprofessional and woefully unprepared. They don't even let them precept....

[Skittl1321]

U of P is regionally accredited. So is Devry, and Strayer, and Walden, and etc. Doesn't mean employers respect the degrees. Does mean the degrees are real, though.

Thanks for the information about open enrollment- I didn't know that.

Not all the colleges you named had programs rigorous enough to be accepted into doctoral programs at the university she works for. May have just been my specific program that they didn't have the proper accredidation. Overall though, I just found them to be insanely expensive, though the school I ended up at is still pretty darn expensive (pretty darn is a few steps down from insanely).

[overedge]

FWIW a major employer in my area will no longer consider applicants with online-only degrees, regardless of whether the degrees are from a respected school or a Phoenix-type private school. Their experience has been that these applicants don't have good interpersonal skills - they are marginally better in online environments but not very good at all in in-person interactions. They also are not very good at teamwork, because they are used to group projects where each person does their own little bit and the only "collaboration" is at the end in merging everything into a single file to send to the instructor.

This employer has also found that these applicants, if hired, have major entitlement issues around work scheduling etc. - basically that because they are used to an education in which they could take classes whenever it was convenient for them, they expect the workplace to show the same kind of flexibility. Which isn't always possible, and in some jobs is next to impossible.

Before I get roasted for being I am not personally saying that all people with online-only degrees act this way. I am just saying that this has been the experience of this particular employer, and (rightly or wrongly) this is why they won't consider people with online-only credentials.

[rfisher]

A lot of universities thought online would equal more because they could reach a larger population. More students means more tuition. The problem is there is a higher fail and drop out rate because a lot of students lack the self-discipline required for online coursework. When those attrition numbers start counting against you and overall funding is impacted, many are really dialing back or making the online classes a blended class with part online and part in person. This is what more and more departments are our university are doing.

[Aussie Willy]

Good on you for considering going back. My mum went to university when she was in her early 40s to become a librarian. That is after having left school at 15 (because back in those days women were only going to get married and be mothers according to her mother). But she eventually finished off her schooling, received her higher school certificate and then got her university degree.

In the next couple of years I am planning on doing a Workplace Safety certificate which work wants me to do. Then I can become a Safety Officer which is probably a really good field to get into. And I will probably be 46 by the time I get around to doing it. And I would never consider myself too old to do something like that.

[Anita18]

No you're not too old, but you are too old to pick something you don't absolutely love. Working full time while going to school isn't easy, even for distance learners. Pick something where you'd actually enjoy doing the homework. If your employer insists, throw them a bone by taking a work related course once in a while.

I'm only 27, and I'm already too old to pick up something I don't absolutely love. I'm currently pursuing a graphic design certificate at the local community college. I know, I know, sounds flaky, but a renowned design school is right next door and some of the same instructors teach at both. At this point I'm not aiming for a degree, just the knowledge. (In art, it's your work that counts, not where you went to school anyway.) It's tons of fun when you approach school in this manner!

Also doesn't hurt that I still have some HS scholarship funds I have to use up before I'm 30 and it goes back to the state.

46 certainly isn't too old to go back for a master's or a certificate, but IMO it's probably too old to go for an MD or PhD if your goal is for your degree to benefit your career.

[Japanfan]

46 certainly isn't too old to go back for a master's or a certificate, but IMO it's probably too old to go for an MD or PhD if your goal is for your degree to benefit your career.

Not necessarily. My sister was over 50 since she got her MA in education and it meant that she could get promoted at the university where she worked as an ESL teacher and earn more money.

Even if you only have 10 or 20 working years left, an MA can be useful.

[Rex]

Wow. A lot of diverse opinions here. I think I should also contact one of the career counselors down at Headquarters too.

[GarrAarghHrumph]

My work had me take a few MBA classes through U of P before I became medical director of one of our units (I have since stepped down from that position, but that's another story entirely!). I found the material, teaching, and fellow students to be marginal at best. One of the teachers even contacted me on the side to say that my work was good enough that, if I was serious about getting the MBA, he'd recommend that I go somewhere else. That told me a lot...

The U of P MBA is kind of famous for that. I generally recommend students look at AACSB accredited MBA programs.

[Skittl1321]

Wow. A lot of diverse opinions here. I think I should also contact one of the career counselors down at Headquarters too.

The school I go to is low enough that you wouldn't be paying much per course at $250/hour reimbursement. If your personal investment wasn't high, it would be totally worth going. If you have to pay it yourself, then I think it's a tougher decision.

[Anita18]

Not necessarily. My sister was over 50 since she got her MA in education and it meant that she could get promoted at the university where she worked as an ESL teacher and earn more money.

Even if you only have 10 or 20 working years left, an MA can be useful.

That's why I specifically noted MD or PhD. Both take around 10 years to accomplish (5 years for a PhD if you don't have much of a life otherwise) and in the case of an MD, a boatload of debt you have to pay back. Impossible if you only have 10 working years left after you finish.

An MA can cost some serious funds too, but at least they only take 2 years to finish so you can take advantage of the higher salary much sooner.

[Louis]

Rex, Temple's MBA program is relatively affordable (as far as MBA programs go) and has an excellent reputation in Philadelphia. You can go to class right in Center City, and 90%+ of your classmates will be working professionals whose company is paying for part/all of their tuition. You can, IIRC, also take a couple of classes as a non-matriculated student before they make you take the GMAT.

The downside to Temple is that their Career Services office doesn't seem to be geared toward helping MBA students find a launching pad. I'd guess most stay at their current jobs.

You could check out Drexel, but I'm not sure how that would work if you'll be tied to your employer for a certain period afterwards. Much of their success with job placement depends on the co-op program, which I don't think you could do while working your current job.

[Prancer]

My two cents on online classes:

There are some good online classes and a whole lot of bad ones. It is harder to do a good job of teaching an online class than it is to do a good job of teaching a traditional class; at the same time, online classes attract many instructors who want to do teach those classes because they are busy people and think these classes are less work. Online students often complain of being abandoned and/or overloaded with busy work that gets very little, if any, feedback. Student participation nearly always lags behind instructor participation, so peer interaction tends to be minimal at best.

The situation has improved in the last five years, but this is all-too-often the case. Every now and then, you might get a glimmer of what online learning could be like if only everyone tried, but for the most part, online education is more about checking off boxes than anything else--as is, to be fair, a traditional education for many. You can learn a lot in an online class, but it will be because you decided to learn a lot and not because that is what is expected.

[heckles]

B&M college professors invariably look into teaching at U of P from home, find out that their faculty actually have to teach full-time rather than teach two classes a week and do "research" for the rest (i.e. have redundant, dull articles published in academic journals nobody reads), and then get self-righteous about how poor a school U of P allegedly is.

[overedge]

B&M college professors invariably look into teaching at U of P from home, find out that their faculty actually have to teach full-time rather than teach two classes a week and do "research" for the rest (i.e. have redundant, dull articles published in academic journals nobody reads), and then get self-righteous about how poor a school U of P allegedly is.

Um, I don't know which schools you are sneering at with these comments, but I don't know anybody who teaches full-time at a university (in a permanent academic job) who only has to teach two classes a week.

And if you think that teaching is just being in the classroom for whatever time class meetings are scheduled for, you are so, so very wrong.

[agalisgv]

Um, I don't know which schools you are sneering at with these comments, but I don't know anybody who teaches full-time at a university (in a permanent academic job) who only has to teach two classes a week.

At research universities in the US, two classes per term is the norm in the liberal arts/social sciences. Schools on quarter systems will often have a 2-1-1 load.

[Rex]

My ESO is looking into MBA programs. They usually cost more than undergrad classes, I am told. But apparently there are several universities who love to work with the federal government. He looked at Liberty University, but they don't give military discounts to Homeland Security civilians (DOD only). He also mentioned Thomas Edison, whom I have not heard of. Will keep y'all posted.