e-Learning Pundit

Is an online, executive MBA coming to George Mason University?  Cool, if so.

Randy Hutchinson, president and CEO of the Better Business Bureau of the Mid-South, comments on diploma mills in the Memphis Commercial Appeal.

California State University San Bernadino offers a five-course online certificate in sustainable practices.  Tuition appears comparatively affordable. 

Accessibility via online learning at Oklahoma State University and University of Oklahoma.

…Forty-five of the 163 graduates who earned master’s degrees from the Spears School of Business this spring earned their degrees through distance learning rather than traditional classroom instruction, according to information provided by the university…

Bogus degrees make headlines again.

HUGE for-profit college roundup at the Cincinnati Enquirer.

Inside Higher Ed: “California’s Deal With Kaplan“

…Still, this is not a cheap endeavor. A standard three-credit online course at Kaplan costs $1,113, and a discounted three-credit course there costs California students $645. By comparison, a three-credit course at a California community college costs a mere $78. Despite the cost, Kaplan officials believe they are helping the state’s community colleges at a difficult time…

If the California system is so overloaded, then why aren’t more students there taking advantage of community colleges such as Central Texas College (TX), Darton College (GA), or Barton County Community College (KS)?  Online tuition for OUT OF STATE students at these schools comes out to roughly 1/2 as much as the discounted Kaplan option. 

Something is rotten in Cali.  You read it here first.  

Microsoft vouchers coming to Utah.

More embarrassing revelations due to a degree mill.

…On his resumé, Talley listed a master’s degree in insurance studies from Hamilton University in Evanston, Wyo., but “60 Minutes” exposed the school in 2004 as a diploma mill with no faculty or campus two years after Talley earned the degree. The school has since been closed….

Operators of these mills could care less.

Anya Kamenetz in the Huffington Post: “Online Education and the Laying on of Hands.”

3.) From the Washington letter: “One of the problems with the newest crop of distance-learning institutions is that they are motivated entirely by profit.”

This is true. The gauntlet has been thrown down. Public institutions need to get involved in defining online education or it will be defined for them by a set of institutions with very different agendas.

An online diploma scam snares another victim.  Why aren’t people researching this stuff for legitimacy?

Equine Guelph, a series of equine-related distance learning programs offered by University of Guelph (Canada) , recently won two Reader’s Choice awards presented by the HorseJournals.com guide.

The Chronicle covers adult education.

…”You have to think of your student body as very different and diverse,” she said. That is, adult students might not have the same cultural knowledge that many 20-year-old undergraduates share.

To illustrate that point, Ms. Kunz described an online sociology course for which a professor at the university based an assignment on Joe Paterno, Penn State’s legendary football coach. “Surprisingly,” she said, “a lot of students didn’t know who Joe Paterno was…”

Blasphemy!

More bogus degree trouble for a FL police chief. 

“The Subprime College Crisis”

…For-profits offer online, night and weekend classes, which are more convenient for students with full-time jobs.

Sounds great right? What could possibly be wrong with an industry that expands access to higher education?

A lot, as it turns out…

Well worth a read.

Back in the classroon at 40-50 years-old young.  An inspiring piece from the Montclarion (Montclair State University, NJ) student newspaper.

More tuition increases affecting distance learners.  Central Michigan University is guilty this time.

A few weeks ago, we mentioned a mayor who came under fire for her bogus degree.  She’s since resigned.

What’s up with simultanously attending multiple colleges?   

US News & World Report: “How to Maximize an Online Education Program.”

The fallout when elected officials purchase bogus degrees:

…Galle has said the investigation is a matter of university accreditation and stood by her degree, which uses her maiden name, Patricia Bologna, and came from Redding University in 1973. The California-based online school is considered a diploma mill by Oregon standards.

But there’s a bigger problem with that document, according to the state’s search warrant affidavit.

Redding University was established in 2003, three decades after Galle claims to have obtained her degree…

Talk about an embarrassment.

From yesterday’s edition of “Mitch Lipka’s Consumer Ally” at WalletPop comes this revealing piece by Beau Brendler.

Nevertheless, we must give credit to GetEducated.com, who was on top of this over two months ago. 

Terrible, really.  Apparently, we — as in here in the good old USA — are the fake college/university capital of the world, according to this report.

It goes without saying that fake degrees hurt us all. 

According to this recent research from the GetEducated.com Consumer Reporting Team, yes, even flaky degrees show up on LinkedIn contacts.

…Almeda University has been called a degree mill by Alan Contreras, administrator of Oregon’s Office of Degree Authorization. A search of LinkedIn for professionals listing Almeda in their educational profiles yielded 1,791 results. Among them: the lead consultant forensic psychologist at a UK mental health facility, a systems engineer at NASA, and a contract manager at an aerospace firm in Denver…

And much, much more.  Near the end of this report, there’s a list of costs associated with degree mills. 

Again, these shady operations hurt us all.