Are online universities coldhearted money-grubbers? (doctorate, costs, scholarships, accepted)

[haggardhouseelf]

The writing just keeps getting worse. Today my husband gave me this (I've cut out personal info - names/schools/place of employment/etc):


The assignment was to interview two people who attend college and focus on strategies for doing well in school. The instructor of the class said that if they didn't know two people who were also students, that they could make two people up! lol I really loved that. lol

At least this person uses paragraphs. Most of the people just do this one huge block paragraph thing - no indents, commas, or periods even - that is nearly impossible to read.

My husband and a few of his work buddies and I were wondering if perhaps the college makes up people and posts things like this as a tactic or something? I mean - is this for real? Some of the names (which I will not post) sound totally made up, too. Like something Bart Simpson would make up and prank call Moe with.

[Gatornation]

Originally Posted by haggardhouseelf

The writing just keeps getting worse. Today my husband gave me this (I've cut out personal info - names/schools/place of employment/etc):


The assignment was to interview two people who attend college and focus on strategies for doing well in school. The instructor of the class said that if they didn't know two people who were also students, that they could make two people up! lol I really loved that. lol

At least this person uses paragraphs. Most of the people just do this one huge block paragraph thing - no indents, commas, or periods even - that is nearly impossible to read.

My husband and a few of his work buddies and I were wondering if perhaps the college makes up people and posts things like this as a tactic or something? I mean - is this for real? Some of the names (which I will not post) sound totally made up, too. Like something Bart Simpson would make up and prank call Moe with.

I'm not clear on your point. The school is a for profit and they let anyone in.

[Three Wolves In Snow]

Originally Posted by haggardhouseelf

So my husband has a really great job with a really great company and he's been with the company for 12 years. His schedule is a bit nuts, however, and so when he decided he wanted to go back to school he knew the only way he could do that and still do his job was by doing one of those online schools.

(Also his company gives him $8K/year to use towards college classes, so every year which has gone by that he wasn't using that money he felt he was basically throwing money away, so he decided it was time to start using it.)

OK - so he began his classes this weekend. Immediately, he began feeling like he'd made a horrible mistake.

The first assignment was to post an introduction. The instructor gave a very specific format that they were to use, and certain bits of information that the intro should include.

Also, once all the introductions were posted, you had to write a three paragraph response to at least three other students in the class. (Three responses to three different student introductions.)

So my husband is reading the introductions, and I hear him going, "Oh my god...."..."Oh my god!!!"...and "Oh I cannot believe this...."... and "Are you serious?"

So, my curiosity piqued, he allowed me to read the introductions which were posted by the other students.

OMG!

First, I was struck by the poor quality of writing and lack of any sort of format whatsoever. Had I not known better, I would have thought the introductions were written by 1st or 2nd graders. There were even a few who did not capitalize a single word - not even their own name. Most were written as one long run-on sentence. As in, perhaps 800 words - no periods. No indents, no new paragraphs, nothing. Just a long thread of words (and sometimes the wrong words) describing every dirty detail of their whole lives up to that point. Much more information than they really needed to share. It was awful.

My husband pressed me to really try to read what these people were posting, so I did. I often had to take a section and reread it a few times until the meaning came through... the writing was such a mess...

Oh my gosh. So sad! These people were posting these incredibly sad stories about themselves. Single mothers with four kids who work at McDonald's who are trying to go to school in order to improve their lives. Quite a few had been in the military and now that they were out, they wanted to get a degree so that they could get a civilian job. A few of the students were in their 50's and 60's and were struggling with losing their homes, unemployment, and health issues like cancer and severe diabetes. A couple of them were high school drop-outs, a many ranted anger against their parents.

None of them, to us, honestly seemed like college material. The quality of their writing was the first sign, but their lives were all in some way just disastrous. These people came across as being very unstable.

And this made me a little upset. Not with these people, they think they are going to improve their life by taking these classes.

I began feeling upset with the University.

My husband did not have to take any assessments or do any sort of qualifying in order to "attend" this university. They basically made sure he could pay, and he was given his first class. That should have been a red flag, but he nor I gave it any thought at the time. Neither one of us have ever enrolled in one of these online schools before.

Doesn't it seem like they are taking advantage of these people? These classes cost over $300 per credit! These people most likely applied for and were given school loans. Even if they are able to complete whatever degree program they are enrolled in (and I would seriously doubt that many of these people will be able to), how are they possibly going to have a better like with all that debt to pay back? This school is very expensive!

I'll stop here because I did not intend for this post to be so long. I am curious for others thoughts on this.

This thread interested me because I would love to hear about some good online schools.

So now that I am here, I will say:

Ever see it when someone types, "It doesn't matter, I'm in a forum" or, "It's just a 'comments section'" or "grammar Nazi, who cares" ?

Those are the people you and your husband were witnessing.

It DOES matter to use proper grammar, sentence structure, spelling, paragraphs, capitalization, etc. When you do it correctly no matter where you are writing, you may then actually claim, "typo" when you make a mistake, (we all do, even professional writers have editors), instead of lying when everyone else can see you just don't know how to write and people DO look at you as less intelligent.

[haggardhouseelf]

Originally Posted by Gatornation

I'm not clear on your point. The school is a for profit and they let anyone in.

I wanted to post an example of the quality of writing I mentioned in an earlier post.

[Gatornation]

Originally Posted by haggardhouseelf

I wanted to post an example of the quality of writing I mentioned in an earlier post.

Guess I'm just not surprised with how poor the students are and how the school is shady. Your husband should really find an online program from a school that is not a for-profit and has entrance requirements.

[kanhawk]

Originally Posted by haggardhouseelf

The writing just keeps getting worse. Today my husband gave me this (I've cut out personal info - names/schools/place of employment/etc):


The assignment was to interview two people who attend college and focus on strategies for doing well in school. The instructor of the class said that if they didn't know two people who were also students, that they could make two people up! lol I really loved that. lol

At least this person uses paragraphs. Most of the people just do this one huge block paragraph thing - no indents, commas, or periods even - that is nearly impossible to read.

My husband and a few of his work buddies and I were wondering if perhaps the college makes up people and posts things like this as a tactic or something? I mean - is this for real? Some of the names (which I will not post) sound totally made up, too. Like something Bart Simpson would make up and prank call Moe with.

Just for fun I counted the grammatical and spelling errors. At least 15. I passed over some errors in sentence structure. This person badly needs remedial English.

[AJBarney]

to the original question...


...not any more so than brick-and-mortar universities. Tuition hikes average ~5% per year. This bubble will pop soon.

[Gatornation]

Originally Posted by AJBarney

to the original question...


...not any more so than brick-and-mortar universities. Tuition hikes average ~5% per year. This bubble will pop soon.

There is of course no data to back that up. Tuition at for-profits are very high for an inferior product.

[haggardhouseelf]

And you would think that, without having to maintain brick-and-mortar buildings/rent/mortgages/landscaping/utilities/parking/transportation services/medical clinics/etc... all the things other traditional college campuses must afford... the cost would be LOWER for online universities. Wouldn't you think?

[Gatornation]

Originally Posted by haggardhouseelf

And you would think that, without having to maintain brick-and-mortar buildings/rent/mortgages/landscaping/utilities/parking/transportation services/medical clinics/etc... all the things other traditional college campuses must afford... the cost would be LOWER for online universities. Wouldn't you think?

It should be. You have inferior teachers who get paid less also. They just take advantage of those who can't get in anywhere else.

My main issues with them is the use of government funds. If someone wants to spend their own cash at one of these places I could care less.