Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Location: Northern Virginia, U.S. and Dominica, West Indies
27 posts, read 111,120 times
Reputation: 76
Advertisements
Frontline is so leftwing it may as well be produced in Havana. If you want a fair documentary you're not going to get it from them. Anyway, these schools are expensive and unremarkable, but they're not "mills".
Frontline is so leftwing it may as well be produced in Havana. If you want a fair documentary you're not going to get it from them. Anyway, these schools are expensive and unremarkable, but they're not "mills".
I've always found Frontline to be quite good, left wing orientation or not. Some people find criticism of "for-profit" anything to be left wing.
As for the larger issue of the quality of Univ. of Phoenix... It depends. I think "sub-prime" education is a good way to put it. Phoenix is at least regionally accredited though, which makes it among the "least bad" of the proprietary sector of education, like the least bad ARM of the sub-prime mortgage market.
I know a guy who teaches part-time for Phoenix and the main problem is that, obviously, they are for-profit. They see the students as customers and the education as a packaged product that they sell for a high price. If you teach for them, you are essentially given the whole "package" of the class up front - the books, the assignments, the content, and the "professor" is a glorified grader who has not created his or her own class.
But at least there are assessments evaluated by someone with a degree, and some standards are upheld when grades are given. They have to do this to keep their regional accreditation, without which they are finished, like ITT Tech.
Compared to a community college it is a horrible deal - about 4 times more expensive for a poorer product. I would recommend Southern New Hampshire University or University of Maryland over Phoenix.
Location: Northern Virginia, U.S. and Dominica, West Indies
27 posts, read 111,120 times
Reputation: 76
Quote:
Originally Posted by redguard57
I've always found Frontline to be quite good, left wing orientation or not. Some people find criticism of "for-profit" anything to be left wing.
Criticism of individual schools, for profit or otherwise, is always fair game. Criticism of all for profit schools as a category, though, is often left wing, and criticism of profit in general is inherently left wing.
Quote:
As for the larger issue of the quality of Univ. of Phoenix... It depends. I think "sub-prime" education is a good way to put it. Phoenix is at least regionally accredited though, which makes it among the "least bad" of the proprietary sector of education, like the least bad ARM of the sub-prime mortgage market.
That's interesting. I actually have more respect for a number of the very low cost DEAC-accredited schools that don't participate in Title IV. I think they offer more value for the dollar than the regionally accredited schools that clearly base their tuition rates on the annual federal financial aid caps.
Quote:
I know a guy who teaches part-time for Phoenix and the main problem is that, obviously, they are for-profit. They see the students as customers and the education as a packaged product that they sell for a high price. If you teach for them, you are essentially given the whole "package" of the class up front - the books, the assignments, the content, and the "professor" is a glorified grader who has not created his or her own class.
I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with schools relying on centralized curricula. My job used to be to teach faculty members at a "perfectly respectable" non-profit university how to make better use of technology and andragogy in their individually-designed courses. Generally they knew their subject matter, but believe me that most of them couldn't instructional design their way out of a wet paper bag.
Quote:
But at least there are assessments evaluated by someone with a degree, and some standards are upheld when grades are given. They have to do this to keep their regional accreditation, without which they are finished, like ITT Tech.
Compared to a community college it is a horrible deal - about 4 times more expensive for a poorer product. I would recommend Southern New Hampshire University or University of Maryland over Phoenix.
That's also interesting, because you chose the non-profit and public university, respectively, that have taken the most pages out of Phoenix's playbook.
Criticism of individual schools, for profit or otherwise, is always fair game. Criticism of all for profit schools as a category, though, is often left wing, and criticism of profit in general is inherently left wing.
That's interesting. I actually have more respect for a number of the very low cost DEAC-accredited schools that don't participate in Title IV. I think they offer more value for the dollar than the regionally accredited schools that clearly base their tuition rates on the annual federal financial aid caps.
I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with schools relying on centralized curricula. My job used to be to teach faculty members at a "perfectly respectable" non-profit university how to make better use of technology and andragogy in their individually-designed courses. Generally they knew their subject matter, but believe me that most of them couldn't instructional design their way out of a wet paper bag.
That's also interesting, because you chose the non-profit and public university, respectively, that have taken the most pages out of Phoenix's playbook.
I think some of this discussion comes down to criticism of "for profit schools" is not the same as criticism of profit in the general sense. It is a term to describe the schools. They tend to be grouped together because they tend to be uniformly poor quality. Now if we want to include the "profit" part of the discussion, the problem that is concerning is that these schools prey off the uninformed to get taxpayers money.
Location: Northern Virginia, U.S. and Dominica, West Indies
27 posts, read 111,120 times
Reputation: 76
Quote:
Originally Posted by tnff
I think some of this discussion comes down to criticism of "for profit schools" is not the same as criticism of profit in the general sense.
I agree, that's why I made the distinction.
Quote:
It is a term to describe the schools. They tend to be grouped together because they tend to be uniformly poor quality.
I think it's not the quality they deliver but their admissions practices that many perceive as problematic. Those of us who've worked for schools of varying tax statuses know that the differences in actual educational quality are far oversold by the detractors of for profit schools.
Quote:
Now if we want to include the "profit" part of the discussion, the problem that is concerning is that these schools prey off the uninformed to get taxpayers money.
Not to mention the trillion dollars and counting from students themselves. But believe me, many tuition-driven non-profit schools do this too.
Whatever your personal opinion of for-profit schools is, the bloom is off the rose as far as the general public is concerned. With the closures of high profile for-profits, I think these degrees will likely be viewed as low quality by employers.
Location: Northern Virginia, U.S. and Dominica, West Indies
27 posts, read 111,120 times
Reputation: 76
Quote:
Originally Posted by Arthur Digby Sellers
Whatever your personal opinion of for-profit schools is, the bloom is off the rose as far as the general public is concerned. With the closures of high profile for-profits, I think these degrees will likely be viewed as low quality by employers.
Perhaps, especially for the ones that do a lot of marketing, but at the same time it's not like people necessarily know a school's tax status just based on its name. I mean, if someone says, "My degree is from Anaheim University," typically the response will be, "Oh, okay."
Perhaps, especially for the ones that do a lot of marketing, but at the same time it's not like people necessarily know a school's tax status just based on its name. I mean, if someone says, "My degree is from Anaheim University," typically the response will be, "Oh, okay."
True, there are for-profits that are neither famous nor infamous. The ones that concern me are the ones with specious advertising - Devry, University of Phoenix, etc...
I really don't know what goes on in their classrooms, so I won't speak to the quality. Phoenix has regional accreditation, so they must do something alright.
What I can say, however, is that a community college has open admission, is regionally accredited, costs a fraction of what for-profits do, and credits are transferable to public universities, mandated by state law. What most of us object to is the absurd cost for a product that's not appreciably better than a city college; quite possibly worse, yet costs much, much more.
Location: Northern Virginia, U.S. and Dominica, West Indies
27 posts, read 111,120 times
Reputation: 76
Quote:
Originally Posted by redguard57
What I can say, however, is that a community college has open admission, is regionally accredited, costs a fraction of what for-profits do, and credits are transferable to public universities, mandated by state law. What most of us object to is the absurd cost for a product that's not appreciably better than a city college; quite possibly worse, yet costs much, much more.
I completely agree with that when it comes to the Title IV-fueled for profit schools. I never recommend them, for that very reason: there is always a much cheaper alternative that's just as good.
An exception would be for active duty military types who literally have no out-of-pocket cost to attend a school with a good track record of catering to them, like American Military University. But that's the only exception that comes to mind.
(Anyway, despite all that I'll admit that I get annoyed when people say dumb things like that they're "degree mills", because that term means something specific, and that isn't it. But that's a different issue.)
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
