Who is on "our" side?

[Martin Eisenstadt]

I think that people sometimes need to get organized to fight what is wrong.

"Well, have we a ram among the sheep?"

There are different ways of organizing.  Other than the great Glen S. McGhee and his FHEAP, I'm not aware of any formal public organizations that deal specifically with our issues.  

Frankly I wonder how many people even understand our issues.  People in education seem to be afflicted with socialist conformist syndrome, and people who aren't so afflicted tend not to be in education too long.  

I don't know that Libertarians are particularly on track either.  Half of them are "social" libertarians, meaning they are essentially either gay or pot smokers (or gay pot smokers), single issue self-interest types.  Of the economic libertarians half of them are Ron Paul types who want to talk all day about Tri-laterals and the Federal Reserve, and don't know or care about practical free market higher education issues.  (As if higher education could ever be called practical.)  And don't get me wrong, I like Ron Paul thematically (less government is good), it's just the implementation that tends to go awry.  

When Spellings was running the DoEd she tried without success to get the cartel to install some "accountability" into the process, such as measures of learning/teaching outcome success.  So although the regime change obviously put that on the back burner, clearly there are some people in the uppermost regions of higher education who understand the notion that for accreditation to be justified it has to mean something.  

If accreditation is going to stand for "quality" you need to be able to measure the quality.  If it's just going to be protectionist thugs beating up on newcomers and cut rate competitors it is less than worthless and needs to go.  

I do see that message in other contexts.  For example, the National Right to Work Foundation is fighting against union goons and forced unionism in the workplace.  But everyone has to work, not everyone has to start up a college.  I see a limited market for members, and an economically outclassed one at that.  Guerilla warfare?  Unless the Organians shame everyone into peace the options seem limited.

[RespectableGent]

RespectableGent and Ham, I thank you for this interesting discussion but can we please return to the original question?

Really there seems to be so much opposition to what I believe is a basic individual liberty. It is in the US and elsewhere. This notion that a government sanctioned body must grant accreditation to an institution (even if that institution is licensed by the state,) for it to be considered valid.

Now I myself am not a political office holder, I am not a judge or a lawyer, I do not have a newspaper that I publish. I am without power or influence. But I really want to know if there are any individuals or groups who support the cause of acedemic freedom.

I want to do more than just talk about it. I want to take action.

There's no action to take because Regionally Accredited colleges are already giving out degrees for little work and no study. They call it competency based evaluation and say that they're measuring your skills through a series of aptitude tests, and trow some pdf's in your face which imply that taking a series of aptitude tests is worth as much as a Harvard education. These places are already walking the borderline between scam and school.

When the CHEA puts out its yearly warning pamphlet about what to look for when spotting a diploma mill they say that it may be a diploma mill if there are too few assignments and if the fees are charged as a lump sum. That's all they say to look for. That's all the CHEA can quantify as a diploma mill. Anything else and they start including their own ranks.

Are you discarding DE because it doesn't take place in a classroom?
You are free to have your opinion.

Yes, I'm discarding it.

Most DE schools are scams. Look at the University of Pheonix, for example. They operate on a short paper curriculum. For each class one must write a one page short paper. It doesn't matter how much you learn, or if you only spent a few minutes flipping through the basic concepts. UoP just wants the students to write a short paper, which is entirely objective, so they can pass them through and go on to pretend that thy have a curriculum.

Any school who wants you to do work without studying for it is just out to take your money. A real school would be interested in teaching and offering learning opportunities.

With some of these schools (regionally accredited) you can learn more on a family hiking trip than with their entire test/write-out-of-school scam program.

RA schools have done more harm to education than diploma mills will ever do. They've made the entire idea of higher education questionable. That's why no one can pin down what a diploma mill is or is not - because these so called "real" schools are capitalizing on the same thing. Going to school isn't about learning anymore.

They do the same thing at the High School level. Don't want to go to High School? Just walk over to your nearest adult education facility and "Test Out" with the GED.

So what should be done about it? Nothing. People just need to realize that all colleges and universities are nothing more than CORPORATIONS out to make a buck. The entire concept of higher education is a scam. There are no "standards" in quality.

A degree is only a piece of paper. Like money and religion, its value is in the eye of the beholder.

[ham]

Yes, I'm discarding it.

Most DE schools are scams. Look at the University of Pheonix, for example. They operate on a short paper curriculum. For each class one must write a one page short paper. It doesn't matter how much you learn, or if you only spent a few minutes flipping through the basic concepts. UoP just wants the students to write a short paper, which is entirely objective, so they can pass them through and go on to pretend that thy have a curriculum.

Any school who wants you to do work without studying for it is just out to take your money. A real school would be interested in teaching and offering learning opportunities.

With some of these schools (regionally accredited) you can learn more on a family hiking trip than with their entire test/write-out-of-school scam program.

Some said

Personally I find that I learn a lot more when I can study in an environment of my own choosing and creation, get up and take a whiz when I need to, go get a sandwich when I'm hungry, turn on the radio and/or the stereo when the mood strikes, or just blow it off and go work out when I've had enough.

I don't see that my learning experience would be improved at all if I first had to fight traffic, try to find a parking place, wonder if thieves or vandals will select my vehicle for their attention today, dodge proselytes and perverts on the way to class, involuntarily listen to some deviant's political indoctrination disguised as part of the class, sit at a desk designed for a midget, rub elbows and make small talk with people to whom I wouldn't give the time of day otherwise, etc. etc.

Those with the multi-billion dollar endowments and owners of said bricks & mortar would have us believe that only the latter above-described experience constitutes the full measure of a true and valid education. I think not.

The fact is that when people cannot be herded, confined and detained they are less amenable to indoctrination, peer pressure and threats.

I never studied with one of the many bizarre USA outfits, but I studied with say UK ones. They adopt triple marking: supervisor, department and external examiner. If that is dodgy, I have no idea what isn't. Phoenix is dodgy, but scandals show there are fraudulent practices going on at A+ universities favoring certain people, so they are dodgy, too. Degree mills are dodgy because all they want is a valid credit card.
You may have an overidealized and unreal idea of what constitutes classroom settings.
I'll give you example from an online class [I am against ALL forms of classroom] I had to take.
Someone mentioned the word 'queer' and there was an endless fight over it, the hell with queer theorists.
A self-proclaimed tetraplegic student went on a grievance rampage when one mentioned a tetraplegic should not be appointed president.
Two people never stopped arguing as if they were carrying on a feud started elsewhere.
Another said he had been a teacher at Stanford (but was taking a first year course).
One claimed at 22 he had 4 postgraduate degrees...
I posted a mainstream press article and it was argued it could offend one category.
Another posted a mainstream press article and it was argued it could offend another category.
They had all kinds of weird way to interpret and sidetrack materials we were studying taking one issue and running with it.
Do I need THAT?
No way.
Does that add to my learning experience?
No.
Glad I now can do without.

[Geoff Vankirk]

Most DE schools are scams. Look at the University of Phoenix, for example. They operate on a short paper curriculum. For each class one must write a one page short paper. It doesn't matter how much you learn, or if you only spent a few minutes flipping through the basic concepts. UoP just wants the students to write a short paper, which is entirely objective, so they can pass them through and go on to pretend that thy have a curriculum.

Any school who wants you to do work without studying for it is just out to take your money. A real school would be interested in teaching and offering learning opportunities.

With some of these schools (regionally accredited) you can learn more on a family hiking trip than with their entire test/write-out-of-school scam program.

There is an easy solution to what you perceive to be deficiencies at such DE schools. Don't attend UoP or Kaplan or DeVry or whatever school you think sucks. If you own a business then don't hire an employee who has a degree from such a school. If you are looking for a house and you know that one of your prospective neighbors has such a degree, move somewhere else. Problem solved.

RA schools have done more harm to education than diploma mills will ever do. They've made the entire idea of higher education questionable. That's why no one can pin down what a diploma mill is or is not - because these so called "real" schools are capitalizing on the same thing. Going to school isn't about learning anymore.

They do the same thing at the High School level. Don't want to go to High School? Just walk over to your nearest adult education facility and "Test Out" with the GED.

So what should be done about it? Nothing. People just need to realize that all colleges and universities are nothing more than CORPORATIONS out to make a buck. The entire concept of higher education is a scam. There are no "standards" in quality.

A degree is only a piece of paper. Like money and religion, its value is in the eye of the beholder.

U.S. Regional Accreditation is not the be-all and end-all of the higher education world, nor is it the final word on a school's legitimacy. It is unfortunate that a number of people have somehow said it so long and so loudly that many people believe it to be so. On the other hand, RA does signify some minimum standard that the school has attained. Let's call a spade a spade, while there is some grey area, diploma mills don't attempt to provide any coursework. They often take a similar sounding name to a legitimate school, or they obscure their true ownership, or they try some phony, foreign bullshit scam like Sorbon(e) and the VAE and try to capitalize on an ill-informed public in the English-speaking world.  

[ham]

In fact I suggested long ago that one ought to better and carefully RESEARCH a school he's interested in, whether accredited or not, in order to realize whether there are significant chances of having to answer later about the school's 'problems'. Phoenix would be one I'd steer clear of for that reason.

[RespectableGent]

There is an easy solution to what you perceive to be deficiencies at such DE schools. Don't attend UoP or Kaplan or DeVry or whatever school you think sucks. If you own a business then don't hire an employee who has a degree from such a school. If you are looking for a house and you know that one of your prospective neighbors has such a degree, move somewhere else. Problem solved.

I'm not saying don't go there, or don't hire people from there. I'm saying that it's better to disregard the entire concept of education entirely. Higher education is a scam. Degrees are meaningless.

If your intention is to hang out in a hiking class and learn a few things about banana slugs, that's fine.

If you want to take an algebra class, that's fine too.

If you want to "test-out" of school in a week, hey, that's okay too.

I don't care what you do. Just don't expect me to think that your banana slugs, aptitude tests, or introduction to algebra class is going to make my company any money. I don't give a crap if your school is regionally accredited or not.

On the other hand, RA does signify some minimum standard that the school has attained.

No it does not. Have you ever been inside of a High School Special Ed class? RA organizations allow High Schools to release students into the world with full High School diplomas based literally on crayon drawings and picture diaries.

Thousands of Mental Invalids are out there right now with High School diplomas based on pre-school work, which are supposedly worth as much as mine and yours.

There are no "standards of education" maintained in RA High Schools. Those single-test High School mills you see online exist at a higher standard of quality than the quality of work High Schools gives its special needs students for diplomas.

Let's call a spade a spade, while there is some grey area, diploma mills don't attempt to provide any coursework. They often take a similar sounding name to a legitimate school, or they obscure their true ownership, or they try some phony, foreign bullshit scam like Sorbon(e) and the VAE and try to capitalize on an ill-informed public in the English-speaking world.

It's more than a case of "no coursework" which is obscuring the legitimacy of diploma mills. For example, Thomas Edison is more than happy to give you college credits for no coursework. They call it a "portfolio review" of your work history. You can rack up college credits by filling out a few forms. After that they give you the tests to "fill in" the gaps and complete your degree.

Right there we have an example of RA college credits being given out for NO COURSEWORK. So if little unaccredited Joe Schmoe college wants to nix the tests entirely and focus solely on portfolio review of your work and academic history, the only thing stopping them is ethics. "Real" colleges are already giving out credits for no coursework, after all.

[RespectableGent]

U.S. Regional Accreditation is not the be-all and end-all of the higher education world, nor is it the final word on a school's legitimacy.

I know it's not. That's because Regionally Accreditation is NOT LEGITIMATE. They may pretend that standards are there and credits/degrees are all worth the same. But they are not. Not in a single one of them. Even the Ivy Leagues have mobile trailer classes for "special needs" students. They may even bump it up a notch by giving them kindergarten work instead of pre-school work this time around.

Those credits are supposedly just as valid as any other.

Regional Accreditors are the true con men in the world of education.

[ham]

Even the Ivy Leagues have mobile trailer classes for "special needs" students. They may even bump it up a notch by giving them kindergarten work instead of pre-school work this time around.

You are lumping many different problems together. In the 1940-50s, when 'diversity' wasn't god's chosen state of grace, you wouldn't even find such problems.

[Virtual Bison]

There are different ways of organizing.  Other than the great Glen S. McGhee and his FHEAP, I'm not aware of any formal public organizations that deal specifically with our issues.  

Frankly I wonder how many people even understand our issues.  People in education seem to be afflicted with socialist conformist syndrome, and people who aren't so afflicted tend not to be in education too long.  

I don't know that Libertarians are particularly on track either.  Half of them are "social" libertarians, meaning they are essentially either gay or pot smokers (or gay pot smokers), single issue self-interest types.  Of the economic libertarians half of them are Ron Paul types who want to talk all day about Tri-laterals and the Federal Reserve, and don't know or care about practical free market higher education issues.  (As if higher education could ever be called practical.)  And don't get me wrong, I like Ron Paul thematically (less government is good), it's just the implementation that tends to go awry.  

When Spellings was running the DoEd she tried without success to get the cartel to install some "accountability" into the process, such as measures of learning/teaching outcome success.  So although the regime change obviously put that on the back burner, clearly there are some people in the uppermost regions of higher education who understand the notion that for accreditation to be justified it has to mean something.  

If accreditation is going to stand for "quality" you need to be able to measure the quality.  If it's just going to be protectionist thugs beating up on newcomers and cut rate competitors it is less than worthless and needs to go.  

I do see that message in other contexts.  For example, the National Right to Work Foundation is fighting against union goons and forced unionism in the workplace.  But everyone has to work, not everyone has to start up a college.  I see a limited market for members, and an economically outclassed one at that.  Guerilla warfare?  Unless the Organians shame everyone into peace the options seem limited.

A lot to go on here.

But to get started that FHEAP site you linked did look interesting. The Accreditation process is pretty messed up really. I believe that there are some things about it that do not make sense, like how Ashworth College (A school I actually attended BTW) is accredited but other DL programs which are actually harder were rejected. I think that its really a closed system and not really democratic at all.

But to get onto the subject of Libertarianism I think its the only system that I truely can believe in. And Acedemic Freedom is just one aspect of it. I really do not care if my neighbor is gay (as long as he is not a public official trying to tell me what school I can lawfully put on my resume) or smokes pot, but primarily I think there are too many restrictions on freedom. If I am a job seeker and want to put some POS university whose address I found on the back of a matchbook cover, and I get hired for a job than its my employer's fault for not doing the research.

Now I hate Diploma Mills. And I do mean mills in the sense of bogus schools which require nothing more than a credit card number to graduate. But in my line of work I have seen people put all kinds of crap on their resumes, including certifications which are not even real, membership in professional organizations I never heard of and employment at places which are not even in business. Employers need to be smart otherwise its their fault.

RA schools have done more harm to education than diploma mills will ever do. They've made the entire idea of higher education questionable. That's why no one can pin down what a diploma mill is or is not - because these so called "real" schools are capitalizing on the same thing. Going to school isn't about learning anymore.

They do the same thing at the High School level. Don't want to go to High School? Just walk over to your nearest adult education facility and "Test Out" with the GED.

So what should be done about it? Nothing. People just need to realize that all colleges and universities are nothing more than CORPORATIONS out to make a buck. The entire concept of higher education is a scam. There are no "standards" in quality.

A degree is only a piece of paper. Like money and religion, its value is in the eye of the beholder.

No argument. I heard about one dude in Georgia who got his cat a high school diploma from a supposedly legitimate school.

I also heard of College Athletes at Big Ten schools who get admitted with ACT scores of 8. But thats a seperate subject altogether.

There is an easy solution to what you perceive to be deficiencies at such DE schools. Don't attend UoP or Kaplan or DeVry or whatever school you think sucks. If you own a business then don't hire an employee who has a degree from such a school. If you are looking for a house and you know that one of your prospective neighbors has such a degree, move somewhere else. Problem solved.

Good advice.

BTW Devry is a pretty challanging school. I work with DeVry grads and they are all pretty sharp. ITT is not bad either. They have liberal admission standards but the graduation requirements are pretty tough.

In fact I suggested long ago that one ought to better and carefully RESEARCH a school he's interested in, whether accredited or not, in order to realize whether there are significant chances of having to answer later about the school's 'problems'. Phoenix would be one I'd steer clear of for that reason.

Good point.

Out of curiosity, is U of Phoenix a bad school?

[Ben Johnson]

Out of curiosity, is U of Phoenix a bad school?

Just another McSchool.