Re: [MLUG - DISCUSSION] Killfiled, was DNA Offers New Insight Concerning Cat Evolution

[Mike Miller <EMAIL:PROTECTED>]

On Sat, 7 Jan 2006, Vern Green wrote:

> So here is another question. I have heard people belittle institutions 
> like technical schools and schools like University of Pheonix and so on. 
> They say they are diploma mills even though the accreditation process 
> that UoP goes through is much more rigorous than any state institution.

I don't know anything about those processes.


> I guess here is another argument, that argument is: Are these schools 
> diploma mills and even if they are, is the education any worse if you 
> have a motivated adult such as myself who is working and learning 
> attending every class and working his tail off, compared to a 19 year 
> old who would rather sleep in and party than attend class.

I think a "diploma mill" would be a place that provides diplomas to people 
they haven't educated:

http://www.webster.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?va=diploma+mill

So distance-learning institutions are not diploma mills.  I've never heard 
anyone put down U Phoenix, but that doesn't mean it doesn't happen.  We 
probably don't get applications for grad school from such places.


> The real question I guess, is a 3.2 or 3.3 gpa at a state funded 
> University such as MU going to be better respected than a 3.7 or 3.8 at 
> a University of Pheonix type school, if everything else remains the 
> same?

You know, outside of applications for grad schools, the GPA is probably 
not going to mean anything.  Most employers don't look at it, or so I'm 
told.  With applications to grad school, I have sat on committees and we 
do care about GPA, but not as much as you might think.  The GPA is very 
hard to use well because a student's GPA depends on the courses s/he 
takes.  So I look at the full transcript to see what the student actually 
took and how s/he did in the courses that are going to matter to 
performance in our training program.  Sometimes a student blew off a 
semester at some point early in college and the overall GPA suffered a 
lot.  I try not to count that against the student too much because some 
young people take a little longer to get their acts together.  The 
*really* important thing for me is the GRE because that is the same for 
every student.  It allows me to compare them better.  In the end, many 
things are taken into account -- letters, personal statements, etc. -- and 
a decision is made based on the whole package.


> I also notice many Universities are moving into online education as 
> well. What is the general consensus about these types of programs? Mike, 
> even University of Minnesota has a distance learning online program. I 
> am of the mindset that any accredited school should have a good program, 
> isn't that what accreditation is all about? That of course is just my 
> opinion, and I am interested in yours.

I know that we are starting to do that kind of thing.  I haven't wanted to 
prepare such courses myself.  The only thing I don't know about is exams 
and how they are administered.  I'm all for distance learning and I would 
expect students to learn just as well that way as with ordinary classroom 
instruction.  We all know that most learning is really self-instruction. 
You have to read the material and struggle with it.  Teachers help, but 
most of the learning happens with the student alone with the materials 
(book, papers, homework assignments, videos, slide shows, etc).

Mike

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