Can I get some recommendations for accredited online colleges?

First, please don't suggest University of Phoenix...that's all I ask.

I'm looking for some suggestions for universities that offer IT related bachelor's degrees that can be completed entirely online. I've got a lot of credits towards one but just haven't finished is all and I want to take advantage of my employer's offer to pay for tuition.

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kriscamaro68

wgu.edu

This is where I will be getting my degree from. I will be starting this year. The nice thing is that you get cert's while going to school there and tuition pricing is actually pretty good. Also if you can focus you can get your b.s. in i.t. in less time. If you already have certs that counts towards the degree and also quite a few people from this site go there and say they have good experience with them.

ajmatson

moonlight08 wrote: »

First, please don't suggest University of Phoenix...that's all I ask.

I'm looking for some suggestions for universities that offer IT related bachelor's degrees that can be completed entirely online. I've got a lot of credits towards one but just haven't finished is all and I want to take advantage of my employer's offer to pay for tuition.

+1 for running from University of Phoenix
+1 also for WGU.

I was i nthe same situation as you needing an online college and just spent the last year throwing away $1600 a month at University of Phoenix. It is the biggest joke of an institution I have seen in my long college life. Hell I learned more in one semester at community college then UOP all year.

That being said I have been workign with a conselor at WGU (Spencer Smith) since November and have been satisified thus far. I finally decided to enroll and I start March 1st. WGU has been ther answering my questions 24/7 and even students that I have talked to there are happy on the type of learning and services/programs offered. I take my Education Without Boundries class for the first two weeks then right away jump into my degree and certs.

I recommend taking a look at WGU and asking around. I am sure you will like what you hear. If you get a referal from a current student they will waive your application fee as well.

dynamik

WGU, Capella, Nova Southeastern (would be my pick).

veritas_libertas

dynamik wrote: »

WGU, Capella, Nova Southeastern (would be my pick).

+1, all good suggestions from Dynamik! I am seriously considering Nova or Capella for my Master degree after WGU.

Zartanasaurus

Find a college local to you. See what they are offering online. Generally going to be way cheaper than the well-known yet of dubious respect from HR online-only college. If they are close enough, but don't offer the exact degree you want online, you can do a lot of the course work online and pick up the extra courses you need for your concentration the B&M way. Plus if you change your mind a few years in and decide you'd rather major in something like business or finance to be more well-rounded, you're guaranteed that your credits will carry over.

No one is going to question your degree from a state college even if you did it all online. Someone might see WGU on your resume and toss it in the trash.

I know many will disagree here, but the first place you should look is a local B&M college and do as much as you can online. If you really have a legitimate reason for not being able to get your degree that route and it's not just excuses, that's when you look at places like WGU.

veritas_libertas

Zartanasaurus wrote: »

I know many will disagree here, but the first place you should look is a local B&M college and do as much as you can online. If you really have a legitimate reason for not being able to get your degree that route and it's not just excuses, that's when you look at places like WGU.

Agreed...

cablegod

WGU all the way!

SephStorm

dynamik wrote: »

WGU, Capella, Nova Southeastern (would be my pick).

Any specific reasoning for the later 2?

msteinhilber

I agree with the recommendation to look into a brick and mortar first and see if they have online options or evening classes that you can manage to get to first. I went this route both when I opted to obtain my bachelor's degree but ended up not going that route as when I started down that path there was little to be offered unless I went for strictly a business degree.

I re-evaluated my options upon starting my master's degree and in my region the only real choice for me again was a MBA program, which while would have come from a great school wasn't quite what I was looking for. In the end I went the WGU route. I trust that schools such as WGU will continue to become more popular and the paradigm will continue to slowly shift into a more accepting atmosphere in relation to HR and hiring managers not giving as much weight or in some cases looking down upon online institutions. In the mean time, it's a risk I factored in that I might not be considered for some jobs based on where I obtained my degree's but I was comfortable with my decision in the end.

SephStorm

Me personally, I am against B&M schools. Most people agree that they learned very little at college, or very little that was relevant to the rest of their lives. I have no use in spending thousands of dollars to be lectured by uncaring instructors, cram for a few exams and be given a degree that in the current economy (And IMO, in the future), means very little.

The other side of that for me is:

1. Hands on experience. Not happening on the school's dime with an online school. Then again, I don't hear about too many four years doing this as well. Of course this does give you the opportunity to set up your own labs that are on line with current technologies, rather than a school lab several years behind.

2. I don't remember what this was

msteinhilber

SephStorm wrote: »

Me personally, I am against B&M schools. Most people agree that they learned very little at college, or very little that was relevant to the rest of their lives. I have no use in spending thousands of dollars to be lectured by uncaring instructors, cram for a few exams and be given a degree that in the current economy (And IMO, in the future), means very little.

The what you learn in school being applied to the real world argument is one that is often brought up by people who didn't spend enough time investing themselves into the material. I've learned a great deal through the classes that I have taken that were not strictly IT related in my studies (the classes that I assume you are referring to). I'm not sure precisely what this argument you present has against B&M schools rather than online schools though as any accredited online school is going to have similar content that is outside of the core major (all of those pesky general education credits). So since you have the same type of courses at the B&M and online schools (for the most part), what exactly is the purpose of your post? It sounds like it's strictly to rant, which isn't really contributing anything to this thread.

B&M or online schools alike, will provide an advantage as long as the student applies themselves. That means you don't just go through the IT related courses with great enthusiasm and slack off with the rest of the content, that other stuff believe it or not matters. And as far as uncaring professors, why should they bother to care when the student in this case (you) doesn't seem to care themselves?

SephStorm

interesting. It seemed like you were putting down online schools for a similar reason, that they weren't as good as B&M schools.

I do think that it requires something special to succeed online, dedication and organization. Hopefully I can master this when I pursue my degree online.

msteinhilber

SephStorm wrote: »

interesting. It seemed like you were putting down online schools for a similar reason, that they weren't as good as B&M schools.

I do think that it requires something special to succeed online, dedication and organization. Hopefully I can master this when I pursue my degree online.

Not really putting down online schools at all, I attained my B.S. through a hybrid of mostly online and some evening on-campus classes and my master's will be entirely online. It's just that some people in positions to hire, or those who fall between you and the path to the hiring manager, sometimes don't give an online school as much credit as they deserve. Granted, there are online and brick and mortar schools alike that have bad reputations - but I just commented that online schools, in general, have some time to go yet in terms of people in positions to hire look at them with the same eyes as they do a B&M school.

I agree with the dedication and organization to succeed online, you have to be able to motivate yourself and control the many distractions around you. Once you remove the physical classroom, it's a lot easier to procrastinate and slack a bit. Kinda like I'm doing right now having wasted a couple of hours doing other things when I should have been studying

earweed

I'm currently going to WGU. As far as the hands on experience goes, that's up to the student.
If you follow a course's course of study (syllabus) you WILL get hands on experience. If all you do is try to pass the course/get cert then you're cheating yourself. We have software supplied (MSDNAA/Dreamspark/VMWare) and extra books (24x7) that not getting the training you need is your own fault. You get out what you put in.

jiovalon

Good day,

I am from Bogota-Colombia, I'm interested in doing the Master of Business Administration in Information Technology Management WGU online, so if Anyone Could please send me an invite, I'd Greatly appreciate it.

I have doubts whether the certification help for the credits, someone can tell me also the quality of education at WGU

Email: jiovanny.alonso @ hotmail.com

Thanks

Timberwolf5578

moonlight08 wrote: »

First, please don't suggest University of Phoenix...that's all I ask.

I'm looking for some suggestions for universities that offer IT related bachelor's degrees that can be completed entirely online. I've got a lot of credits towards one but just haven't finished is all and I want to take advantage of my employer's offer to pay for tuition.

Capella University is excellent.

kaldrouby

Do you guys know if WGU accept a B.S from ITT Tech ? i just graduated with a four year degree in information system security with a high GPA. and would like to take my Masters at WGU .

Iristheangel

jiovalon wrote: »

Good day,

I am from Bogota-Colombia, I'm interested in doing the Master of Business Administration in Information Technology Management WGU online, so if Anyone Could please send me an invite, I'd Greatly appreciate it.

I have doubts whether the certification help for the credits, someone can tell me also the quality of education at WGU

Email: jiovanny.alonso @ hotmail.com

Thanks

I sent you a PM

erpadmin

Iristheangel wrote: »

I sent you a PM

WGU might not accept him because he's in Colombia. The only "foreign" country that WGU will take students from is Canada. Overseas Americans in the military are also the exception.

jdancer

For a list of accredited schools, goto:

geteducated.com
degreeinfo.com

Pishof

kaldrouby wrote: »

Do you guys know if WGU accept a B.S from ITT Tech ? i just graduated with a four year degree in information system security with a high GPA. and would like to take my Masters at WGU .

Yes, they should accept transfers from there.

msganti

Since WGU is both Nationally and Regionally accredited, it will accept both types of degrees. ITT is nationally accredited, so it should be acceptable.

The only other school I know of, which is dual-accredited like WGU, is American Public University.

LinuxRacr

I second this. They accepted my A.A.S. from ITT Tech, along with classes I took while at University of Phoenix.

cmorris1441

I've applied to the Penn state World Campus and hopefully I'll start there in the Fall. I've already taken a bunch of courses at local B&M colleges and hopefully after transferring them I'll have less than 2 years to get my Bachelors in IST.

IMO, a big advantage to going the PSU route is when you graduate you're degree and diploma will be the same as the B&M degrees and diplomas, whereas with WGU an employer could find out that you got your degree online by doing a simple Google search of the college. I think that online degrees and colleges have lower reputations than B&M degrees because of "degree mills" like UoP and ITT Tech. However, online colleges are only going to continue to become more popular because of the cost comparison to B&M schools and in 5-10 years online degrees will probably be considered equal to B&M degrees.

Penn State is also well-known and it has a lot more academic prestige than WGU. If I was starting my degrees in a few years, rather than finishing up the second half of it now, then I would probably go WGU because of the price and because you can go at your own pace.

Good luck either way!

joneno

Hey cmorris,
is that graduate or undergraduate you are talking about?

SteveLord

cmorris1441 wrote: »

I've applied to the Penn state World Campus and hopefully I'll start there in the Fall. I've already taken a bunch of courses at local B&M colleges and hopefully after transferring them I'll have less than 2 years to get my Bachelors in IST.

IMO, a big advantage to going the PSU route is when you graduate you're degree and diploma will be the same as the B&M degrees and diplomas, whereas with WGU an employer could find out that you got your degree online by doing a simple Google search of the college. I think that online degrees and colleges have lower reputations than B&M degrees because of "degree mills" like UoP and ITT Tech. However, online colleges are only going to continue to become more popular because of the cost comparison to B&M schools and in 5-10 years online degrees will probably be considered equal to B&M degrees.

Penn State is also well-known and it has a lot more academic prestige than WGU. If I was starting my degrees in a few years, rather than finishing up the second half of it now, then I would probably go WGU because of the price and because you can go at your own pace.

Good luck either way!

BS-IT
125 credits required.
Average tuition cost per - $513.50
Total cost $64,187.50 Wow...

Am I calculating this right?

cmorris1441

joneno wrote: »

Hey cmorris,
is that graduate or undergraduate you are talking about?

Undergraduate.
Penn State | Online Bachelor of Science in Information Sciences and Technology | Course List

SteveLord wrote: »

BS-IT
125 credits required.
Average tuition cost per - $513.50
Total cost $64,187.50 Wow...

Am I calculating this right?

Penn State | Online Bachelor of Science in Information Sciences and Technology | Costs
Flat rate of $6,625/semester ($6,625 * 4 semesters = $26,500) for me before Financial Aid. So if you don't get any FA or if you're not transferring, it's quite expensive compared to WGU.

I've spent about $8k on the courses I'm transferring so $8,000 + $26,500 = $34,500.

joneno

got you.

erpadmin

cmorris1441 wrote: »

Penn State is also well-known and it has a lot more academic prestige than WGU. If I was starting my degrees in a few years, rather than finishing up the second half of it now, then I would probably go WGU because of the price and because you can go at your own pace.

Good luck either way!

With your own logic, I hope you live in State College, PA or reasonably close to the town. Otherwise, your whole argument doesn't hold water--in your case, employers will just say you paid for an online degree with the Penn State name. [I'm using your own argument as my counter argument.]

The only way your argument can make sense is if you lived in close proximity to Penn State. Otherwise, all you are saying is that you paid for an Online School with a recognizable name.

Also...this was something I picked up reading the MIT vs. MITx and Harvard vs Havard Extension school articles. Even though your degree will say Penn State on it...if you ever find yourself with a hiring manager who went to Penn State, and he starts asking questions only someone who physically went to school there could answer, you might find yourself in a potential quandry. (Unless you state from the onset that you did your degree online.) No amount of Google can help you answer those questions either, it's stupid little stuff that's quasi-secret. (Not really secret, but not exactly blogged about either...) This is stuff I'm picking up now with my own B&M adventures at the graduate level.

Just keep that in mind...

cmorris1441

erpadmin wrote: »

With your own logic, I hope you live in State College, PA or reasonably close to the town. Otherwise, your whole argument doesn't hold water--in your case, employers will just say you paid for an online degree with the Penn State name. [I'm using your own argument as my counter argument.]

I live in CT, so I'm not right near it, but I'm pretty close. Either way, if I'm not sure that would make a difference unless I was pretty far away. Otherwise, it would probably look like I went there out of state. If I listed a job on my resume in CT though, then I could see your point. I work as a freelancer though so that's not an issue.

Good point about the hiring manager. I definitely would never claim to have physically gone to the PSU campus on my resume or in an interview, nor would I say that it was online, unless I was asked.