Student Experiences at Western Governors University (WGU)

earweed

erpadmin wrote: »

I doubt that's going to fly. From what I understand about the capstone, you'll be basing that more on the Tech Writing class. LAT1 (ideally) should be on a subject not near and dear to your heart (like technology). Supposed to be about a general topic, that ideally isn't polarizing.

+1 Erp put it a lot better than I would have. The writing classes are an important part of your education and are not to be taken lightly. The Tech writing is your proposal for the project and the capstone is the "results". The LAT1 is merely a normal average everyday research paper that, in a way, is designed to teach you the ins and outs of writing a paper. The tech writing and Capstone don't have all the individual tasks that LAT1 has. You just turn in your paper and you should have learned the process of writing a paper through LAT1.

uhtrinity

Keep in mind the Capstone has to have a deliverable. When I did portfolio, tech writing, and the capstone I wrote about a project I had completed (32 IP camera system & dvr server). The project had been completed for roughly 6 months. All I had to do was pull together the documentation, add some technical and anecdotal evidence, research a few other similar cases and all three of those classes were done in 3 weeks. Since I had completed the project I knew it inside and out. The only additional research involved finding other school districts and their experiences with similar technology.

I suggest that anyone doing a WGU IT degree start on their capstone project early. In hind sight I spent the most time doing the project. Also look over other capstone examples and follow the rubrics exactly.

BlackBella

Any fellow newbies get their webcam today?

I already have one, but still

jahsoul

BlackBella wrote: »

Any fellow newbies get their webcam today?

I already have one, but still

*hitting Bella up on Skype using the school webcam*

lol

BlackBella

jahsoul wrote: »

*hitting Bella up on Skype using the school webcam*

lol

If only I could remember my skype name. lol!

Facebook and twitter chick.


The GSU in me hurts that you are a Auburn person

jahsoul

BlackBella wrote: »

If only I could remember my skype name. lol!

Facebook and twitter chick.


The GSU in me hurts that you are a Auburn person

LMBO.....don't hurt, we can still get along...lol. *ehug*

themagicone

Anyone else have those times you doubt yourself? I'm really starting to question myself on if a degree in IT is right for me. After finishing 45 CU at WGU this whole IT business isn't clicking with me. Could be 70-680 is seriously kicking my butt. I do want to get into network engineering but the only thing in the degree from WGU has for that is the CCNA class, all the other stuff is geared towards helpdesk and admin work. I got a week to think about before I set AAV for a new term. I was working on 70-680 and another class to take first week of the new term but I put it aside to finish Network+. It isn't part of my degree but I figured I might as well get it.

veritas_libertas

themagicone wrote: »

Anyone else have those times you doubt yourself? I'm really starting to question myself on if a degree in IT is right for me. After finishing 45 CU at WGU this whole IT business isn't clicking with me. Could be 70-680 is seriously kicking my butt. I do want to get into network engineering but the only thing in the degree from WGU has for that is the CCNA class, all the other stuff is geared towards helpdesk and admin work. I got a week to think about before I set AAV for a new term. I was working on 70-680 and another class to take first week of the new term but I put it aside to finish Network+. It isn't part of my degree but I figured I might as well get it.

Maybe you are just sick of studying for something you don't care about?

erpadmin

themagicone wrote: »

Anyone else have those times you doubt yourself? I'm really starting to question myself on if a degree in IT is right for me. After finishing 45 CU at WGU this whole IT business isn't clicking with me. Could be 70-680 is seriously kicking my butt. I do want to get into network engineering but the only thing in the degree from WGU has for that is the CCNA class, all the other stuff is geared towards helpdesk and admin work. I got a week to think about before I set AAV for a new term. I was working on 70-680 and another class to take first week of the new term but I put it aside to finish Network+. It isn't part of my degree but I figured I might as well get it.

70-680 is *arguably* one of the hardest exams in the MCITP:EA track. To put that into perspective, many folks on TE and even techs that I personally know failed the 70-270 (the XP exam for the MCSE track). The client exam, I've been advised, is something you have to attack much harder than A+/Network+ combined. This is why I, personally, saved that bad boy for last. I don't even have Windows 7 at either my workstation and/or my laptop.

The good news about the 70-680 is that we have access to the Labsims now! I'm starting the 70-642 hopefully this week if work hasn't kicked my butt too much for daring to take a week's vacation. What I plan on doing is watching the videos and doing the labs and then supplementing what I've watched with the MS Press guides AND the Sybex guide. The difference between 2008 and 2008 R2 (functionally) is pretty nil, so it should not be a problem for me.

But I recommend just going through the LabSims with 70-680 and see if it helps you out. While they're not TrainSignal or CBT Nuggets....they're better than nothing if you like CBT Training and if you were to buy them buy yourself, they do offer a pass guarantee (which I doubt would fly with us, as we get them through the school). But that's at least a bit comforting.

themagicone

I have the labsim for the 70-680 but I will agree it is the hardest test I've studied for so far. I have failed every section exam in labsim and I'm only 50% through it. It is one of those "why in the world do I need to know this?" kind of things. If I need to figure out how to deploy windows 7 via network and winpe, I'll google it. My career goals are no where close to needing to know that.

That aside I might get lucky this week. I had a prescreening last week for an entry level cisco engineer position. I was told I passed and would be getting a phone interview this week. It is 3 months of unpaid internship to begin with paid training to get my CCNA and above then after the 3 months it starts at $25/hour and up. May be if I get that I'll get my motivation back to get back to studying.

earweed

The labsim section exams are hard to pass. Most have 4-6 questions and 80% is passing. I pass very few of them but I do review what the right answers are. The labsim test questions are actually not that far off from the difficulty of the real test question difficulty.
If you check out the client server community you'll find a lot of people who failed the 680 multiple times.

veritas_libertas

erpadmin wrote: »

70-680 is *arguably* one of the hardest exams in the MCITP:EA track. To put that into perspective, many folks on TE and even techs that I personally know failed the 70-270 (the XP exam for the MCSE track). The client exam, I've been advised, is something you have to attack much harder than A+/Network+ combined. This is why I, personally, saved that bad boy for last. I don't even have Windows 7 at either my workstation and/or my laptop.

The good news about the 70-680 is that we have access to the Labsims now! I'm starting the 70-642 hopefully this week if work hasn't kicked my butt too much for daring to take a week's vacation. What I plan on doing is watching the videos and doing the labs and then supplementing what I've watched with the MS Press guides AND the Sybex guide. The difference between 2008 and 2008 R2 (functionally) is pretty nil, so it should not be a problem for me.

But I recommend just going through the LabSims with 70-680 and see if it helps you out. While they're not TrainSignal or CBT Nuggets....they're better than nothing if you like CBT Training and if you were to buy them buy yourself, they do offer a pass guarantee (which I doubt would fly with us, as we get them through the school). But that's at least a bit comforting.

Yeah the 70-680 really beat on me hard. I didn't pass the 70-685 on the first shot and I still haven't taken it a second time. I will eventually get to it...

eansdad

I can't believe the software we can use. I figured M$ would give access to DreamSpark type software but I was surprised to see Exchange 2007 and 2010 beta, Enterprise versions for Server 2008 almost everything except Office and other add on server software like SCCM(SMS).

On a side note I feel like a slacker...everyone else going for IT certs/classes first while I started with Gen Ed classes. Although I've already finished LAE1 and will have BBC1 tomorrow with QLC1 scheduled for next weekend and might take the WFV1 by next weekend also. Anyone else feel like they should get the Gen Ed stuff out of the way first? I wanted to clear math, english and maybe either natural or social science before going after IT related courses.

earweed

A lot of people either do the gen eds first or just mix and match the IT and gen eds. I took the A+ and WFV1 my first term and didn't touch and IT for the next 2 terms. After that it's been all IT all the time.
One thing about waiting to do either one is that WGU does do program changes and you could get caught in the middle of one so it's best to finish either the geneds or IT stuff early.

erpadmin

eansdad wrote: »

I can't believe the software we can use. I figured M$ would give access to DreamSpark type software but I was surprised to see Exchange 2007 and 2010 beta, Enterprise versions for Server 2008 almost everything except Office and other add on server software like SCCM(SMS).

On a side note I feel like a slacker...everyone else going for IT certs/classes first while I started with Gen Ed classes. Although I've already finished LAE1 and will have BBC1 tomorrow with QLC1 scheduled for next weekend and might take the WFV1 by next weekend also. Anyone else feel like they should get the Gen Ed stuff out of the way first? I wanted to clear math, english and maybe either natural or social science before going after IT related courses.

Eans, as you could tell, I'm pretty much in the same boat you're in. I'm STILL waiting on my LAT1 paper to be graded...before I work on LUT1, but I'll be happy when that's out of the way (I don't know how much free time you have, but you are most likely not going to kill LAT1 the same way you did LAE1....don't feel discouraged though lol). QLC1 and QLT1 I'm going to do next semester...those are going to be my first classes along with the MS 70-640. I want to do a cert and am happy with the GE classes I did knock out so I want to get my head in the game for my real certs. Once I'm done with QLT1, QLC1 and 70-640, I'm shooting straight for INT1 and then if there's time, Project+. (I want Project+ done before end of Q'1 2011.)

I would love to hear about your QLC1 experiences though....I hate math like no other.

BTW, from DreamSpark, make sure you get Server 2008 R2 (not the regular one)....if you can "find" a legit Enterprise key, that will be so much better for you...thankfully, my coworker hooked me up without me having to use Magic Jelly Bean on R2 servers we have. .

eansdad

Already had 2008R2 thanks to work. With the natural sciences at 4 each I'm tempted to leave them for next semester (them plus 1 class for my 12) so I would have more time on other classes. I actually want to take my A+ and Sec+ in Jan for the CE part of the title. I know it doesn't mean much but I like fancy letters...lol. I might take Project+ this semester. Just remember math is easy since it rarely ever changes. Plus my office is about 10 feet from an Algebra/Geometry class room (the joys of working in a high school).

erpadmin

eansdad wrote: »

I actually want to take my A+ and Sec+ in Jan for the CE part of the title. I know it doesn't mean much but I like fancy letters...lol. I might take Project+ this semester.

LOL...you are the first person that I know of that DOESN'T want CompTIA lifetime certs.... .

CE,CEUs are all right though...in my 13 going on 14 years of Public Service, I've gotten a few of them myself. But I'm going to allow my resume speak for my A+, Network+ experience.

Seriously though, that's not a bad deal though for you.

erpadmin

eansdad wrote: »

Plus my office is about 10 feet from an Algebra/Geometry class room (the joys of working in a high school).

I'm sure I could get math if I found a cutie math teacher to help me along....

Wifey may not care too much for that though....

eansdad

erpadmin wrote: »

I'm sure I could get math if I found a cutie math teacher to help me along....

Wifey may not care too much for that though....

Well....considering it's a guy AND my wife's cousin I don't think that would work for me...

erpadmin

eansdad wrote: »

Well....considering it's a guy AND my wife's cousin I don't think that would work for me...

Well......no that probably wouldn't work....but I was definitely thinking for myself (and also of the female variety..... ).

BlackBella

I take a single male math pattern if I needed to take math. On grounds he have to eat my good food

themagicone

The math classes scarred me. BUT I finished all 3 in less than 3 weeks. The first one is the hardest as it covers the most. The 2nd is only 11 questions. As long as you have common sense and know mean, avg, mode, etc you'll pass. Last one took me the shortest, 2 hours. Follow the links for the graphing software and use that. Very very easy. The hardest classes are getting me now, social science and language arts. I'm not going to discuss my hatred for 70-680 again.

erpadmin

I sent my final paper today. There were definitely some "lessons learned" (you'll hear that a lot in the Project Management world.....A LOT...lmao.) Here is some stuff you will want to do if you want to breeze through LAT1:

1) Pick a general topic that might be considered unique. I went with gentrification and how it's a good thing for low income neighborhoods. When your grader comes back to you with something like "interesting topic" you'll know you're on the right path. I was actually inspired to go the non-technical route by themagicone (thanks buddy!)

2) books.google.com and WGU's ebrary are definitely places you want to go to for your book sources. Keep in mind that books.google.com will kill a lot of pages due to copyright issues, but the free pages you get from your google sources may be enough. When you find a source you like, you may want to save it in your google library so you can come back (use your wgu email to sign into google). Also, you want to find a topic that can be found in academic databases like ebscohost (I believe WGU has those databases available, but since I work at a college, I have access to it as well). You will also want at least two newspapers. But the magic number is 10 sources. Now did I read 10 sources? Well, the academic journals and newspaper articles were short enough....but where e-books come into play is you can SEARCH the item you want to talk about in your topic and then you're gonna paraphrase that. No one has time to actually read 200-300 page books when they have other stuff to do. (searchable e-books FTW). MAKE SURE you get your WGU ebrary account from the librarian so you can get rocking and rolling. Searching for 10 sources that I could "make it work" was what took me so long to get LAT1 done.

3) You will not be using copy and paste that much. Your best bet is to paraphrase and synthesize...you will learn how to do that in your tasks. You're going to direct quote very sparingly, if at all. When you do paraphrase, you still have to cite.

4) Get MS Office 2007/2010 if you haven't already. The References tab is your friend...you can create your bibliography right into Word and then when you annotate it, you can do it right there. Remember, in APA, only the first word of the title, the first word of your subtitle, and ANY proper noun is capitalized. The rest is lower case. You can also use BibMe: Fast & Easy Bibliography Maker - MLA, APA, Chicago, Turabian - Free to create your bibliography (which is what I did). But what's cool about Word 2007 is when I want to cite something, I just point my mouse to the source and I get my in-text citations done for me. Saves me time from typing that again.

5) Mindedge is still your friend....a couple of those video tips actually helped me out. Work through Mindedge to get your paper done.

6) READ THE INSTRUCTIONS AND RUBRICS FOR YOUR LAT1 TASK! So far, I only had 2 revisions, but one of them was definitely my fault. My last revision, I sent the grader the wrong file. Thankfully, I was able to talk wifey into emailing me the correct file so that I could reupload it back to the grader and wait the whole 8-9 hours. LOL. The 1st revision I didn't cite my newspaper articles correctly (it should have been the same as my other sources). I am hoping there isn't a 3rd revision but I'll know hopefully later on today.....this is for the "final" task. If that's accepted then I'm done. Then it's off to LUT1 which by all accounts should be a walk in the park.

As I said earlier, LAT1 is not hard, but there is just so much crap involved and for a 2 CU course....wow! Hopefully I'm done, but until I hear back, LAT1 will stay where it is on my sig.

It is my hope this post helps someone out. As themagicone (once again, my thanks to you!) helped me out, I too wish to pay it forward. I'm a big subscriber to that. Of course, if you have any questions on LAT, I'll answer them. As well as if there is anything additional that perhaps I missed. From the time I was done with my third task til my drafts (rough and final) it took me about a week to get the paper to "look right". This was not LAE1....unless you love writing AND have nothing else to do, expect to spend some serious time on LAT1. Serious time...

earweed

^^^+1
When I took the course it was called LCTA and included the paper AND the presentation. It was 3 CUs and due to getting revisions on nearly every task AND the slow graders that course is the only one to besmirch my SAP. I didn't get it done in time for the end of term. My own fault for not putting in enough REAL effort and I also started it out not having used Microsoft Word before EVER. As Erpadmin pointed out once you learn the reference citing tools in Word 2007 it really helps a lot.

themagicone

I've used Office my whole life and never knew about the reference tool till now. And I'm already done with my paper, dang. Learn the hard way I guess. Congrats on getting it done. LUT is a cakewalk compared to lat.

erpadmin

themagicone wrote: »

I've used Office my whole life and never knew about the reference tool till now. And I'm already done with my paper, dang. Learn the hard way I guess. Congrats on getting it done. LUT is a cakewalk compared to lat.

Me too...it wasn't until I did APA google searching that I saw some professor at some school introduce that to me. I do not believe that could be done in Word 2003 (I think that's new to Word 2007....MAYBE it's an add-on in 2003, but who knows/cares at this point). The only Office I never used was Office XP....but Office 95, 97, 2000 (garbage!), 2003 and now 2007 have been used.

Still haven't heard back from the grader, but it's probably gonna be yet another end-of-day type deal before I hear back. In the meantime, I'm just gonna concentrate on LUT1 so that hopefully I can be done by the weekend. I gotta see if I can find the USB cable for my camera....should be in my office. Just glad the English is near done so I can do some 70-642 work.....that's all I'm doing the rest of the term. But whether it's 19 CUs or 25, I'm going into the next term with 100% SAP! Yee haw!! (I think the terms of my scholarship require 100% SAP....but it was erpadmin's policy to do that as well anyway..... )

themagicone

Is anyone going to be tackling GUT1 around January? I have it in line to do it in my next term. It's a team project so it'd be nice to do it with someone on here.

earweed

I saw where blackbella is doing that class this term. You may want to PM her.

erpadmin

Holy Mackeral!!! It's over!!!!

From the grader ....:

"Great work on a detailed assessment. The paper is informative to the topic and well structured."

Seriously, definitely heed my last post about LAT1!

Oh happy day! LOL. It really was work though.......

eansdad

Gratz.....I took my BBC1 today and passed. Only QLC1 on the 24th and WLV1 left for the semester.