finishing a degree online?

One thing to keep in mind - getting an online degree might be helpful in your airline career, but if the intention is to have a fall-back if you lose your job or need to work in the real world, stay clear. Many recruiters I've dealt with specifically avoid people who do online degrees or goto places like University of Phoenix. In many cases, these places are similar to the PFJ flight training schools, but instead you are paying for a degree. Naturally you go through the motions, read books, write papers, but it doesn't compare to the rigor and interaction you get in a real University.

I look at alot of resumes at my job (I work for a very large pharmaceutical company) and I instantly weed out any of the University of Phoenix/ ITT Tech etc types of degree people. Actually, I'd much rather see someone who went to a respectable 4-year college for Business with only a BS degree rather than someone who got an MBA from Uni of Phoenix.
 
av8sean said:
One thing to keep in mind - getting an online degree might be helpful in your airline career, but if the intention is to have a fall-back if you lose your job or need to work in the real world, stay clear. Many recruiters I've dealt with specifically avoid people who do online degrees or goto places like University of Phoenix. In many cases, these places are similar to the PFJ flight training schools, but instead you are paying for a degree. Naturally you go through the motions, read books, write papers, but it doesn't compare to the rigor and interaction you get in a real University.

I look at alot of resumes at my job (I work for a very large pharmaceutical company) and I instantly weed out any of the University of Phoenix/ ITT Tech etc types of degree people. Actually, I'd much rather see someone who went to a respectable 4-year college for Business with only a BS degree rather than someone who got an MBA from Uni of Phoenix.
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Not a real University? Not respectable? You're kidding? It takes more discipline to do an online degree, because you don’t have to go to class, or participate in debates, or discussions. If your company is “weeding-out” people who have graduated from UOP then there is a problem with your recruiters. I was promoted to management because I got my BS degree from UOP. It is a real University, they have a campus, you have the option to attend the online-campus, on-campus, or a mixture of both. In-fact more and more Universities are offering degrees online.

UVSU (Utah Valley State University) Offers degrees online, even their aviation degree, Aviation Science, is an online program. Management and HR recruiters are ignorant, to think when they hear “on-line collage, UOP” and to assume the school is not legitimate, and “weed” those people out. One of my good friends graduated with a physiology degree from UOP and is now working with the state as social worker, and has been offered a job in California working with a pharmaceutical company. I have known many people who have graduated from UOP and have landed awesome careers.

As far as ITT Tech, they are not an accredited collage or university, they’re a certificate program. Some of the guys at our information technology team attended ITT Tech and were hired because of that. UOP is a real university…. They may not have a football team, or sorority house, but people loose nothing from not getting the “interaction” you think you only get at a traditional collage. You do, there are students you have to work with and communicate with. So your wrong bro, and your company needs to re-think their staffing strategy. Because there a lot of very talented people who come from UOP. UOP is designed for the working adult seeking a hire education. There not about the social, parties, drinking, and crap you deal with at a collage dorm. It’s for the more mature of us.

I haven’t come a crossed an employer who has looked down on UOP, research it, they have one of the best business degree programs in the nation.
 
Re: thanks for proving my point!

eagledriver101 said:
As far as ITT Tech, they are not an accredited collage or university, they’re a certificate program. Some of the guys at our information technology team attended ITT Tech and were hired because of that. UOP is a real university…. They may not have a football team, or sorority house, but people loose nothing from not getting the “interaction” you think you only get at a traditional collage. You do, there are students you have to work with and communicate with. So your wrong bro, and your company needs to re-think their staffing strategy. Because there a lot of very talented people who come from UOP. UOP is designed for the working adult seeking a hire education. There not about the social, parties, drinking, and crap you deal with at a collage dorm. It’s for the more mature of us.

I haven’t come a crossed an employer who has looked down on UOP, research it, they have one of the best business degree programs in the nation.
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Wow... that pretty much sums up my reasoning about people who do online degrees. It boggles me that someone who graduated with a business degree cannot spell COLLEGE or knows simple things like the difference between "lose" and "loose", "there" or "their". Oh well. At least you can say you have a degree!
 
Re: thanks for proving my point!

av8sean said:
It boggles me...
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"It boggles my mind..." is the accepted usage. That's probably not taught in college though, so I'll give you a bye.

Maybe someday I can be educated enough to have a degree too? I think I'm already smart enough.

:bandit:
 
Re: thanks for proving my point!

Not sure how they could tell the difference. My degree is gonna say Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University on it....not ERAU Online.

And as far as it going through the motions and just buying a degree, you've OBVIOUSLY never taken an online class at Riddle. It's far from an automatic pass, despite what you might think or hear.
 
You're right Sean, I am such an idiot for going to class online and I'm sure I will not be able to compete with others in my peer group of professional fliers. I'm sorry, did I use the correct ‘you're’? I think so, but it could be your, you'ins or another iteration. I think back to a class I had that involved crash dynamics (OK ERAU boys and girls, remember that one?). I had to teach myself the trig in order to estimate accident forces. Oh yeah, and who can forget physics? I happened to take these two classes and two others at the same time while flying my rear end off in the “sand box” for Uncle Sam. The syllabuses for these classes are the same as the classroom, so it takes quite a bit of motivation and brainpower to TEACH yourself this information. I am now enrolled in an online Master's program that a co-worker is doing on campus. We have arranged it that most of our classes are running concurrently. Do you care to guess who's has been harder so far? If you are weeding out folks just because they "attended" online, then I am afraid you slept through some of your in-class HRM courses. So much for the “whole person concept” I guess.
 
To clarify, I wasn't referring to online courses offered by established universities like ERAU. I took a few online classes at my university too. I still think there is a lot to be gained by going to conventional classroom courses and interacting with students and professors face-to-face, especially for people doing business degrees.
 
kellwolf said:
Eh, just get the darn thing. As long as it's an accredited school, it can be Joe Bob University.

I went with ERAU b/c it saved me (oddly enough) a ton of cash. They gave me a lot of credit for my flight ratings, took all of my credit from Mississippi State as transfer credit (they even combined three one hour classes into a three hour elective) and allowed a ton of CLEP test credits. Sure, it's more money per class than some of the other places, but in the long run I'm actually saving money going with ERAU. Of course, your mileage may vary in this situation.

As far as what degree to get.....get it in something you're likely to finish. If I were doing an online degree in business or psychology, I'd be working on it until I was in the grave. I'd have to MAKE myself do all the homework assignments and the tests. With an aviation degree, I WANT to do the assignments. It makes a huge difference, especially in a self-motivating situation like an on-line degree. Now, if I had it to do all over again, I would have finished a history degree at Mississippi State back in the mid-90s instead of dropping out to work for Disney....
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I'm actually already enrolled in the four year already. It's a Business Administration degree which could be beneficial down the road. I am just thinking that I might get on with a regional faster if I finish it online.
 
Re: thanks for proving my point!

av8sean said:
Wow... that pretty much sums up my reasoning about people who do online degrees. It boggles me that someone who graduated with a business degree cannot spell COLLEGE or knows simple things like the difference between "lose" and "loose", "there" or "their". Oh well. At least you can say you have a degree!
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Well sorry for the errors…. I didn’t know I was writing an academic paper. I should have proof read I guess, don’t judge me because I misspelled some words, we all do it sometimes, typos happen. It proves nothing. Of course I know the differences between there and their, and I know how to spell “college” oops is all I can say, but what does it prove? My degree had me making 45k a year before I was 23… Can you say that? Didn’t think so.
 
Re: thanks for proving my point!

kellwolf said:
Not sure how they could tell the difference. My degree is gonna say Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University on it....not ERAU Online.

And as far as it going through the motions and just buying a degree, you've OBVIOUSLY never taken an online class at Riddle. It's far from an automatic pass, despite what you might think or hear.
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There is no difference, as long as its an accredited school, and I believe Embry-riddle is, isn’t it?

My degree was largely online, but the diploma says nothing in reference to taking classes on campus or online.
 
Re: thanks for proving my point!

av8sean

Oh one more thing, because you're in the mood to correct spelling and grammar, I'll return the favor.


Wow... that pretty [Word choice. Pretty is a weak word whose literal meaning is “attractive.” Use a specific adjective to be more effective.] much sums up my reasoning about people who do online degrees. It [It must refer to a specific word in the sentence.] boggles me that someone who graduated with a business degree cannot spell COLLEGE or knows simple things like the difference between "lose" and "loose", [In English, a period or comma always goes inside the quotation marks.] "there" or "their". [In English, a period or comma always goes inside the quotation marks.] Oh [Insert comma] well. At least you [Word choice. You and your mean general humanity. In writing, second person (you and your) should be replaced with a third person pronoun (he, she, it, one, and they). ] can say youhave a degree!

That’s all; I hope this helps in your future writing and correcting of others. Bye.

P.S Watch those comma splices...
 
Well alrighty then...I'm thinking that this one has wandered far enough off-topic.

How's about we all quit the "you don't speak so good, you must be a dummyhead" program and move on to something a little bit more pertinent and productive, eh?
 
Sounds good.

Beach,

Getting your degree on-line is a good idea for the schedule an airline pilot has. My old CFI did an on-line degree. He actually just got his Masters, on his own time, which is the greatest benefit. And don’t listen to the rumors of HR recruiters weeding out candidates solely based from where they earned their degree. It’s simply just not true, when I did my HRM courses I had to research many well-respected HR journals. While having a degree certainly increases your chances of landing a better job, it is still only a portion of the selection process. If you had a Masters in organizational behavior, but the only job experience you have on your resume is pizza-hut. The guy who has 10 years experience will land the job.

Check out the Societyfor Human Resource Management. They talk about the recruiting process of companies all over the world, they even discuss education, and how companies and recruiters feel about college degrees on-line, on campus, what types of degree etc. If you choose to get your degree online you’ll be just fine bro. Good luck!
 
Re: thanks for proving my point!

kellwolf said:
And as far as it going through the motions and just buying a degree, you've OBVIOUSLY never taken an online class at Riddle. It's far from an automatic pass, despite what you might think or hear.
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AGREED!!

Online classes are time consuming and anything but an automatic pass.
 
beechpilot said:
I'm actually already enrolled in the four year already. It's a Business Administration degree which could be beneficial down the road. I am just thinking that I might get on with a regional faster if I finish it online.
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It is very probable that you could get on faster. On-line degrees are generaly much faster because of the way the program is designed to work. For intense, I started my college education a BYU…. It just seemed to drag, I had gotten married, started flying, man it took for ever. So I transferred my credits to University of Phoenixes' on-line business degree program, and had my Bachelors 18 months after I got my associates degree. I calculated it; I could earn about 27 credits in the time it took me to get 15 credits at BYU. I am all for regular colleges, to say one is better than other would be a false statement, nevertheless, it’s about your time and needs, and what fits you personally.

It is almost like comparing flight-training… is one pilot better than the other because he or she took 2 years to get their ratings at a mom and pop FBO, vs. 90 days at ATP’s accelerated program. No. It won’t matter if you go traditional or not, what you get out of it, depends on what you put into it.


 
eagledriver101 said:
It is very probable that you could get on faster. On-line degrees are generaly much faster because of the way the program is designed to work. For intense, I started my college education a BYU…. It just seemed to drag, I had gotten married, started flying, man it took for ever. So I transferred my credits to University of Phoenixes' on-line business degree program, and had my Bachelors 18 months after I got my associates degree. I calculated it; I could earn about 27 credits in the time it took me to get 15 credits at BYU. I am all for regular colleges, to say one is better than other would be a false statement, nevertheless, it’s about your time and needs, and what fits you personally.

It is almost like comparing flight-training… is one pilot better than the other because he or she took 2 years to get their ratings at a mom and pop FBO, vs. 90 days at ATP’s accelerated program. No. It won’t matter if you go traditional or not, what you get out of it, depends on what you put into it.
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Thanks, I appreciate the advice. The school I'm at now is actually at a faster pace than say a traditional school. If I stay on the current track I will obtain an associates and BS in 3 and a half years total. Right now I'm looking at a year and a half left if I stay on my current trck.
 
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