I can't wait for a fully online without human University. I'd like speed running to be a thing
Check out Western Governors University, it's self-paced.
University of the People: Tuition-Free, Accredited Online Degree Programs
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Re: University of the People: Tuition-Free, Accredited Online Degree Programs
#22I can't wait for a fully online without human University. I'd like speed running to be a thing
Speed running comp. sci. in 6 months!
Re: University of the People: Tuition-Free, Accredited Online Degree Programs
#23Current student in the CS program. Feel free to ask questions.
Rigor?
Modest to "it depends." I'd place it on par with a local community college for myself. However, I think it depends more on the student.
The instructors act more as moderators rather than instructors. There are no lectures, and they have limited interaction (e.g., a few posts in the forums and responses to our weekly learning journals). Thus, it's hard to really take advantage of their knowledge.
Instructor are also volunteers. I've read that they're paid a small honorarium, but I've been unable to find supporting evidence in any school documentation. (Granted, I haven't looked hard.)
You will primarily teach yourself through course materials. The materials can vary from excellent to awful. Thus, it can be a challenge sometimes. (Fortunately, I've been to grad school [education field] in the past, so it's not much of an issue for me.)
The school talks about "peer learning," but it is poorly integrated. It mainly amounts to peer assessments and required discussion forum posts. So, as you might guess, the quality of the latter varies wildly.
There are definitely quite a few students who struggle, and there's not a lot of support structure built into the school yet. (It's still young. ~10 years old.)
The CS curriculum is fairly standard (e.g., operating systems, programming, algorithms, data structures, etc.).
Re: University of the People: Tuition-Free, Accredited Online Degree Programs
#24Is this available to international students?
Yes. In fact, I believe most of the students are international students. In my last course, I had students from Nigeria, Italy, Germany, the US, Vietnam, and China.
Re: University of the People: Tuition-Free, Accredited Online Degree Programs
#25I can't wait for a fully online without human University. I'd like speed running to be a thing
You can kinda do that already. In my first semester at WGU I went through about 20 classes. It’s competency based and you can complete classes as soon as you master the material.
Re: University of the People: Tuition-Free, Accredited Online Degree Programs
#26Is UoPeople completely free? Are there any costs? While we have removed most of the costs associated with attending a university, we do still have some fees to help us keep UoPeople running, and take care of all the admin and processing work we have to do for all of our students. To cover these fees we ask for: A one time non-refundable application fee of $60 and, For undergraduates: an assessment fee of $100 per cou…
Accredited or not, “university of the people” sounds just like “hard knocks university”, “life college”, etc. Works for the Saul Goodman’s of the world, maybe.
Re: University of the People: Tuition-Free, Accredited Online Degree Programs
#27Great, they made it tuition-free, accredited, and online; now take it all the way and get rid of the idiotic hoop-jumping of the admissions process! Edit: I know nothing about their admissions process, only that they have one . Somebody's unimaginative I see. "Admissions" should be filling out a form including contact info, bank info and so forth, and then verifying that it's all true. What could they (or you downvot…
As a US based student, it wasn't too difficulty. It's comparative to any other school in the US. For students outside the US and particularly outside English speaking countries, it can be more involved.
Re: University of the People: Tuition-Free, Accredited Online Degree Programs
#28They sure ask for a lot of information for signing up, which make me think that it is not free.
Re: University of the People: Tuition-Free, Accredited Online Degree Programs
#29The first question I always ask of these weird online universities is, are they regionally accredited? National accreditation is not really a high bar and isn’t considered competitive; all legitimate institutions of higher learning should qualify for and receive regional accreditation from an appropriate authority before considering such study in one’s best interest. This online learning site is eligible for regional…
So what makes regional accreditation so great? Do other countries have it? Why can’t a major regional body go national? Is it the law? It all sounds like a scam from that to textbooks.
Regional accreditation is the "gold standard" in the US. National accreditation is consider below that. However, the school is accredited by the DEAC which is recognized by the US Department of Education. (Some have tried to claim the school is unaccredited, but that is false.)
Re: University of the People: Tuition-Free, Accredited Online Degree Programs
#30I can't wait for a fully online without human University. I'd like speed running to be a thing
Check out Western Governors University, it's self-paced.
I'll just add that many UoPeople students in the US transfer to WGU to complete their bachelor's degree. (WGU is regionally accredited, so it carried more weight. And it accepts UoPeople credits.)