Complaint Review: CTU Online - Colorado Technical University - Colorado Springs Colorado

 I am a current student who has wasted 2 years with this school. I am withdrawing at the end of this “session” because the school has gone continually downhill since I began in 2011. I would like to point out that the majority of the “I’m content/happy with the school” reports are from years ago. I wish a few of those who were happy with the school had a chance to go back now and see what has been done because I am confident that they would change their opinions. Instructors: although there have been a few I really enjoyed the majority seem to either be disgruntled employees or just plain hate students. I think someone has already mentioned this but there are also a large number of instructors who can barely speak English. I, myself, have had more than a few instructors who I absolutely could not listen to their lectures live. I had to listen to the recorded version because I would have to listen to sections over and over to try and figure out what is being said. I thought, “Maybe it’s just me?” at first and had a few coworkers and friends listen as well and none of them could understand the first go-round. They all had to listen at least twice through sections to understand a portion of what was being said. Sometimes they want you to be verbose and sometimes they don’t but you don’t know that until they grade you down for it or point out that you could have included more information regardless of the word count. Assignments: You have 2 discussion board postings due the first Wednesday of each term for each class (no matter if you are in one class or two, and classes start on Sunday). Monday is when the first “Individual Paper” is due and is almost always supposed to be between 400 – 600 words (but see my comment above about grading and the word counts). Live chats are usually twice per week (one to cover the discussion board posting and one to cover the individual post), but there have been some classes where the information to be covered in our “Individual Paper’s” isn’t covered until the day the posting is due. Example: It is Monday at 2 p.m. and the instructor holds the live chat for that day but is covering the topics due that very evening (11:59 p.m. Eastern) so you have 10 hours to do the work as long as you were able to attend the live chat at 2 p.m. and as long as you have nothing on your plate but school. Add in kids, a spouse, a job and you’re pretty much not going to get the paper done on time (and if you do manage it is going to be of a very poor quality). They stress APA formatting and even seem to cram it down your throat at the beginning but if you pay any attention at all you will see that there are more students who do not follow the formatting than who do (even in higher level classes) and they are still getting decent grades on these assignments. I have only had one teacher (and that is this session) who is stressing the APA format or get a bad grade. Financial Aid: ha, I don’t know who they are “aiding” because it certainly isn’t the student. They used to be open about disbursement times. You got a statement letter in your documents that showed you the dates of disbursement for the entire year. Now, there is just a total of what you are receiving in financial aid and total of what your tuition for the year is going to cost. They used to say, “We are allowed 14 days from the disbursement date to apply the loans/grants and if there is a leftover amount, disburse the stipend to you.” Now, since they don’t seem to even go by the disbursement date on the FAFSA website you don’t have a clue as to when they are going to disburse everything and don’t even think about calling or emailing financial aid to ask because you will either get (a) the complete runaround or (b) a nasty and rude employee who doesn’t seem to want to lift a finger to even look anything up. This isn’t even an isolated incident with just me. There is a post on “Get Satisfaction” (their official “support site” now) dedicated to the frustrations many, many of the students (all CTUO) are experiencing with financial aid right now (and have been experiencing for months now). One student was told his stipend would be allotted in April and is now being told the end of June before his loans are applied. Tuition: the amount they charge has increased significantly in just the 2 years I have been there. Many students I have had a chance to “talk” to have commented that they are horrified at the increase in tuition rates. Overall Impression: CTUO is too worried about making a buck and not worried enough about the student body. Their motto, “Students First” should be changed to “Stockholders First, Students Somewhere Down at the Bottom!”