Buddy
Quad Cities,#2Consumer Comment
Sat, December 30, 2006
I feel sorry for the people who have been really hurt by this, I am not very good at writing speeches so please bare with me. I am not, nor ever been employed by CTU/AIU. I am currently registered I guess you would say, for about a month, my start date is Jan 7th. I am a separated 23 year old guy with a 2 year old daughter whom I want to provide a better life than a crap 10-16$ per hour job. Since the beginning I have been called many, many times by my Admissions Advisor, to the point where I am tempted to be rude, but I am not because he *seems* concerned with me and my education. Since the start, I have been pushed and prompted to get my financial aid updated and ready to go.go.go, supposedly since the start date was Jan 7th. I also remember my advisor telling me something about getting registered/enrolled soon because the new year could (and he said "most likely") be more expensive. I was rushed for the first 2 to get financial aid set up, the 3rd week was the occasional (every other day at least) phone call from my advisor/financial advisor checking on the financial aid, and me trying to get my schedule (which I still don't REALLY have until 2 days before school starts, I won't know my classroom time until then). I have been having technical difficulties with my computer as of lately, and cannot see any of the school's websites. So the past week I have been talking to the tech guys (awesome techs, I must say they are the best I have ever had, knowledgeable, friendly, everything I could really ask for on the other end of a phone line) my financial advisor and other people seem different, like they want to get me done and over with so to speak. I fear I may be in or very near the same situation, I am asking if there is anything I can do to withdrawal, at least for the time being so I can do more research about this school and the real financial requirements. Since they already have my financial aid all ready, do they already have MY money from the loans/grant? I can't get to the website, so I cannot give you the details on my grant/loan situation, but I remember a number close to 10,000 for the classes, and 18,000(?) for the total costs, I think I remembered that right. I quit my job to go here full-time, and get a part-time job, I was only getting paid 10 bucks an hour, but for around here that is somewhat good, this area isn't growing as an economy, it's actually dieing, but I have a child here and cannot move, so I really, really wanted to get a degree in business and go to a management position and earn a somewhat good living without having to travel.(construction means I have to travel, which I don't want to be away from my little girl if she needs help, or something comes up, I am very family oriented). As I said before, I am sorry for others who have been sucked in by something that they (and I) thought was a good, smart decision to change. For those of us who are close, but haven't attended any classes yet, is there any way to back out, at least for until we decide to further our CTU experience, or choose to not go any further ?
Stan
Frisco,#3Consumer Comment
Sat, December 23, 2006
Hello, I am currently a student of CTU Online. I have read the comments in several sections, and though I would state my situation as a non-biased view of what is happening. First some background: My school is paid for by my employer, GE. GE steered me to CTU, (or actually AIU first since they are "education partners"). I ran away from AIU because of the horror stories I heard from AIU, so I can not comment on that school. The CTU online school though, I am currently 45% finished with my BS degree. The classes are difficult in that you have to understand the subject matter, but there are no tests performed... only posting of documents, spreadsheets, and powerpoint files. These all have to be in APA format (was not told about this before starting this course work.. research about APA and how to use it before signing up!) I noticed that the student manual talks about testing, and the multimedia online information talks about tests too... There are none. There are a series of 10 assignments with one being a group project. I have passed 8 of my 20 classes so far with all A's in the classes. Most of the classes, the subject matter is vaguely relevant in relation to the actual subject matter. My impression is that the classwork is a way to "get your paper", and have an introduction to the actual subjects since each class is only 5 weeks long, and you have two at a time. The major emphasis seems to be on the APA formating more than the actual information, HMM. My resulting opinion is that the school is not a good environment to learn from, but good to get your paper of completion (degree certificate). This school is supported by GE again, so the idea of employers not accepting their degree is not true. The quality of learning is minimal at best because of the short time and vagueness of the classes to the subject matter. At first the price seems high, but on investigation of traditional schools and even their online programs, they all fall in the same range of price basically. CTU provides books, windows operating system, Office, but no APA software or much in the line of souce materials (they do have a 'cybrary' research center, but it is mainly just shortcuts to public articles on the internet, and nothing of physical substance) If you are in an industry and need a degree that is legitimate quickly, this is your ticket. If you want to learn about the materials covered, look somewhere else. I do supposed that you could learn as you progress in your schooling, but the retension after an intense 5 weeks is not so good, and besides there is another 5 week period immediately following the end of your set you are in. You simply learn to stop trying to remember that stuff from last session to focus on the new stuff for this month! I hope that gives you guys an idea of the situation that is truely in CTU. I think a lot of the complaints are from people that thought it was a quick blow-off diploma thing, and found out that they have to actually work (I have spent MANY times past midnight nursing a sick project!). These people want to know the materials after completion or want to just pass through with little effort and work. The school work is tedious, not very retainable, and very stressful in the fast paced environment (not to speak of the shock of having to immediately know about APA formating - Worst part of the school). Remember that most of the real students are refered to CTU for getting their degree for the job (I asked many of my fellow students and found this to be the rule..) Government retraining grants or military retraining stuff does not work very well as the school is geared to this employer sponsored type of student, where the paper needs to be in hand in 15 months. I thank GE for paying for my school so far, My associate degree is through a community college, so the rest is CTU so far. You are very welcome to ask me amy questions and I will answer the best that I can, and I swear that this information is true and very accurate as of 12/22/06. Stan **** (CTU Student currently)