How to Avoid Diploma Mills on the Road to an Online Degree

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The Internet has revolutionized daily life in many ways. It has also drastically transformed the education landscape. From online assignment postings to virtual classrooms to entire degrees obtained via the Internet, this medium provides a level of convenience that is difficult to surpass.

Online learning, once called distance learning, has grown by leaps and bounds. Eduventures, a Boston-based education research firm, estimates about one in 10 college students will be enrolled in an online degree program for 2008. In March of 2006, Congress passed a law that dropped the requirement that colleges offer at least half their courses face-to-face to receive federal student aid. The law is one factor in the growing popularity of online education.

Online schools offer educational options to a person who would be unable to attend a university for reasons such as time, proximity, or transportation. But opponents say that there are also downsides to getting a degree online. Critics offer that a student does not receive the enriching intellectual exchange that sitting in a classroom can provide. Others say that young students may not have the discipline to work independently, as most online programs require.

Another downfall to online educations is the abundance of diploma mills out there that avid students must weed through on their way to finding a reputable institution. A diploma mill is actually a business that makes a profit by selling bogus degrees. It may by an institution that offers low-quality programs and issues a degree, or just a place that prints a diploma for a price.

It is not difficult for a business to register a domain name with the .edu suffix and design a professional looking Web page, and the anonymity of the Internet makes it difficult to tell diploma mills from reputable schools.

How to Recognize a Diploma Mill

• The "school" may have a similar name to a well-known college or university.

• The school is not accredited. Reputable U.S. colleges and universities will be accredited. Accrediting occurs by an accrediting agency or state approval agency recognized by the U.S. Secretary of Education as a "reliable authority as to the quality of postsecondary education" within the meaning of the Higher Education Act of 1965, as amended (HEA).

• Degrees can be earned in less time than normal, such as one month.

• Degree requirements are vague or unspecified, lacking class descriptions and without any mention of how many credit hours are required to complete a program.

• Tuition or fees are charged on a per-degree basis rather than per credit.

• Academic honors, grade point average, and even diploma date can be prespecified.

• Admissions selectivity is virtually nil, and there is no question of grades or previous test scores.

• Do some homework:

• Check accreditation of the online degree at the the U.S. Department of Education www.ope.ed.gov/accreditation/Search.asp

• Check legitimacy of the Internet University with the Council for Higher Education Accreditation.

• Write to the Diploma Mill Police, which that authenticates Internet Institutes of Education, at www.geteducated.com/services/diplomamillpolice.asp.