Grand Canyon University
StudentsReview ::
Grand Canyon University - Graduate (MS/PhD) Ratings | |||||||||||||||||||
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Total Grad Surveys | 45 |
Females | 24 |
Males | 21 |
Avg years at University | 1.9 |
Research Quality | B (6.6) |
Research Availability | B+ (7.5) |
Research Funding | B+ (7.9) |
Graduate Politics | B+ (7.7) |
Not Errand Runners | A- (8.1) |
Degree Completion | A- (8.3) |
Alternative pay [ta/gsi] | B- (6.1) |
Sufficient Pay | B- (6.5) |
Competitiveness | B+ (7.5) |
Education Quality | B+ (7.5) |
Faculty Accessibility | B (7.1) |
Useful Research | B+ (7.6) |
"Individual" treatment | B (6.6) |
Friendliness | B (7.2) |
Safety | B (6.9) |
Campus Beauty | B (7.2) |
Campus Maintenance | B (7.0) |
University Spending | B (6.7) |
Extracurriculars | B (6.8) |
Scholastic Success | B (7.3) |
Surrounding City | B+ (7.4) |
Social Life/ Environment | B (6.9) |
She is a PHD, and tha makes her feel superior to her lowly students, so she keeps changing the curriculum to her personal standards, but gets annoyed when you try to get a clear view of what she wants, until after you have submitted your work, and she FINALLY gets around to posting your grades. Then, after ruining your grade, she will include smarmy little comments explaining why she gave you such low marks. The problem is that she is too late for yout o learn what to do, if she only tells you after you have already failed. She refuses to respond to inquiries from students within the required 48 hour time frame, and only responds to questions when she get around to it, which is also usually too late for your grade. Of course, she graded everything fairly the first week of class, mainly because she knows that after the first week, you can no longer drop the class, without having to pay out of pocket to take it again. This is a trend among bad "instructors" at GCU, they always wait until they think you are trapped in their class, to show their true colors, and it is infuriating. At almost EVERY other institution of learning, you can withdraw from a class up until it is halfway finished, but for whatever pointless reason, GCU won't let you get out after a single week. If you are an online student, like I am, you have almost ZERO means to get in contact with the University, except through your Student Services Advisor, who is mostly useless, and unable to assist at all, except to suggest contacting the "instructor", which is almost guaranteed to be a waste of time and effort as they have already decided how they are going to "teach", and that is that.
I decided to continue for my Doctorate in Business Management. I started this 4 years ago. I am still working on my 10 point strategy plan. They tell you "You have the keys to your bus" meaning you plan the dissertation, and they will help you. Absolute lie. You make the 10 points, and have it approved with the IRB, BUT then they will ask you to make changes, in which the other IRB members will refuse. So you will start over... and over... and over. Each time having the 10 points approved, but then asked to have it change (to make it interesting, or more original) and then have it refuse. My word of advice, DO NOT GO TO GCU!!!!! You can't get out! The credits don't transfer, and you have to stay in, or pay the $120,000 student loan back, which you can't until you graduate, but you can't graduate until they approve your dissertation, which they won't. So you will always have this debt, and then can't go elsewhere. I would be willing to agree to joining a civil case against them for malpractice.
I earned my undergrad (B.S. in Finance and Economics) at GCU and am currently enrolled in the MBA program. I have taken many classes online and on campus. The faculty has always been very helpful and outgoing. The curriculum is challenging but anyone can succeed if they are willing to buckle down and work hard.
I would recommend GCU to all serious students who want a solid education. I am proud of my D1 school! LOPES UP!
I am a working nurse, and the degree is very much respected in the nursing community. So, I wouldn't listen to those that try to disparage the nursing program at GCU. Here are some positives/negatives about my current experience at GCU.
First, I have some concerns about GCU:
1) There is no way to communicate with an instructor until your program starts, and by then it may be too late. If you have a vacation scheduled, a work conference out of town, etc., a question on whether the text is mandatory (or will hardly be used) you have to wait for the first day of the course to discuss this with the instructor. This may be too late for you to make changes outside of school. So, if you work or have a social life, and need any considerations, starting each course is a risk.
2) The course development is poor, meaning not enough information is given on each assignment. Therefore, even as an ultra-independent online learner (such as myself), you have to constantly ask the instructor for clarification. As you can imagine, this leaves a lot up to the instructor's vision of the course. If you have an excellent, helpful, involved instructor---great! If not---not so great. I am taking a course now with a fantastic instructor and am getting a lot of direction (because I am asking for it). A friend is taking the same course with a different instructor, and she is having a very difficult time getting appropriate responses from her instructor. Therefore, my friend's grade is much worse than mine.
3) MSN online classes are 8 weeks, taken BACK TO BACK until you complete your degree. You cannot take more than 2 weeks off at a time during your course, or you will lose your financial aid. An 8 week class is a VERY RIGOROUS schedule: You will be reading for 6 hours a week, answering Discussion Questions for approx 2-4 hours per week, and then participating in a CLC (Collaborative Learning Community) project for 2-6 hours weekly. This is VERY TIME CONSUMING, and if you are a procrastinator, or aren't able to commit to such a rigorous schedule, I'd seek another institution (with a slower pace).
SERIOUS CONCERNS:
The CLCs are disgusting! The Collaborative Learning Community is akin to online groupwork with people that you have no face-to-face contact with. And there is a GROUP GRADE! So, if you have great, independent hard workers, you do your share of the work and it pays off. If you have slugs, you do all of the work to protect your GPA. It's silly, unfair, and unnecessary. How do you work as a nurse without having a team? Why am I paying a university to create a simulated team environment? This alone would have diverted me away from GCU if I would have known sooner.
Overall, I think that the nursing leadership at the College of Nursing really cares about the program. However, I don't think that always translates into the faculty that they hire. They are very slow to act upon complaints, as well.
The cost: Approx. $20,000 for my entire MSN. That would be just about $4,000 more than a current online degree from a brick and mortar university in AZ. I chose GCU because I will have my entire MSN done in 18 months.
About For-Profit universities: Who cares? The difference between for-profit is that any excess profit goes to the shareholders, while in a non-profit organization, the excess profit (yes, even non-profits have profit) is reinvested into the business. It's the institution's Customer Service that matters.
I have a total of 3 contacts to GCU, which originally caused me concern, but is OK now:
1) Academic Advisor
2) Enrollment Advisor
3) Financial Aid Advisor
The problem is that they have a very narrow role, and whenever they try to do more, they make mistakes. I have only been a student for 4 months, and have not had a change yet. I have been to GCU's ground campus many times, and although I have never taken a ground course, I think it would be a great school to attend.
Sometimes it would take up to 4 weeks to have a return phone call or email. When I first noticed the financial aid error, they said the 4 week delay addressing my question was due being reassigned a new FA advisory--but sadly since it had been 4 weeks, now it was too late to fix.
I will add the instructors were awesome and I really did learn from them. However, since they also teach outside GCU, I would suggest you go to another school that is more organized and makes you feel like a student not burden. Or at least a school that takes responsibility for their errors rather then just brushing them off. At one time I encouraged others to enroll in the school and was so proud of my school, now I am not even telling anyone where I graduated and if it comes up, I just say, that the last year was horrible due to the cost and frequent changes in Academic and FA advisers (it changes several times per year).
The academic and financial aid counselors changed about every two months. They have no idea what's going on with their students.
The financial aid department FORGOT to submit my aid to the government. They wanted me to pay my tuition in FULL before I could re-enroll. Obviously, I didn't have the money. Even though it was 100% their fault, they gave me an "oh well" attitude.
I'm still struggling to fight to get my degree, and this has been going on for 6 months.Please do not go to this university! It's total crap.
The instructor in my second class supposedly was a PhD with good credentials. She was dumber than a box of rocks. She did not even know the universtiies policies for research papers, but attempted to grade them anyway. Her grammar and writing abilities were equal to that of a seventh grader.
I withdrew again, now Grand Canyon seems to be trying to steal what is left of my Federal Financial aid. Do your self a favor and stay clear of Grand Canyon University.
I think one of the other challenges is the significant number of professors, which total more than 2,000,in the online format. I have taken 500 level courses which were very difficult and then followed up with a 600 course that was a piece of cake. The difference was completely attributed to the professor, which is not unlike any institution or format.
My review of this university is similarly mixed. While I feel that I have learned a significant amount from some courses, others have left me feeling cheated. However, the number of positive outcomes outnumber the negative interactions. At the end of the day, if you want to get by doing the minimum, the online format allows you the opportunity, in some instances, to do so successfully. However, it is just as likely that students with determination and initiative will be able to take advantage of the opportunity afforded by this university. This will require you to be a self starter, intelligent, disciplined and financially capable of taking on a difficult venture.My review is neutral, but take caution when looking into the opinions of others. While this university has a high acceptance rate, little more than 35% of students who begin school here actually finish. This translates to a significant amount of persons, all unable to finish the program, that might be inclined to attribute their inability to succeed to something the university did. This is due to an external locus of control and individuals who exhibit this type of characteristic are rarely successful.
"Education Secretary Arne Duncan said the data confirm, 'students attending for-profit schools are the most likely to default. While for-profit schools have profited and prospered thanks to federal dollars, some of their students have not. Far too many for-profit schools are saddling students with debt they cannot afford in exchange for degrees and certificates they cannot use. This is a disservice to students and taxpayers, and undermines the valuable work being done by the for-profit education industry as a whole.'
"Here?s a sample of how the schools scored in percentage of loans defaulting in fiscal 2008:
* American Public University (run by American Public Education (APEI)): 5.2%
* Grand Canyon University (run by LOPE): 3.4%
* University of Phoenix (run by APOL): 12.9%
* Kaplan University (run by Washington Post?s (WPO) Kaplan division): 17.2%
* Everest College, San Bernardino, California (run by Corinthian Colleges (COCO)): 31%
* Colorado Technical University (run by Career Education Corp. (CECO)): 12.4%
* Strayer University (run by Strayer Education (STRA): 6.7%
* DeVry University (run by DeVry (DV):10.2%
In an email late this afternoon, BMO Capital analyst Jeff Silber remarked of Grand Canyon?s results that, ?While their default rate did increase to 3.4% from 1.4%, its still among the lowest in the industry, including not for profit schools. This is another indicator of the relatively high quality nature of the company and its students, in our view.?Everyone working at GCU showed what a great place it is by being hard-working an focused. Great job, fellow alumni!!!
This deeply distrubs me. It says a lot about their academic standards.
If you are looking for a quality university, keep looking. In addition, they have a poorly trained student finance department, Who do not take phone calls, but respond after you leave several messages.
and the professors provide routine feedback, rather than personalized grading.
Basically, you do the assignment you get a good grade.
I have tried to make this work, but I would be embarassed to hang a degree from GCU on my wall.
I am returning to my ala mater, and leaving GCU in the dust.. They have their work cut out for them.
My negatives are as follows. Tech support was clueless when I needed their help most, but for basic stuff they were fine. Professors could sometimes grade weirdly, like by word count rather than content, would sometimes ask you to revise and resubmit, which made for a really heavy workload, and some of them could be sharply rude. Sometimes they assumed you'd do things you were never told to do, and they'd be rather mean about it. My academic advisor kept changing but was nice enough. I never talked to financial aid. I thought everything was going smoothly and even called to find out the details of the internship requirement well in advance, got it arranged, was ready for graduation with no problem....Then when the internship came, I found out everything I was told was wrong, the requirements were totally different and not what I arranged. So now I may fail the internship and not graduate. Now I understand the comments I saw here a few months back that were negative. I was puzzled how they could be so different that what I experienced. That said, I should also mention that brick and mortar schools have their share of troubles, just maybe this program is more inflexible in handling complaints because it's still too new for online programs.
I earned by B.A on campus, and graduated with a 3.5 GPA from a great university. When I moved I had to consider going to graduate school by distance. I researched Grand Canyon University and made the choice to go because I was really impressed by the courses offered in GCU's Masters in Counseling program. The main reason I chose GCU is because they offered the program I wanted by distance and after studying the course descriptions and licensing requirements in my state I knew it would prepare me to become an excellent professional counselor.
The classes are challenging and I'm earning my Masters degree from a regionally accredited private school that has an actual ground campus, and a student to faculty ratio of 12:1.
I noticed that some of the Education majors gave negative reviews on the basis that the classes were not challenging and repetitive. I'm sorry to say that has nothing to do with the quality of education you receive at GCU, but everything to do with your major! Most Education majors say that their classes are not challenging whether they're degree is done on campus or by distance at ANY school.
Keep in mind that whether you're an on campus or a distance student, all students should know that the quality of one's education always boils down to how motivated they are in their major and how much work they're willing to put into their degree.
I would highly recommend GCU!
Their excuse? "We work on a semester program and we have no choice but to charge you." Of course, other institutions do not work this way. Iknow of plenty of semester institutions that offer 8 week online programs...they offer 8 week students a separate deadline for each class. It is a violation of both Christian and business ethics to charge for services that have not been given. Regardless of what policy they claim to be using...it cannot be justified by a moral standard of right and wrong.
I expressed my dissatisfaction with both the heartless manner in which I was treated and with the institutions ethics. I was informed that Christianity had nothing to do with it, they were running a business.
The kind people I met when they were trying to attract my "business" turned into a bunch of strong arm thugs. They violated the very principles they profess to hold.
I would think very seriously before I committed to an online education through this Institution. There are many organizations that claim Christian values in order to attract business, but when push comes to shove it goes by the wayside.I can only thank the LORD that I found this out before I invested two years in their program.
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