America's Accredited Diploma Mills

Is it possible in today's college accreditation happy environment to actually acquire an accredited college degree that is worthless; one not unlike that from a known diploma mill? According to online education pioneer, Dr. Fred DiUlus - It is.

Each year DiUlus rates and ranks over 500 US Department of Education recognized degree granting institutions that offer alleged accredited online degrees. The providers run the gamut from several Ivy League schools to the totally online for-profit 100% distance education universities.

Dr. DiUlus measures online college degree providers and their ability to deliver their online curriculum. This includes his analysis of the qualification level and ability of each school to easily deliver and teach online classes in a cyber based environment. He measures the comfort level the schools possess to deliver their online programs while also emphasizing and measuring the quality of the professors to deliver and teach their classes in each schools designed virtual world.

According to the 2016 edition of DiUlus's BEST & WORST ONLINE SCHOOLS, he has identified over 100, a minimum of 20% of the schools he rates, that are marginal at best, diploma mills at worst. He puts it more bluntly – "The degrees are absolutely worthless". The schools in this category, he points out, provide little academic rigor. Enrolled students have sparse chances to transfer their credits earned to a top tier university without taking many of them over or being denied entry outright. It is even a harder to accept such a decision when both schools are accredited by the same regional or national accrediting agency sanctioned by the US Dept. of Education.

The list of marginal online college degree programs according to DiUlus is expanding so fast that the numbers have grown five fold in just eight years.

Uniformed and unsuspecting students, particularly from foreign nations who seek out the convenience and alleged prestige of distance learning from schools located in the USA have unfortunately been sold that an accredited school in the USA, any accredited school, is the gold standard of higher education in America. Many continue to sadly chase the same dream and eventually come to realize that an accredited degree from just any school that is accredited in America is NOT a passport to jobs, prestige and career advancement. By then, it is too late to start over.