Let's Talk About Western Governors University

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"Diploma mill!!"

If you've done frequent searches online, this is likely the first thing you've seen on numerous sites, and it's got you curious whether or not this school is credible.

No time to read?  The answer: WGU is NOT a diploma mill.  Not even close to one.  As hard as it may be to believe, it's the real deal, and deserves a serious look for anyone wanting to continue their education.  (For the bullet reasons and to skip the below, go to the very bottom of the post.


The purpose of my blog is twofold: First, I want to educate you on the difference between a diploma mill and a credible school (since the inordinate number of diploma mills have created confusion online), and second, I want to explain to you just what the big deal is about Western Governors University.  To do those, I need to start with the first, which is defining and clarifying a "diploma mill" and the history thereto.

What is a Diploma Mill?

Back in the early 2000's there were a number of companies that showed up claiming to offer you an Associates, Bachelors or Masters degree (some even offered Doctorates!) in an "expedited" fashion.  You were required to fill out a form that detailed your work experience - fundamentally, a résumé - and "attest" to the fact that all of the experience you had was valid.  There was no verification, no qualification, no remedial courses, no transfer credits, no tests.  Behind the scenes, some admin assistant paid $9/hour looked at your submitted information and clicked a button that sent you a message indicating your enrollment was "approved", and all you had to do was submit $XXX to process your diploma (essentially, a worthless artifact).  This scam went even farther by asking you if you wanted to have a fabricated transcript, offering to give you summa cum laude or other undeserving titles at extra cost or having leather bound holders, or even *gasp* edit your GPA to look amazing.

You may think that only the gullible would fall for such scams, but there were quite a few notables who went through this process to get essentially worthless degrees, including police officers, doctors, and government personnel at higher levels.  If that scares you, it should!

Sweetwater CFO Pick Scrutinized

Even Cops Getting Stuck in the Web of Diploma Mills

Pacific Western University

Dog Gets High School Diploma

Top 10 Diploma Mill Scams

One of the more notable ones (and one that was most egregious about what it was offering) was Ashwood University.

Is It Justified To Call Ashwood University a Scam?

A couple of guys went so far as to show how a dog, Sonny, was able to get a PhD from the school, and created a hilarious video of the dog showing up at a local hospital, ready to work:

If it weren't so hysterical it would be downright scary.  Of course the guys were simply trying to make a (funny) point: that the degree handed out by Ashwood wasn't worth the wood the paper was pulped from.

In summary: a diploma mill is a counterfeit black market, no different than getting a phony ID or a phony passport.  You pay (outrageous sums of) money in exchange for a document and cross your fingers that someone won't be smart enough to validate it OR that the "life experience" situation is sufficient, since of course you do have the experience, right?  Who knows.  That's the problem: it fails my "Parable Test": Quantifiable, Justifiable, Verifiable, Testable.  (I'll probably do a blog digging into the "Parable Test" at sometime in the future, as I think it has value.)

Certification Training School Scams

Behind diploma mills, between the late 90's and 2000's, were "IT certification schools" - where there was a certain level of credibility but you still didn't get the last mile.  Microskills and Laptop Training Solutions were two such schools, where you paid (obscene amounts of) money in exchange for books and a single attempt at the certification exam.  You weren't handed the certificate, you still had to earn it, but the problem is that course material was often outdated and useless to pass the certification course.  The appeal to students of "You Keep The Laptop" was overshadowed by the fact that the laptop came from a no-name hardware provider and would break down within a few years with no way to get support.  In both cases you were on your own, usually not getting the certifications you were essentially paying for.

These were a different kind of scam for two reasons.  First, you were paying for books, labeled as "tuition" when there really was no learning to be had, and the prices charged were outrageous.  Second, everything you ended up paying for could be purchased separately for a fraction of the cost, and with more value than what the schools provided.  While they seemed a godsend for those that didn't know where to begin, the fact that both of the aforementioned companies closed down unceremoniously attests to the fundamental problems with unaccredited institutions: you end up paying for nothing (fortunately, at least in California, there was a program that allowed students to recoup 100% of what they paid in the event this happened.  With the shutdown of these schools, and certain other budgetary constraints, that program no longer exists.)

Distance Learning Programs

You need to understand how the above is different from online schools.  There are many credible schools that offer online and/or distance learning programs: Kaplan University, University of Phoenix, and Western Governors University are just three off the top of my head.  Where Kaplan and University of Phoenix have physical school campuses for students in the local areas, Western Governors University is purely a distance learning system, designed to optimize the method by which you are educated.

Distance learning has gotten a bad rap over the years due to a belief that sitting in a classroom and letting a teacher lecture to you is the only real way to be truly educated in a field.  In truth, there are certain fields that benefit from the classroom experience.  Certain medical professions simply require an in-person, hands-on approach to learning just by virtue of the requirements of the student to be successful (would you trust a future surgeon who never had a chance to practice using the scalpel?  Didn't think so).  But other professions are tailor made for distance learning.  If you're in IT, you probably have remote dial-in capabilities to your work.  You don't necessarily need to be in front of a workstation to be effective, especially if your entire infrastructure is virtualized; as long as you have connectivity, you can function.  Distance learning works a similar way: there's no added value to sitting in front of a terminal at a school versus doing so from your home computer, provided you have one that's powerful enough and you have a good enough internet connection.

It's understood that certain people learn better in collaborative, communicative environments, and excel when they are paired with other students in a forum.  Whether that's a virtual forum (i.e. Citrix) or a physical one depends on the demands of the student, and the student must decide for themselves which way is more effective.  It is important to remember: one is not "better" than the other.  It is a subjective argument for which there will never be a fixed answer.  If nothing else, I want to just make sure you are aware that fundamentally, depending on the role, it's just as effective as sitting in a classroom, and for certain roles, will achieve the same objective.

Understanding Accreditation

What does it mean when a school is "accredited"?  The answer is, it depends on the institution doing the accreditation.  Any school can say they're "accredited", but:

• is it by an agency recognized by the Department of Education?  
• Is it institutional, specialized, regional?  
• Is the school eligible for Title IV funds?

The third isn't necessarily as important as the first two, but it adds to the credibility of the school.  I used to work in the Federal Family Education Loan Program (FFELP), so I'm quite familiar with the process.  Federal funds are available to any student that wishes to go to college.  How much funding is dependent on a number of factors, but a school can only request Federal funds if they are eligible to do so, and the eligibility criteria is rather strict.  A school is NOT required to offer or accept these funds if it chooses not to, which is why I say it's not critical that they are not eligible, but if a school meets all three, you can be assured it's on the up-and-up rather than a diploma mill (which will never be eligible for Federal funds because there's no education).

Per the U.S. Department of Education's FAQs about Accreditation, accreditation by definition is "...the recognition that an institution maintains standards requisite for its graduates to gain admission to other reputable institutions of higher learning or to achieve credentials for professional practice. The goal of accreditation is to ensure that education provided by institutions of higher education meets acceptable levels of quality."  

If a school can claim they are accredited by an agency recognized by the DoE, it's credible, period.  Doesn't matter if it's distance learning only, physical premise learning only, or a combination.  If you're investigating a school to attend this is the first thing you should consider doing, even before applying.

1. Go to the school's website and find their Accreditation page.
1. If they don't have one, it's a red flag, but most will have it under their "About" page.
2. Note the agency that they claim to be accredited by, and the type (institutional, specialized, regional). 
1. The ideal school will have a combination.  An institutional/regional accrediting agency will have multiple schools they serve, which adds credibility.  A specialized accrediting agency lends credence to the actual programs offered, to make sure the degrees are worth something.
3. Access the U.S. Department of Education's Database of Accredited Postsecondary Institutions and Programs, and search for your school.  
1. If it's a distance learning school, you'll want to enter the home state of the school, not your state.
4. Verify it's on the list with a valid OPE (Office of Postsecondary Education) ID number.  
1. The OPE ID is issued by the Department of Education and confirms the school is credible.  It's also what the school must have to accept Federal funds.  When you apply for Federal funds, you'll give this on the FAFSA so the school is notified.
5. Click through and verify that the school shows an active membership with at least one agency type.  
1. In some cases, an accrediting agency may no longer be valid or relevant for the school, or the agency may close.  For these the school may show "Resigned" indicating that it's no longer accredited by that agency, but another one may show active in its place.  A red flag is when the school only shows one Resigned agency, which means they are not accredited as of the time of the search.

If you get that far, your school is OK.  

For the record, Western Governors University has been accredited by the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities (NWCCU) since 2003.  That agency is primarily responsible for accreditation services for colleges and universities in the northwestern states. "Traditional" colleges such as Bellevue College, Western Washington University, University of Nevada and Idaho State University are all accredited by the organization - which again, adds credibility.  Additionally, accreditation must be maintained; once granted, you must continually re-apply and be evaluated to ensure that the quality of the education remains the same.  A 10-year stretch isn't bad at all for a school that doesn't have a football team!

How Western Governors University is Different

Now that you understand what we're dealing with, let's talk about Western Governors University, and how their program approach is really an evolution of things already in place.

In WGU's case, the optimization of education comes from the way information is delivered.  Rather than a live session that is pre scheduled with an active instructor, you have recorded video sessions that give slipstreamed information to the student.  You also have e-texts and self-paced quizzes to constantly measure where you stand with a specific topic.

When you were in high school, you likely heard about students "testing out" - basically allowing them to graduate early by passing a special exam designed to quantify the fact that you didn't need to learn any more of the material.  California has such an exam, it's called the California High School Proficiency Exam (CHSPE), and it's offered to students upon approval.  I'd wanted to take that exam for at least 3 years, but my parents are from the "old school" where they believed sitting in classrooms was the best way to be educated.  Unfortunately for them, I remember about 10% of what I learned in high school simply because over time, I found that most of it was not used.  Things I learned in elementary school were of great value and continue to be even to this day (the way I learned to compose, for example).  College has tests that you can take to get credits instead of sitting through the courses: the College Level Examination Program (CLEP) exam is the most notable of these, but there are others:

• American Council on Education (ACE)
• DSST
• Excelsior College Examinations (ECE)
• Excelsior College's UExcel Exams

Think of Western Governors University as an amalgamation of the above program types.  It offers the same courses in a linear, term-separated course curriculum, and offers credits once you pass the assessments.  It's a non-profit, which means the money it takes in comes from the governments, state and federal (more state than federal, as WGU has different state sub-entities funded by state governments to support education for the residents).  It also sells branded merchandise on the side, but I can't see this raking in major profit, but the fact that it's non-profit and has no physical classrooms, plus the absence of sports and other educators means the cost is tremendously low in comparison.  However, the credit structure allows you to control that cost even further depending on your aptitude for the material and how much experience you're coming in with.

WGU takes this a step further as part of its enrollment and orientation strategy.  Here, you can transfer college credits as with any other school; but you can also transfer relevant certifications into college credit where the knowledge necessary to pass the certification is fundamentally the same as that covered in the course material.  This means that if you're coming into WGU from an incomplete college stay and trying to get finished with a degree after a life changing event, or if you're heavy on certifications but want to take it to the next step, you can drastically lower the time it takes to get a degree (and by net, lower your effective cost of doing so) by transferring in.  An enrollment counselor helps you through this process, and that person is assigned to you until you start.  You'll be asked to submit a high school diploma or GED as well as complete entry exams that are equivalent to a 9th grade education.

Once you begin school, you'll be assigned a mentor.  This is where some students may have misgivings about the program: the mentor's job is to ensure you keep on track with your studies and testing.  This is required for WGU to remain accredited (more on accreditation later), as with what I mentioned before about diploma mills, they don't really care whether you know the material and don't ask that you prove what you state.  They simply take money and hand you a piece of paper.  The mentor program is WGU's way of making sure the student is actually going through the course material and taking the exams as they are supposed to.  Some may find this to be somewhat "nanny", as initially this is a weekly call that needs to take place and they're in a different time zone, so it may interfere with your work, or if you're the kind of person who leaves their ringer off, you may miss their call and need to email them.   As long as you are showing progress in your courses, the call should last only a few minutes to talk about where you stand and where you intend to be by the next call.  If the mentor sees that you are at risk of not completing your minimum credit requirements (more on that later), their job is to get you back on track and make sure you get the results you need to.  They're also the ones who approve every assessment and pre-assessment you take, as well as setting out the course schedules.

It then goes a step further by offering you training materials to help you pass, and the order you pass the assessments is entirely up to you.  You'll be requested, and required, to pass a pre-assessment - this should be the most exciting part of each course since it will tell you where you stand before you start digging into the educational material.  Again, thinking back to high school, you probably often wished you could just take the test because you felt you already knew the source material; same thing applies here.  If you take the pre-assessment and score high enough, you'll be allowed to request approval for the final exam and schedule it at your leisure.  You'll also get a coaching report that indicates weak spots where you may want to study up before taking the final exam so you can improve your score even more.  If you don't pass the pre-assessement, you can focus on the weak spots in the coaching report and take the pre-assessment up to two additional times until you do get to an acceptable score.

I want to stress: it is you who determines how much you need to learn for each course.  If you are comfortable with the source material and can prove it with the pre-assessment, you don't need to go through the entire course.  In fact, it's designed to let you target your weaknesses, which speeds up your ability to pass the course because you don't have to waste time on things you already know - which I'm 100% certain was a high school frustration for everyone.  Do you already know decimals back and forth?  Take the pre-assessment to prove it, then move on to the next.  Lather, rinse, repeat until you get to being able to request approval for the final exam, study your weakpoints, then pass that and move on to the next class.  In some cases you can knock out classes in a matter of weeks.  Remember, you're paying for it!

Speaking of payment, you can opt for Federal funding if you wish (which I recommend), or you can just pay it out of pocket.  The thing about WGU is that you'll pay the same amount per term, which equates to 6 months.  The term cost is less than a single Stafford loan, which means that you could get by without even taking a PLUS loan or private loan and just pay them back when you have money.  Once the loans are disbursed, you'll need to reach out to Sallie Mae to create an account, and you can pay while you're in school to keep the interest from capitalizing at the end of the term.  If you qualify for grants or scholarships you can use those at the beginning of the enrollment period to offset how much Federal funding you'll need; if your work has tuition reimbursement, you can incur the cost and then get reimbursed to pay the loan down or off. WGU offers payment terms if you choose to pay for the program without taking out a loan, which some may opt to do in anticipation of a tuition reimbursement.

There's a trick to this though, and WGU tries to help you understand the trick.  Finance 101 (not a real class) tells us if we pay $X to achieve Y tasks, the effective cost of each task goes down as Y goes up.  In other words, if you know a term is 6 months long, and in the Bachelors program you're required to complete 12 credit units equaling four courses, and you know that you've taken out $3500 for that term (imaginary cost figure), that nets out to around $875 per course!  Clearly, it does not benefit you to do the bare minimum in a 6-month period.  Contrast that with a 10-course term, and suddenly you're netting $350 per course, which is a lot more palatable, and if those 10 courses equal 40 credit units, you might very well be a quarter of the way finished - all in a single term.

If you look at it that way, it means that you can stand to finish in a single term, and pay only that $3500 for a degree that in a "traditional" college might cost you well over $25,000.  Not bad.  I submit that unless you're a stay-home mom or someone who does not work or perhaps is disabled and unable to work, such an aggressive goal, while doable, is impractical for many reasons.  You'd have to be on the school's site nearly 10 hours a day AND have transferred in with a significant amount of credits to even come close to that reality.  Most students will likely spend 4 terms; those going for a degree in a totally new field of study will likely go the full 10 estimated terms. 

What matters though, is that you have total control over your education.  You can learn at your own pace, 24 hours a day, when it's reasonable for you and at a place of your choosing, with only internet access being required.  For the most part the website works on tablets, so even if you don't own a computer, you should still be able to go through most of the material (except some of the performance exams, which really do require a computer to be fully effective, and the actual objective exams will require you either go to an associated university to take the exam or use a school-provided webcam to do it, but that needs a Windows computer).  In some people's eyes, this ability to work without teachers or classrooms may feel threatening, or perhaps too close to a diploma mill, but the testing requirements are not easy.  You have to prove you know the material; it's not enough to state it and a human is engaged at each assessment.

That said, it's not for everyone.  If you're easily distracted - for example, you have kids who need a lot of attention or you're caring for an ill or elderly family member - or if you lack the ability to properly pace yourself, you can find yourself overwhelmed with the program.  If you're not comfortable with websites and general navigation, you may be confused at the layout; the orientation alone can take you hours simply because they cover every single thing possible.  If you aren't keen on the mentor concept you probably need to seek another school, because that's a requirement, and if you aren't good at reading, writing and arithmetic, you're almost guaranteed to struggle.  There is help: each course has a set of course mentors (different from your student mentor), that are there to help you through difficult parts.  There's also an internal community board that you'll have access to until you pass the course where you can post questions or concerns.  But at the end of the day, you'll really need to tap into yourself and push hard to reach a goal. 

WGU is an evolution of traditional learning.  Some may consider it "computerizing" learning, but the reality is that most of what we all do is driven by computers.  There are some who still need the collaboration of a classroom experience; the feeling of living on campus, the touch of physical textbooks, and the guidance of traditional teachers in front of a white board.  For those who can pace themselves and have always been self-starters, consider a different approach to learning that will get you to the finish line as fast - or slow - as you feel comfortable going.

Let's bullet this out.  Why's WGU not a diploma mill, and why is it credible?

1. It does not award degrees based on money being given;
2. It does not generate phony transcripts with fake titles;
3. It does not use GPA at all, thus it does not allow you to fabricate the score you get;
4. It requires that you prove you know the material, and then pass assessments certifying mastery;
5. It has human mentors whose job is to ensure you're on track and continuing to pass courses;
6. It has human evaluators whose job is to grade and score your performance assessment products;
7. It is accredited by an agency recognized by the Department of Education;
8. Its institutional accreditation agency also accredits other "traditional" colleges, which can only happen if the quality of education offered by WGU is comparable to that offered by those colleges;
9. It has been approved to accept Title IV Federal funding;
10. It is a non-profit university, meaning it is not driven by how much money it brings in;
11. It has a variety of state-funded branch universities, organized to support education for the state residents (Washington, Indiana, Missouri, Texas, and Tennessee, with HQ in Utah);
12. It has been recognized by both the Department of Education and the President for an innovative, cost-effective means of education; and
13. It's NOT easy!  The performance assessments alone will cause you to lose your hair, but at the end, you'll be convinced it's legit.