How Prevalent are Bogus Degrees?

Paul Townend asks: "The BBC are reporting that a US government investigation has found that 28 top federal employees possess bogus college degrees (usually based on 'life experience'), and the phenomenon may be much bigger. Have Slashdot readers come across or worked with people with such degrees? Does it give them an advantage? What happens when they're discovered?"

Comments

Shows

[u-238]

how much the actual acedemic drudgery is truly necessary for doing the job that requires the degree.

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[BoomerSooner]

Bullshit, it shows they are liars and will probably be fired and sued for the overcompensation they received. If they were qualified without the "fake" degree why didn't they apply that way?

Because you get paid based on your experience and education. It's simple fraud.

GW isn't a good example of a Yale education either.

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[GigsVT]

If they were qualified without the "fake" degree why didn't they apply that way?

Because a lot of jobs require degrees for no reason.

I don't see how you can call it "overcompensation".

If they weren't doing the job they were hired to do, then they should have been fired for poor performance.

If they were doing the job well enough to command their compensation without getting fired, then that proves the degree is bullshit, by your own argument.

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[Anonymous Coward]

Please mod this up. Most salient point yet in this thread.

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[kabocox]

Bullshit, it shows they are liars and will probably be fired and sued for the overcompensation they received. If they were qualified without the "fake" degree why didn't they apply that way?

You must be new to the US. The way things work are HR writes an impossible requirements page. Recent grads. with no work but lots of classroom experience, put as many buzz words in and get their resume padded that way. People that have been working for 10 years, but don't have anything other than a HS diploma if that just put down what they've done. Here is news for you: HS drop outs can make alot more money than PhD folks. On average they don't, but they can if they have the drive and skills. PhD folks rarely make good employees. They've just spent way too much time in school getting "educated" to be useful to society in anything but a research setting. HS drop outs are usually of no better use to society than janitors and min. wage employees. I'll let you in on a secret. There are people that have made millions without a degree of either HS or College.

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[nelsonal]

There is a signficant school of thought that believes that degrees (or any certification for that matter) is a signal to potential employeers that you have the determination to achive something difficult and the training invested in you will not go to waste. The hypothsis is also used to explain why bank signs and facades are quite expensive to produce. Since a sign is emblazened with a company's name it will not carry much use if the bank were to go under. Since the management team was willing to spend so much on a sign, they are capitalized well enough to be around for a while and not go under with your deposits (this was pre FDIC insurance). I think this is the vast majority of the extra value of an prestigous degree (let's face it if you try you can learn plenty from any undergraduate institution). Almost anyone can be trained to do most jobs (engineering, medical, and a few other no mistake jobs excluded) competently. The important part is the expense undertaken by the employeer to train someone. The degree shows that you are willing to endure some discomfort and effort to achive a long term goal. As such they are very, very costly signals, but no one has found a better method of sorting people.

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[cmowire]

See, there's a difference between "padding your resume with keywords" and a fake degree. One's trying to defeat the keyword filter in an HR system, the other is outright lying.

The problem with your opinion is that there are some folks who didn't graduate from HS, College, or both who have made millions. Bill Gates is one of them. But, on the average, a dropout isn't going to make as much money as somebody who got the BS. But that doesn't mean that the other 99.9% of folks who didn't "finish their education" are particularly brilliant.

By drawing a sharp line between a PhD and a grade school education, you are confusing the issue. Most businesses don't care about a PhD, they generally care about folks with a bachleurs or a masters and that's about it.

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[Frizzle Fry]

If they were doing the job well enough to command their compensation without getting fired, then that proves the degree is bullshit, by your own argument

If you really believe that they aren't overcompensated, then feel free to start your own company and hire these people at slightly less than the salaries they were previously getting. "By your own argument", if they weren't overcompensated before, you'll be getting a real bargain now and will be able to outcompete the companies that care about college degrees.

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[kabocox]

But, on the average, a dropout isn't going to make as much money as somebody who got the BS. But that doesn't mean that the other 99.9% of folks who didn't "finish their education" are particularly brilliant.

My thing is that I graduated with a BS from an state university. Both my brothers barely made it out of HS. Both my brothers make more than me. I know it averages and odd data points. I just hate seeing my brothers do better than me money wise when I was always ahead of them in grades in school.

Life teaches you that school doesn't matter. Work doesn't matter other than the money you earn. What really matters is that you are somewhat happy doing what you do. If the money is a limiting factor for you, because you don't make much, find a job that you can earn more at. (You may not like it as much though.)

Actually, both my brothers are slightly happier than I am. Ok. I have a wife and they don't so I am unhappy far more often than they are.

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[cmowire]

Don't know what your experience is, but life showed me that you can't quantify people.

I've seen folks with a BS or even an MS from great schools who couldn't code their way out of a box. I've seen bright folks who had such obnoxious personalities that nobody wants to work with them. I've seen folks with a PhD in random off-the-wall fields with no "useful" degrees who can both code well and manage people. I've seen grads from great schools with no common sense. I've seen folks who didn't graduate and got a plum job and then had problem years down the road when they were trying to find a new job and the market wasn't the same as before so they couldn't. I've torn apart folks in an interview because they didn't know anything about the words they stuffed in their resume. I've seen excellent artists getting in trouble in art schools because they didn't stretch their own canvas or used computers or such things.

There could be a variety of reasons why your brothers are doing better than you are other than education.

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[spectral]

If they're NOT overcompensated, they're either compensated properly or undercompensated. Thus his new company won't work, because he's paying them less than they deserve. You seem to not understand what he's saying:

If they do the job good enough for what they're being paid for, even though they don't have a degree, then what's the problem.

if they're being paid more than their competence should allow, then the company is stupid for paying them that much.

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[Henry V .009]

There are plenty of methods of sorting people that work better, but they have mostly become illegal in the past 50 years. Race and background are still reasonably good indicators. IQ testing is a tremendous indicator of future job performance -- far better than degrees -- but the Supreme Court made IQ testing for employment illegal 35 years ago.

What you have to understand is that the "signal to potential employeers that you have the determination to achive something difficult" speech is code. What college degrees actually do is tell employers that the person holding the degree is more likely to come from such and such an economic background (hence the outsized importance of ivy league diplomas) and is more likely to be white, Jewish, or Asian. It also tells employers that the holder of the diploma is likely have an IQ above some threshold.

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[Frizzle Fry]

I understand what he is saying just fine. And if he were right that companies who care about degrees are doing a poor job of measuring competence then companies that don't would be able to outperform them. And that's not what happens. That's the only point I was trying to make.

It's all irrelevant anyway because even if they were as competent as the company thought when they hired them and set their salaries (unlikely), they are still liars and the kind of people who lie about something like this are probably not people you want working for you, even if they have technical skill.

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[uncoveror]

As long as a piece of paper is among the hoops we have to jump through in life, buying that peice of paper from a diploma mill is going to be common. If someone is doing their job well, then where they got their paper credentials should not matter.

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[tverbeek]

There are plenty of methods of sorting people that work better .... Race and background are still reasonably good indicators.

Social background? Yeah, there's some correlation there.
Race? Not if the applicants are first matched for education, experience, and/or background. The reason it's no longer a legal criterion is because there are far better indicators available than fading stereotypes... and oh yeah: using race as a hiring criterion is socially corrosive, and individually unfair.

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[Henry V .009]

Did black America suddenly turn around and get its shit together while I wasn't looking? But I agree with you on the socially corrosive and individually unfair part. Unfortunately economically effective follows them on the list.

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[tverbeek]

Did black America suddenly turn around and get its shit together while I wasn't looking?

Yes. Welcome to the late 20th Century. Please keep moving, and you'll catch up with reality pretty soon.

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[GigsVT]

And if he were right that companies who care about degrees are doing a poor job of measuring competence then companies that don't would be able to outperform them. And that's not what happens. That's the only point I was trying to make.

That argument is bogus, because of the perception of value in the degree.

Those with skills will be more likely to get a degree to ensure they can get a job fitting their skills, whether they wanted to get a degree or not.

Yes, this means the a lot of the most skilled people will have a degree, but the degree itself had nothing to do with it.

It's a sort of catch-22. The skilled get the degree because the employers think it is important. The employers won't drop the degree requirement because they get in general, more skilled people with it.

The only way I see to break this vicious cycle of unnecessary waste is when a degree becomes such a common thing that "everyone has one". Once it hits that level, it will cease to become perceived as a valuable thing, and finally break this cycle of stupidity.

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[Henry V .009]

Really? They no longer commit half of America's violent crime (despite making up 10% of the population), no longer have stratospheric rates of out-of-wedlock birth, and no longer represent an out-sized portion of the welfare role? Thanks for clueing me in on that. Amazing news. Where can I subscribe to your newsletter?

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[Frizzle Fry]

You call my argument "bogus", but then you don't say anything that disagrees with me. You are primarily saying that "a lot of the most skilled people will have a degree, but the degree itself had nothing to do with it." I agree with this. But I don't see where the problem is. The fact that you've gotten the degree shows that you can work hard and achieve goals and will likely be a good employee. The act of getting the degree serves as a sort of test to show employers that you are competent. Why is this bad? This seems to me to be a good system and is working quite well. The alternative is to hire people essentially at random and then fire them if it turns out that they are incompetent. But figuring this out can take a while, as you need to give them time to learn the job. The current system is more efficient for everyone.

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[GigsVT]

You aren't understanding anything I'm saying, are you?

It's not a sort of test at all. It's something that pretty much anyone with two brain cells to rub together can get. It's bad because it isn't a valid test of anything.

Skilled people get it because they think they have to, due to the perceptions of employers. Employers require it because they think it indicates some skill.

Do you need me to draw you a Venn diagram?

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[Frizzle Fry]

Skilled people get it because they think they have to, due to the perceptions of employers. Employers require it because they think it indicates some skill.

This is true, except that they are both right. It really does affect the perception of the employer, and it really does indicate skill. So, again, what's the problem? Obviously, going to a crappy school isn't going to require much skill, but guess what? That's why degrees from those schools aren't as helpful for getting good jobs or high salaries.

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[Froggie]

And as long as people are too stupid tell the difference between any piece of paper and the paper they're actually looking for, then they deserve the underqualified staff they'll inevitably employ.

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[AlecC]

Did black America suddenly turn around and get its shit together while I wasn't looking?

Yes. A lot, but not all, did. Social background and education are much more informative than skin colour. If you factor these two terms in, you have already used all the information given by skin colour; if you add skin colour in, you are effectively double counting. And these other measures are more efficient: they allow you to drop white dropouts and bring in brilliant blacks.

It is true that if you had no other information at all, skin colour would have some predictive value. But if you have the information available on any normal resume, skin colour tells you nothing more than you know already.

Statistics for black people only tell you an average for about 20 million people, exactly one of whome you are interviewing at this moment. They are about as useful as statistics for the 20 million people in the same height band.

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[Anonymous Coward]

Sure, you can find some statistical correlations between race and job performance, but those correlations are all based on sociological factors, not on race itself. By the same token, you can find a strong (approaching 1) statistical correlation between "argues that race is a good predictor of job performance" and "is an apologist for racism". Just so you know why nobody likes you.

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[cloudmaster]

Hey! Facts aren't important to that discussion - emotions and "equal treatment" are. ;)

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[BoomerSooner]

Remind me of that when you're getting your eyes operated on by a guy who got his MD from an online university.

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[belthezar]

This is a terrific reply. Thank you for the insightful comment. Skin color really is pretty useless information when any other information is available. Even when it's the only information you have, you should be careful not to let your own life experiences jade your viewpoint before you have gathered any more information.

If I had mod points I would have modded you up, so instead you get a personal reply.

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[Anonymous Coward]

Take off your politically correct blinders and Mod-up parent:
+5 Insightful

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[Henry V .009]

I appreciate your comment, but I will be honest and say that your statements strike me as products of wishful thinking about equality rather than facts based upon experience.

If you have the information available on any normal resume, skin colour tells you nothing more than you know already.

I wish that were true, but I think that first you overestimate the value of the information on a resume. It is useful, to be sure, but it is a long way from adequate for job performance predictive value.

Second, I think that you underestimate the achievement gap between the races in the United States. Unfortunately, that's easy to do. The reaction to hard figures is generally shock. For example, try looking up the figures for how many black students in the United States got above a 1400 on their SATs. You will not be pleasantly surprised, I guarantee. The current IQ offset between blacks and whites is around 15 points, which does not sound too bad. (The presence of the IQ gap is not currently argued. What tends to get debated are the validity of IQ tests and how much of the performance gap is genetic rather than cultural. In my opinion, the validity aspect is usually argued by those people who don't like to be dragged down by facts. The evidence lies firmly on the side of IQ being a good measure of general intelligence across cultures.) So 15 points difference. But recall that IQ follows a bell curve distribution. Which means an exponential drop off. If you are talking about a professional career which probably requires an IQ of 120 at the minimum, you are looking at a small tail. That is just smart blacks. The "brilliant blacks" will be few and far between.

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[DerekLyons]

There is a signficant school of thought that believes that degrees (or any certification for that matter) is a signal to potential employeers that you have the determination to achive something difficult and the training invested in you will not go to waste.

That school of thought is based on the now bygone era when someone who had graduated from college *was* someone who had achieved something difficult and was unusual. Fast forward to the present era when scholarships and grants and loans are commonly available - and it's possible to have an associates or baccalaureate without having actually studied anything difficult, significant, or useful! Colleges, like public schools are rated on the quantity they produce, not the quality. The net result has been a reduction in value of college degrees.

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[Anonymous Coward]

Because a lot of jobs require degrees for no reason.

If they weren't doing the job they were hired to do, then they should have been fired for poor performance.

You are forgetting that these are federal employees. Federal employees have "rights" that make it pratically impossible to fire them for poor performance. However, it is possible (though still difficult) to fire them for fraud in their job applications.

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[Vintermann]

"IQ testing is a tremendous indicator of future job performance -- far better than degrees"

Reference, please? I've read the opposite.

"It also tells employers that the holder of the diploma is likely have an IQ above some threshold."

So the indicator indicates that they would probably score higly on another indicator? Not very useful. Seriously, don't you know "smart" people who can't or won't do a rat's hindquarters? I do - plenty!

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[bobej1977]

Perhaps I'm an odd data point, but half-way through college I decided that I wanted to quit my crappy convenience store job that I worked to pay my college tuition. (No student loans or parent's money here, just 40 hours at work and 20 at class.) So I decided to lie on my resume and apply for a job mid-way through the summer term after my second year. I did NOT lie about experience, just my degree which I was honestly pursuing and was getting A marks in to that point. I figured that if it didn't work out, I'd just sing up for classes the next semester.

I put my resume out there and I got numerous job offers and ended up taking one. Still with the reservation that if it didn't work out, I'd quit before the next term started. It worked out just fine. Turns out, in an entry-level programming position you end-up learning a whole new skillset and rarely get to apply anything you learned (or missed) in college.

5 years later, I'm doing great. I still haven't missed anything from college, except the social aspect that I was mostly missing anyways. I will continue to lie on my resume about my college education too, as I see no reason to handicap myself simply because I was able to successfully short-circuit the system.

Further, I'm now responsible for selecting applicants at my company when we occasionally hire, and my primary filter on resumes is a nasty coding problem I email to them. If they show brains in trying to figure that out, I interview them, regardless of education. (To be fair though, I don't know that I've ever gotten a resume that did not claim a college-level education.) If I found out they lied about their education I WOULD have ethical concerns, but I'd give shot nonetheless. No doubt though, if HR found out they were lying they wouldn't let the door hit them on the ass.

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[4of12]

It also tells employers that the holder of the diploma is likely have an IQ above some threshold.

The IQ threshhold for obtaining a degree from some prestigious institutions is not necessarily as high as you guess from looking at the highest IQs of rejected applicants.

Some accepted applicants with family money and connections and just spending some time at a high quality private school can obtain entrance with a lower IQ than someone coming from left field, no money, no name, average public high school.

The degree and GPA is just a rough and crude sorting mechanism. It is not always fair, nor is it always effective, but it's easy and convenient for employers to use to do some initial screening.

A number of years ago at a fluid dynamics conference Robert T Jones was honored for his achievements. IIRC from the introductory biography, his career was more remarkable because he possessed no formal college degrees.

I suspect raw talent and self education go further in nascent fields, of which aeronautics was one in the last century and of which IT was in the last couple of decades.

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[Henry V .009]

Certainly there are people without college degrees who are smarter than many people with college degrees. But as a statistical matter, it generally isn't true.

"It is not always fair, nor is it always effective, but it's easy and convenient for employers to use to do some initial screening." And that is exactly the truth. What is being used is a crude and wasteful method compared to what is available (i.e. IQ tests).

Nope

[Excen]

I work at McDonalds, you insensitive clod!!!

Re:Nope

[metamatic]

Actually, McDonalds have a "University of Hamburgerology" in Oak Brook IL, and it does issue degree certificates.

Not sure if they count as "bogus", though, and they're probably worth more than an MCSE.

Re:Nope

[toganet]

It's called "Hamburger University".

equivalence systems

[perlchild]

Lots of universities have some kind of system to accreditate "life experience" when relevant, to pre-graduate students. There are also lots of "honorary" doctorates going around. But do degrees as job requirements fulfill their basic tenet: "Only let someone competent do a job?"

Even with a real degree, I'd certainly have doubts.

Re:equivalence systems

[foidulus]

Supposedly a degree shows a willingness to challenge oneself and the ability to expand ones mental horizons. Though with the number of "diploma mills" in the US(and elsewhere) parading around as accredited schools, I doubt that is true anymore.
An education isn't supposed to be a job training program, it's supposed to help you develop the skills needed to tackle any problem. This usually means doing more experimentation and research and less belching up whatever you crammed in last night on a test. Knowing where to look up obscure details is more important than memorizing them(because you will probably forget them anyway) However, that seems to no longer be the case in America's schools, and it is indeed sad.
Sayonara creative problem solving!

Re:equivalence systems

[kabocox]

I don't want a doctor that only knows how to expand his mental horizons and creatively problem solve. I want a doctor that can tell me what is wrong and if he determines that there is nothing wrong with me won't just give me drugs to make me happy and go away (otherwise known as creative problem solving.)

I don't want emergency personnel that have to look up things in the big book what is wrong with me and how to treat it. It may take them 10-15 min. to look it up, but I want them acting on me to save my life in that 10-15 mins not looking up information that they should know!

Re:equivalence systems

[override11]

But above all, the main thing a degree shows is that someone had the time and the money to go through and get the degree. I am 25 years old, and have been working at this current job for 3 years as a network admin, and the past year more and more as a coldfusion coder. Prior to that, I did sysadmin work hourly for local business that couldnt afford a full time IT person. Would you rather hire someone fresh out of school, or someone with 6 years on the job experience that is still young enough to be somewhat cheap? =)

Re:equivalence systems

[V_M_Smith]

I don't want a doctor that only knows how to expand his mental horizons and creatively problem solve. I want a doctor that can tell me what is wrong and if he determines that there is nothing wrong with me won't just give me drugs to make me happy and go away (otherwise known as creative problem solving.)

This is an entirely different situation. Medicine is considered a "professional school" (much like law, dentistry, etc.) in which the point is to learn the skills and background needed to do the job and not an academic pursuit like philosophy, history, mathematics or physics.

Re:equivalence systems

[be951]

Apples and oranges. A masters bears little resemblance to an M.D. or nursing degree or even EMT certification. What is the point of comparing the vast majority of professions that can be successfully executed with OJT and minimal other training, with a select few that require highly specific training that can mean the difference between life and death? Besides, nearly all health care providers must be licensed in addition to their educational pedigree.

Re:equivalence systems

[cmowire]

An accredited degree, in theory, has somebody checking up on them to make sure that the life experience is really valid if it's used. Generally most accredited schools will still make you pass tests to make sure that you know the stuff. Otherwise, they lose accreditation and nobody takes them seriously.

Honarary degrees are similarly interesting. It's usually a given that they require a lot of approval from the various professors, who are snooty enough to not give a degree to just anybody. And also, if a school gives out too many dumb honorary degrees, nobody takes them seriously.

So there's generally some sort of checks to make sure that this doesn't get majorly out of hand.

Re:equivalence systems

[foniksonik]

Completely agree. Most of the people I meet who have degrees can barely carry on a conversation, much less be an effective employee. Just because you are capable of showing up on time doesn't mean you've learned anything. University curriculum is a joke for the majority of the departments and doesn't get even remotely rigorous until you've entered a graduate program. At least that is what my graduate degree and post doc friends tell me...

I don't even have an associate's degree, seemed like a big waste of time for the career I'm in and truthfully it would have been... though a master's in communication would eventually help me, after 10 years of ladder climbing, who knows if what I learned then would even be relevant though?

Re:equivalence systems

[tverbeek]

University curriculum is a joke for the majority of the departments and doesn't get even remotely rigorous until you've entered a graduate program. At least that is what my graduate degree and post doc friends tell me...

Have you considered the obvious bias they have? I've been through two completely different undergrad programs (I'm a bachelor twice over) and I found plenty of rigor in both of them.

I don't even have an associate's degree, seemed like a big waste of time for the career I'm in and truthfully it would have been

That could very well be true. Not every job requires the same kind of education.

Re:equivalence systems

[foniksonik]

Hmmm they may have a bias but there are a lot of them. I tend to agree with them but then again they are my friends and I most likely share the bias. To further explain my point:

Undergrad program curriculum seem to look a lot like a checklist and not a very deep one at that. I always thought that checklists were for Trade Schools, not Universities. So when did University curriculum switch to trade preparation? Are the jobs available so specialized now that even the Undergrads need such single-minded exam passing methods? I always thought you were there to learn how to learn, to receive the tools you would need to further your own education. Seems to me that what gets churned out are a lot of dead ends instead of a lot of open minds.

Re:equivalence systems

[whorfin]

University curriculum is a joke for the majority of the departments and doesn't get even remotely rigorous until you've entered a graduate program.

My personal experience is that after finishing my undergrad degree at a not-too-highly-respected public university, I then applied and got accepted into graduate school at a 'prestigous' private university. I quit after one semester because I found that the material we were covering was farly obviously remedial (even using the same books I'd used in lower-level undergrad classes), yet over half the students in each class were getting flushed because it was 'too hard'.

So perhaps some undergrad programs are weak, and the result is that even the graduate programs that cater to those weak graduates are as well. Trouble is...how do you tell which is which?

Re:equivalence systems

[kevin lyda]

given that choice, i'd hire someone fresh out of school.

Re:equivalence systems

[tverbeek]

Some colleges tend to focus a lot on job preparation, others focus on exposing students to a lot of different things. They pretty much all use checklists, because "take whatever you feel like taking" (especially in the hands of teenagers) is a recipe for a lot of wasted time and money.

My first bach degree, for example, was based on a checklist that required me to take classes in literature, economics, a foreign language, math, history, psychology, theatre, music, physics, philosophy, phys ed, and religion... as well as the comp sci program that was my major. And the comp sci classes, while they covered nuts-and-bolts topics, all stressed general problem-solving principles. e.g. I don't remember much about Pascal in particular from Intro to Programming, but I learned a lot about concepts like modularity, optimisation, recursion, etc.

My second bach degree was in digital media, but I had to take classes in life drawing, painting, sculpture, color theory, a bunch of art history, 30 credits from the humanities and sciences, and my choice of electives from other departments... again, using a checklist to ensure that my education included both breadth and depth.

Are there by-the-numbers undergrad programs that are little more than glorified trade schools? Sure. In some cases that's because they're trade schools whose programs have "grown up" to become four-year colleges. In others it's becase they're simply not very good colleges. But those same colleges' grad programs are probably just as uninspired and uninspiring. Elsewhere there are undergrad programs where the grapes simply aren't that sour.

Re:equivalence systems

[override11]

Really?? May I ask why? How is taking a class that is out-dated by the time they print the books, better experience than real on the job experience?

Re:equivalence systems

[1iar_parad0x]

Doctors are a poor example. First, doctors have years of on-job-training before they can actually be doctors. Med school is just the beginning. Plus, how often do you know whether you doctor is an "el doctoro" [an off-shore med school graduate]. Often times, you can tell whether someone is competent just by talking to them.

Re:equivalence systems

[kevin lyda]

learning the theory behind things makes it easier to learn new things. that's what a cs degree gives you.

Re:equivalence systems

[BrodyVess]

As an EMT, I just want to make a clarification. We EMTs don't really *treat* anything. We manage conditions until a person is stable enough to get to a hospital for treatment. Belive me, you dont want an EMT to treat you for a broken neck. Put you in a cervical collar and then a full spinal package for transport? Yea, you want that.

And another good point was raised in that all EMTs have an educational certification, but that's not what allows them to practice. The certification to work is issued by either an organization called the National Registry or the states themselves. That certification is dependant on course completion, skills demostration, and a surprisingly rigorous test.

All that being said, emergency medical work takes a great degree of creative problem solving. You ever tried to get someone out of a compact car (thats become much more compact) without turning their head? Just try it next time in your own car. Now imagine doing that in on an interstate covered in blood, glass, metal, and with broken legs.

Call me Dr. $99

[Conesus]

That's right. You can actually buy a doctorate for only $99 smackers. Amazing, isn't it? To think, that a non-accredited "university" would dish out meaningless degrees.

Of course, forget about those 'honorary' degrees, or non-accredited but soon-to-be universities such as the Franklin W. Olin College of Engineering.

This story runs into a pet peeve of mine. When people are caught with fake degrees, their employers usually say "Oh, it's okay, we didn't hire him for his education anyway. Just his experience and background." My reply is, did you hire him for his integrity and honesty? Cause you sure didn't get what you paid for. And it's not the foreigners doing it. It's American citizens.

Conesus

Re:Call me Dr. $99

[LinuxWeenie]

I work for a defense contractor and we check up on all degrees. I have worked for this company for almost 10 years and yes there has been more than one time that a newly hired person was sent packing for having "faked" his/her degree. We can't afford it in our business - and believe it or not the government checks up on the degrees and their accreditability in some of our contracts.

Re:Call me Dr. $99

[NearlyHeadless]

There's an interesting presentation (8 MB PDF) from George Gollin, who researched (mostly on the Internet) these diploma mills. There are a few players who operate under a lot of different names. It's 123 pages, but basically a slide show, so it goes really fast.

Re:Call me Dr. $99

[Anonymous Coward]

Read through the entire presentation and they will send you a Degree.

Re:Call me Dr. $99

[sfjoe]

When people are caught with fake degrees, their employers usually say "Oh, it's okay, we didn't hire him for his education anyway. Just his experience and background.

I have had an exact opposite experience. I once had an interviewer actually ask me if my degree was from a real school or if it was a diploma-by-mail degree. Now, my school may not be widely known but it is fairly highly respected.
I did get even, though. About a year later, my current employer asked me to evaluate several products. One of which was the company that the asshole worked at. Needless to say, they didn't stand a chance in hell of landing our business.

Re:Call me Dr. $99

[yuri benjamin]

Now, my school may not be widely known but it is fairly highly respected.

How can someone be expected to respect a school they don't know. I don't think the interviewer was trying to be an asshole - he was probably just being thorough. Don't take these sorts of questions personally.

About a year later, my current employer asked me to evaluate several products. One of which was the company that the asshole worked at. Needless to say, they didn't stand a chance in hell of landing our business.

I sure hope for your current employer's sake the the vendor you chose had a superior product to the one you rejected for personal reasons.

Re:Call me Dr. $99

[stanmann]

Well, that depends on the school, given that this is slashdot I would guess that the institution was either RIT or WPI.

Re:Call me Dr. $99

[ngoy]

We had an employee here that was all happy about getting a degree with his life experience. And then I showed him it was from a university in Liberia. He gave up on that and started with University of Phoenix (which I think is just an expensive diploma mill).

Seriously though, what is a fake degree? Just because they are not accredited? No job posting I have seen says "requires a BS from an accredited university". They just want a degree. If the government doesn't make non accredited universities illegal, then no one can complain. If the job requirements are "four year degree", then it would be different. A fake degree would be something I made up in Photoshop and printed out. A degree from a non-accredited university is still a degree.

Go apply for a job on Monster. Guess what you get after you finish your submittal? A nice huge ad for Kennedy Western Note that they have a .edu domain. And how hard is it to fake accreditation? If you read the Wired article it talks at the end of how Hamilton University is accredited by the American Council of Private Colleges and Universities, which looks to only accredit Hamilton.

I remember arguing with a previous manager about a pay raise, and him telling me that 4 years of work experience were equal to one year of "higher" education. What a load of crap. More like the other way around. I have worked with people with real degrees. That doesn't mean that they know anything.

I took a couple courses at University of Phoenix Online. $1200 for 3 credit hours. First class was basically "introduction to group learning and how to write papers according to the APA format". What a waste of time and money! Second class was not any better. So I am out $2400 (or my employer is) for classes that no self-respecting entity should allow or accredit for college credit. So by writing group papers every week somehow I am some greatly enhanced in my mental capabilities and have "earned" a degree. Maybe some other day I will write about how the whole higher education system is just another money making scheme and government brainwashing mill.

Re:Call me Dr. $99

[sfjoe]

How can someone be expected to respect a school they don't know.

I don't know a large oercentage of the schools out there. I could certainly find a way to learn about the interviewees school without asking denigrating questions.

I sure hope for your current employer's sake the the vendor you chose had a superior product to the one you rejected for personal reasons.

Maybe it was. I can say that every person that's heard that story now realizes they may have to do business one day with the people they interview. Do you think they'll treat the interview with a bit more respect?

Re:Call me Dr. $99

[yuri benjamin]

I could certainly find a way to learn about the interviewees school without asking denigrating questions.

Well, I 'spose the interviewer could have googled for the school in question before conducting the interview.

they may have to do business one day with the people they interview.

Very true. However, in spite of first impressions and all that, I personally don't write someone off until the second time they piss me off. My first dealing with someone may just have been on their off day - and I've had enough off days when I've potentially pissed someone off that I hope to get a second chance :-)

Re:Call me Dr. $99

[batemanm]

You can actually buy a doctorate for only $99 smackers.

What a rip off my doctorate won't cost me a penny, although these people have stummed up quite a bit.

I'm unimpressed

[Otter]

I'd be curious to see this report -- who are these "28 top federal employees"? From that description, I'd expect people one or two notches below Cabinet level jobs, not "including nuclear monitors". If they found a total of 28 white collar workers in the entire US government with sketchy degrees. I'd say the practice isn't too prevalent.

In any case, if you have a degree from something like that "Capella University" that advertises in banner ads here, it's not like you're reaping huge benefits from it. The biggest is probably in union jobs or whatever where a degree automatically gets you a higher pay scale.

Re:I'm unimpressed

[michaelggreer]

From the CBS story:

"Assistant Secretary of Defense Charles Abell has a master's from Columbus University, a diploma mill Louisiana shut down. Deputy Assistant Secretary Patricia Walker lists among her degrees, a bachelor's from Pacific Western, a diploma mill banned in Oregon and under investigation in Hawaii"

These two, at least, are indeed just below cabinet level

Re:I'm unimpressed

[Otter]

Ahh, thanks! Yes, that's much more in line with "top federal employees" than the way the BBC made it sound.

And, as the AC points out -- Pacific Western is one of John Gray's alma maters, along with some University of Transcendental Meditation in Europe.

Re:I'm unimpressed

[RyanGWU82]

Mr. Abell is not "Assistant Secretary of Defense" as the article claims. His actual title is Principal Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness which puts him three levels below Rumsfeld.

Likewise, Ms. Walker's actual title is Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense (Material and Facilities) (PDF), but even that's misleading because it's only for Reserve Affairs. In other words, she's 4-5 levels below Rumsfeld, as this PDF indicates.

In the big scheme of the federal government, those people are high, but not unreasonably so. There are thousands of employees at their level.

It's strange that they're in the Department of Defense, though. You'd think that a significant security clearance would be required for that kind of job. On the other hand, having a worthless master's degree wouldn't necessarily disqualify them from the job.

Ryan

Re:I'm unimpressed

[Anonymous Coward]

In any case, if you have a degree from something like that "Capella University" that advertises in banner ads here, it's not like you're reaping huge benefits from it. The biggest is probably in union jobs or whatever where a degree automatically gets you a higher pay scale.


Actually, that's incorrect. Of all the students at Capella, the majority are working on their PhD's, second largest group are working on their Majors, then Bachelors, then Undergraduate work.

I don't know about you - but I don't know of an carpenters with a Doctorate, do you? Just because it's not a brick and mortar university, doesn't mean it's a diploma mill by any means.

Full Disclosure: I work for Capella

Re:I'm unimpressed

[gerbilfood]

I would look closer at sites like Capella. One of the biggest reasons you do not see higher ed advertising more often is because of regionalized marketing. Would a /.'er from Alaska reap the benefits from banner ads from Penn State? Prolly not. Capella, Phoenix, and the like have a national, if not international, base of potential students. I totally dig that they advertise. Being myself interested in adult education, I have looked into Capella. I found them to be strong educators... defnitely the real deal. Plus, where else can you go to class at 2am? I have found out as well that Capella is an accredited university. That is huge.

Classify Bogus degree

[MerlynEmrys67]

Shouldn't be a problem if they say they have a degree from Ajax school of blundering idiots, and indeed they do have that degree from Ajax.

I would be much more concerned with individuals in government that claim to have degrees from the University of Texas (graduating with honors) when in fact they flunked out after their freshman year. ( I know this one happened when said in-duh-vidual came to speak at a commencement at my college and ended up getting exposed ).

The problem as I see it is that a lot of "automatic" extra money comes along with saying I have an additional degree - there needs to be limits on this "automatic" money, to include things like "from an accredited source". The government is just a bunch of idiots if they accept degrees from non-accredited sources

Re:Classify Bogus degree

[KingOfBLASH]

You're absolutely right. Employers are responsible for checking that universities are accredited, and if people are hired without checking the background of a college that nobody has heard of before but by calling up the "university" to make sure they got a degree from there, the problem is with checking accredidation.

Let me re-phrase

[Anonymous Coward]

Let me re-phrase your question:

Am I a huge smelly nerd?

The answer is "yes".

Re:What do you expect?

[Anonymous Coward]

Dude, I'm not one for spelling flames but there are certain words you always need to spell correctly -- for example, when you're calling someone an "iliterate".

An excoworker had one

[SoCalChris]

About a year ago, we found a bunch of an old coworker's newsgroup postings.

One of them was looking to buy a forged degree from the California State University system. The posting was from a few months before he got the job with us, and of course, when he applied he said he had a degree from Cal State Long Beach.

All of the others postings of his were personal ads of him looking for someone to kidnap and anally torture him, or for someone to dress up like a super hero in spandex with him. The day we found all of those was the day I laughed the hardest I ever have in my life.

The guy wasn't well liked to begin with, but all of his old newsgroup postings made it so we couldn't even look at the guy without laughing.

Re:An excoworker had one

[raider_red]

So basically what you're implying is that everyone with a fake degree is probably also a dirty sex-pervert. At least he was good for some entertainment at the end of his career.

Re:An excoworker had one

[Anonymous Coward]

No, he's not implying that. Apply some logic to your thinking before you post next time.

(Hint: one != all)

Re:An excoworker had one

[UnrefinedLayman]

Well... what happened with the coworker?

Re:An excoworker had one

[Anonymous Coward]

My my... a little defensive aren't we? I'm sure your diploma is completely legit. Just make sure to be careful where you post your gay sex want ads :)

Re:An excoworker had one

[SoCalChris]

He's still there. The company is afraid of firing him. They think he would sue them for discrimination if they fire him, and basically claim he was fired because of the personals he had placed.

Luckily, I got out of that company a few weeks after the posts were found. I'm at a much better job now. I've still got friends at the company though.

Re:An excoworker had one

[raider_red]

I only post them on Slashdot. I don't think anyone will think to look for anything sex related there. (And yes, my degree is legitimate.) And thanks for getting the lame joke, unlike the overly logical previous poster.

Re:An excoworker had one

[ubugly2]

...Or if somebody steals his stapler he might burn the place down to the ground...

In Corporatist America

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Bullshit, it shows they are liars and will probably be fired and sued for the overcompensation they received.

In Corporatist America, being a liar means that you're better qualified to be a C-level executive.

Re:In Corporatist America

[jo42]

Hmmm... Degrees and Education didn't stop the Execs at Enron, Worldcom, Tyco and others from fibbing and thus causing significant financial damage to many people...

Re:In Corporatist America

[Marxist Hacker 42]

How do you know their degrees are real? From the rest of the comments in this thread, even "accredited universities" give out credit for life experience, and recent surveys show that virtually everybody admits to cheating on a test at some time or another in their lives. Thus, it's reasonable to assume that if the liars mentioned by you (execs at Enron, Worldcom, Tyco and others) were able to fib for so many years, they were good at fibbing back in college too, and certainly when they turned in their resumes for their current jobs. Thus proving my point- being a good liar is a great way to get overcompensated in a C-level executive position.

YES.

[Neck_of_the_Woods]

Not only did the guy have a bogus degree. He claimed to have a MCSE, CCNA, and RHCE. Retired from the Military with 8 years in as well as 8+ years of Solaris, +2 linux, +4 SQL/MySQL. Turns out when I asked him what to expect from "ps-e | grep sendmail" on our solaris box he kind of just blinked and said "I did more coding on it than anything".

Turns out he has +3 years of C. Which he can't code in, no solaris exp, no linux exp, no SQL exp, and did not know how to put together a computer from scratch. Let alone, no Certs at all and a bogus degree.

The kicker? They hired him, then found all this out. Did they fire him? Nope cut his pay in 1/2 and put him in customer service.....I am amazed to this day.

The justification quote "We could get him for 1/2 of what we pay you."

Classic, just classic.

Re:YES.

[kabocox]

I have 3 questions for you. Where did you work, how much was half what you are paid, and are those managers still there?

Re:YES.

[/dev/trash]

This explains why my calls to customer support are answered by idiots.

Re:YES.

[Anonymous Coward]

Missing the point.

It costs money to hire people. A surprising amount; ads to attract people, time to enter them in the system, orientation, etc. There are also costs associated with firing people, risks of lawsuits (baseless lawsuits still cost $$$ to defend).

Cut his pay, put him in a corner he's likely to quit from, he might be an asset to the CS folks since he's seen how the Dev folks work, etc.

Re:What do you expect?

[Nasarius]

Thermonuclear Urban Renewal

I assume you studied under Edward Teller?

Read "Art of Deception" by Mitnick

[foidulus]

He writes a story "fake" degrees in the Michael Parker story(though the degree is real, but the person in question didn't earn it, but used it to get a job anyway)
Offtopic, but interesting.

There are a lot of "fraulleges" out there..

[RainbearNJ]

But then there are at least a few that do help you do things like CLEP out of classes based on life experience. And they are acredited, like the Thomas Edison State College in New Jersey.

Then again, they're not a "Send us $99 and we'll give you an MBA" type of school, either.

Bogus Resumes

[jmpoast]

I don't know anyone personally who have claimed bogus degrees, but several people I work with flat out made up stuff on their resume. Claiming they know languages they couldn't program in if their life depended on it. Unfortunately the boss either hasn't noticed or is too scared to do something about it.

Re:Bogus Resumes

[dtfinch]

I've seen people with real CS degrees who one year out of college couldn't code more than 5 lines in their favorite language. They're most likely to become managers, which ironically pays more than if they had to program.

Re:Bogus Resumes

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Claiming they know languages they couldn't program in if their life depended on it.

At my college, this was fairly common practice. Then again, the software engineering program was rigourous enough, and covered 26 different compilers, that anybody actually *graduating* with a BSET could pick up any computer language in a weekend well enough to debug and in a week well enough to write a text editor.

Picking up languages after you've scheduled the interview isn't that hard.

Why not ask Derek Smart?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ask Dr. Derek Smart, PHD, Esq. He's on expert on bogus dimplomas.

Re:Why not ask Derek Smart?

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, I spel gud. Just imagine that I proof-read the posting before brainlessly mashing down the Submit-button.

Re:What do you expect?

[Captain Splendid]

I might as well tell people I have a PhD in Thermonuclear Urban Renewal from the U of C in this climate.

Ah, the Harry S. Truman Scholarship I suppose?

Re:Can a post be both flamebait AND troll?

[danbeck]

Geez, talk about opening yourself up to flames of hell here at slashdot. You just confirmed their hatred with that Bible remark. Not only is he st00pid, but now he's a Bible reading hayseed.

G.R@DU4TE N0W

[Anonymous Coward]

G.R@DU4TE N0W And Earn The Degree You Deserve. New Future with Increased Money Earning Power. No Testing or Coursework Required. Your Accomplishments CAN Be Recognized

Seriously though, I wonder how many of these people got their fake degrees by responding to spam e-mails? That, more than the absence of a real degree, definitely proves that they're not suitable for a top Government job.

Re:G.R@DU4TE N0W

[Marxist Hacker 42]

As opposed to a shrub who needed daddy's contacts to get a Harvard MBA and get elected to a top Government job with only a 2.0 GPA?

Sound-alikes schools

[breon.halling]

Let's not forget degrees form sound-alike schools; such as MIT -- the Miami Institute of Technology.

And yes, such a place actually exists. I think it's above a convenience store.

Re:Sound-alikes schools

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not from the US so I'm curious as to what your sig means.

Not exactly an administration official...

[Anonymous Coward]

But John Gray of Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus fame bought his PhD at Pacific Columbia University. She he also so sells easy answers and bullshit in equal helpings, but that "authority" gets him in the door to make his pitch.

You'd be surprised if I told you where in the UK..

[exp(pi*sqrt(163))]

...you can get a bogus degree. The University of Cambridge. After you get a BA you wait a few years (that's the 'life experience' bit) and you can then buy an MA. I keep meaning to send them my money to upgrade my BA.

Bogus Degrees... My Experience

[MrIcee]

Way back when, in junior high school (and I'm currently 46 - so Wayyyyyy back when) - my math teacher, a jovial, portly, good natured woman, always had us do assignments that were strangly non-math related.

Among the projects were memorial things like sticking colored beads to styrofoam spheres with pins (very attractive), drawing, and other things that struck me more as being "arts and craft" than math.

About two years after I was out of junior high, she was arrested on the basis that her teaching degrees were completely fictious. She was sent to jail for a few years.

The irony was, that after she got out of jail the city hired her as an accountant. Go figure. And I suck at math and blame it on her (but you should see my beaded styrofoam sphere collection :).

Degrees

[Anonymous Coward]

I think it's a bit of a shame that so many jobs have degrees as a requirement. I dropped out of university and have never looked back and know plenty of people without degrees who are way more capable and higher quality than many who did complete university. Seems to me that every job requires a degree partly because so many people have them. University has become almost a baby-sitting process for a lot of people: a time to drink and party. Not that I'm against that sort of thing - I just dont see it as a huge enabler once you enter the workforce.

Re:Degrees

[dcavanaugh]

I once had a candidate call me and ask about a job that was advertised. I was the hiring manager for the position, which made me the chairman of the search committee. The candidate said, "I was thinking about applying for the job, and my experience looks like a good match, but I have no degree. How serious are you about the degree requirement?" I explained that if the degree requirement was enforceable, meaning we found a very good candidate who also had a degree, then the degree requirement would be enforced. On the other hand, I was not going to be limited to hiring the second or third best candidate just to enforce the requirement -- at that point, I would rather make an exception. If you want to find out what we will do, you must be willing to print a resume and invest 32 cents for a stamp. The worst we can do is say no.

Bogus how?

[clambake]

I went to one of those real expensive accredited schools, but I was essentially a retard for four years and scraped by just enough to get my piece of paper without a shred of new knowledge (in class, that is... Oh boy did I learn a lot of new extra curricular knowledge) that I didn't already possess when I went in.

How is my degree more valid than a $99 WalMart degree? Because I paid more money for it?

Re:You'd be surprised if I told you where in the U

[cperciva]

The University of Cambridge. After you get a BA you wait a few years (that's the 'life experience' bit) and you can then buy an MA.

While you're right that they hand out bogus degrees, the MA isn't the bogus one. The BA is bogus.

When you enter Oxford or Cambridge as an undergraduate, you're studying for the degree of MA. The MA is a seven-year course, just as it has been for the past eight hundred years.

After three years, you've finished your lectures, and you get a certificate saying that. This certificate is called a BA. It's not a degree, and it doesn't give you any of the privileges of having a degree (eg, being allowed to mark exams); it's just an affirmation that you've studied for three years and passed some exams.

Re:You'd be surprised if I told you where in the U

[exp(pi*sqrt(163))]

Damn! Now I really do have to hand over my money to get an MA. Thanks for the info.

Re:You'd be surprised if I told you where in the U

[exp(pi*sqrt(163))]

More info

Wired News coverage about diploma mills.

[KevinDumpsCore]

Check out Wired New's coverage of diploma mills:
http://www.wired.com/news/school/0,1383,54596,00.h tml

They note that US colleges should be accredited by either the Department of Education or the Council on Higher Education Accreditation.

Re:Wired News coverage about diploma mills.

[dododge]

And a more recent article.

This one mentions Laura Callahan, who resigned from Homeland Security after a similar scandal last year. I know someone who worked for her (before she was at DHS), and the day the story broke he was practically grinning from ear to ear. Apparently he had not enjoyed working under her very much and was not surprised by this at all.

Does an Economics degree count?

[Simonetta]

I sometimes wonder about the validity of my 'academic' degree in Economics (as opposed to my trade degree in Electronics).

Most US universities actually offer two Econ degrees: one in the liberal arts college and one in the business college. Generally the arts degree requires upper level language and literature study for a B.A. while the business college requires upper level marketing and accounting classes for a B.S.

Depending on the university, it is possible to get an Econ degree without writing a single paper in four years. Econ classes (at least the ones that I took) never required undergrads to write papers. For my upper-level arts classes, I ran the university film committee for three semesters. Got college credit and got paid for doing the projection work.

Generally Econ classes are not difficult if you accept the fact that what you're studying has little grounding in reality. For example, we were taught that high unemployment and high inflation would not happen at the same time, but that was exactly what was happening in the late 1970's when the deficits incurred as a result of losing the Vietnam War and the OPEC oil shocks were working their way through the economy after a few years delay. (Don't look now, but something similar will likely happen again in about five years).

Anyway, the classes were full of contradictory material, there were no papers due, and no seriously difficult material to master. So is an Economics degree bogus even when it's legit?

I might add that there is absolutely nothing that you can do with an Econ degree. If you are not making more money from student aid, Pell Grants, scholarships, and subsidized student services than you are paying for tution and opportunity cost of hanging out in Econ classes, then chose another major.

one important factor

[AarghVark]

Anyone who has either worked for or contracted to the government will be able to tell you that the government writes a lot of its contracts and hiring standards based off years of experience and years of degree/school combined.
In plain english, this means if you ignore veterans preference that someone with only 1 year experience and a bogus Masters degree can be hired in preference over someone with no degree but 5 years experience.
I know it sounds insane, but keep in mind this is the government and it actually does happen like that.

They won't get discovered ...

[bergeron76]

... because they have a degree! They're too smart to get caught!

Engineering

[Anonymous Coward]

At my Univeristy they dispensed free Bachelor of Arts degrees from most toilet paper dispensors in toilets around the uni.

And all you had to do was wipe to get honours.

Yeah, TESC is good.

[dbirchall]

Thomas Edison State College is part of New Jersey's state college/university system, and it's all legit and accredited and all that stuff.

An aunt of mine got a degree (not sure whether it was a bachelor's or a master's) there after a fair amount of work experience. I don't think there's any doubt in anyone's mind (including the state AG she works for) that she's qualified to do the job(s) she does - criminal analysis, anti-fraud, anti-terror, you name it. Honestly, she'd probably be qualified based on experience alone, degree or no.

TESC is probably the first place I'd ever consider getting a degree, since I've got ~15 years work experience and really do not like the idea of taking 2 years of "core courses" that I probably know enough to be teaching by now. :)

Re:You'd be surprised if I told you where in the U

[Anonymous Coward]

I've managed to get three degrees by similar means. I took a BA at Cambridge, then moved to Oxford. Oxford theoretically doesn't recognise degrees from other universities, but awards a BA to graduates of Cambridge or Trinity College, Dublin, in order that they not be in statu pupillari, i.e. of the status of an undergraduate (which mainly has implications for how far out from the Carfax one can live). Then I collected the MA from Cambridge, having remained solvent and free of criminal convictions for the required time, and a DPhil (i.e. a doctorate) from Oxford. Finally I went to Imperial and collected an MBA for which I had worked, and DIC (Diploma of Imperial College) for which I had not.

In all, six degrees after working for three - not really a problem as such, just funny.

Re:You'd be surprised if I told you where in the U

[Anonymous Coward]

You do work for the degree though- Im a cambridge undergrad right now, and I doubt it is possible for them to make the course any harder

Degree didn't get you ethics

[obtuse]

So padding your resume with keywords isn't lying? Nonsense! Padding a resume is lying, and if you don't believe that, you're lying to yourself.

Perhaps you distinguish dishonesty between "outright lies" and the category that resume padding falls into. I guess resume padding is just plain old lies. But then you imply that resume padding is not even lying. The distinction is a self-serving one.

Resume padding is dishonest. If it wasn't dishonest, it wouldn't need the special name, would it? It's important and almost universal, but unless the statements on your resume are true both literally and in implication, then it's lying.

At leaset Izzy Illiterate actually has a degree from the College of Wants Your Money. Did he work for four years for it? No. Did he say he did? No. Does he have a diploma? Yes.

Hell, a fake diploma is just trying to defeat a keyword search too. SQL == True, C++ == True, Bachelor's degree == True.

I'm not defending fake diplomas or attacking resume padding. There are lots of justifications for lying, and occasionally good ones, but lies are still lies.

What disgusts me is those who think the guy who has a fake degree is worse than the one who pads his resume.

To the poster:
Hey, I'm psychic, and I'll tell you two things about yourself.

(ready)

1. You have a degree.
2. You pad your resume.

Have fun with the flexible morality and the sanctimonious attitude though. You must be ready to legislate morality now.

Re:Degree didn't get you ethics

[cmowire]

I think you are confusing putting something that you have *some* experience on, even if it's not especially substantial (padding), with putting something that you have *no* experience on (lying). But that's OK, because I didn't give an actual definition for "padding".

What I forgive somewhat is padding, not outright lying. If somebody puts Java on their resume, I'd expect them to at least be able to explain a little bit about it, maybe talking about interfaces, inner classes, etc. Perhaps they screwed around with it at home for a while, or made some sort of one-off tool with it at their last job so they could have that extra buzzword on their resume. That's what I'm getting at.

I estimate about 3%

[Anonymous Coward]

Years ago, I worked in state government higher education. Our HR policies were created by the Board of Trustees and very much centered on degree requirements. By the time a person received a job offer, they were required to have their offical (sealed) transcripts sent directly from the college that issued the degree. About 5% of the time, the documents would not appear. In some cases, the people found jobs elsewhere for a higher salary and a faster hiring process. How many of the 5% were bogus degrees is debatable but I know of several cases where our candidates dropped out of the process and turned up as applicants elsewhere in state government -- they chose continued unemployement over supplying the proper documentation for a job where an offer was pending. These candidates are the ones who were not smart enough to manufacture bogus envelopes and mail the bogus payload from the appropriate city.

Almost anything can be faked: degrees, certifications, job experience, employers, etc. Overseas degrees are difficult to verify (how hard would it be to register a domain and set up your own bogus offshore college?) Desktop publishing takes care of the actual diploma and maybe a transcript. In a pinch, you could scan the characters off of a Chinese restaurant menu. Sure, I have a Ph.D. in computer science from the University of Moo Shoo Pork. Is anybody in HR willing to stay in the office until 8:00PM to call what appears to be a college in China and try to find someone who speaks English?

In some parts of the world, bribery is a common business practice. I suspect there are places where clerks can manufacture a degree with a complete audit trail from a nationally accredited college. A scam like this would not hold up for very long in the US, but there are places where this would be easy. Considering what I have seen, nothing would surpise me.

Then again, it is simpler and probably more effective to use an obscure private college that has merged and changed names. Ideally, you want a college that is listed in old editions of a higher education directory but is missing from the new editions. Anything less than a militant stance on degree verification is going to let the bogus degrees get past the gatekeepers.

Experience is even easier to fake. If I claim to be a senior IT director for Enron with 20 direct reports and data centers in 3 states, how is anyone going to prove me wrong? Look! I have all these letters of recommendation, on what appears to be Enron letterhead! Take any corporate merger, and assume the role of senior manager who got nuked for being on the wrong side when the deal went down. You don't need a real name or a real job title, just a plausible story that is impossible to verify.

The interview process is 100x as useful as the employement and education verification process. At best, you can weed out the dumbest of the dumb who make grandiose claims without making an attempt to cover their tracks.

In my opinion, anyone who is not finding 3% of degree claims to be fake is just not paying attention. In some cases, we should be more honest about what these credentials are truly worth, and learn to live with people who have proven talent without a pile of wallpaper.

Not very smart, but he's...

[Anonymous Coward]

He's honest except for lying about his multiple arrests.
He's a hard worker and patriot, except for being a deserter.
He's a good person, except for using cocaine and then attacking drug users.
He's conscientious, except for the druk driving.

His favorite book as a child wasn't published until he was an adult.

In his case not being very smart is the best possible excuse for his behavior. Not to insult the stupid, but with an IQ of about 80, he's pretty limited. Borderline deficiency is anything below 80.

He's lucky to have people to take care of him. People like Donald Rumsfeld.

There's a guy who knows how to take care of people.

Great GWB Bush Quote

[pyite]

As I was attempting to study for my Linear Algebra final this week, I was paging through a college humor/advice book at Barnes & Noble. It contained the following quote from a a commencement address that George W. Bush gave: "To those of you who received honors, awards and distinctions, I say, well done. And to the C students, I say: you too can be president!"

But maybe management *is* their talent

[aquarian]

We joke about people with no technical skills becoming managers. But the fact is, management is a different skill. Being a good manager may or may not have anything to do with being a good coder or engineer. Some people can do both, just as some chemical engineers are also good singer/songwriters, but it's not common. Being a good manager requires a basic understanding of the technical tasks at hand, but the real job is -- managing.

Hamburger University

[Animats]

Hamburger University issues a "Bachelor of Hambergerology" degree.

Here's the resume of someone who has both a Bachelor of Hamburgerology degree and an "A+" certification. You can judge from this how much either is worth.

Take the Tri-State Tollway to I-88 west. Exit at the McDonald's Plaza exit and turn right onto 22nd St. Turn right at Jorie Boulevard, then left at Ronald Lane. Hamburger University is on your right.

Order your bogus degree here

[Animats]

Yes, you too can have a College Degree for the low, low price of only $110. Includes diploma, verification by the "college" in case anybody calls, and a copy of the college's accreditation certificate.

Additional services include transcripts and "professorships".

I'd like to see a "transcript".

Real World School

[phorm]

A degree may show a willingness to challenge oneself, but more often it simply shows that you had both the money and time to go to University. I've got my diploma, and I know the contents of the equivilent degree course... while some of the basic problem solving theories and documentation/coding practices were useful, I could have learned them in a 2-4 month course. The rest is all pretty much dogcrap which has been of little use to me in my job, nor have any seen many other jobs where it would prove useful.

Ability to adapt, learn fast, and think outside "the box" (in this case, I have to think not only like a programmer but also as a user) have kept me my job and made me good at it. I learned more within the first 6 months at work than I did in college, and I'm still learning.

That being said, there's definately something to be said about programs that offer a "co-op" or paid practicum term. It helps pay the college bills, and gives really valuable experience. If anything out of college was useful to me, I'd say that my workterms were the most important.

Of course, I'd definately have trouble trusting some guy who claimed to have X years of experience in field Y. Even with a degree, I'd look much more at his employment history in related fields than post-secondary education. But if his experience was limited, a degree would still count for something.

Holy Shit!

[Anonymous Coward]

$1200 for 3 credit hours.

Wow. Are you sure you have the exact number of zeros in both terms? That figure sounds beyond ridiculous.

Re:Holy Shit!

[Anonymous Coward]

He's telling the truth. 1200 is correct. Actually for that APA format class (complete bullshit), I paid $1326 books and all. I was disgusted in myself. UOP. Ripoff kings.

We live in an era of cheap paper!

[1iar_parad0x]

Would you hire an engineer who recieved his degree from Columbia, Johns Hopkins, or Georgia Tech?

What if I told you taht this individual finished his degree in an off-site evening-degree or distance learning program?

We live in an era of cheap paper. You can buy your diploma from just about anywhere. Sure, some quality is there, but it's not the same. Would you really want to hire somebody who studied rocket science at home? Schools don't make engineers; that's why co-ops, internships, and senior projects are important.

Colorado

[dnb415]

I work for a lobbyist in Colorado, and I got some info about a bunch of state employees were hired because of their unaccredited degrees. They have since been fired.