Slashdot Mirror
Online vs. Traditional Degrees?
Justin Rainbow asks: "As a computer science student, avid internet user and full-time programmer I find it very appealing to finish my CS degree online. Finishing at least a year early and studying whenever I want are just a couple of the draws to the online campus. However, are these internet degrees even worth the paper their printed on? Is an online degree just a waste of money? Can an online degree give you just as many opportunities as a traditional university? Has anyone in the Slashdot community graduated from one of these online schools? Did it help or hurt your career? What about graduate school admissions? Does an online degree hurt your chances to get into a great graduate school?"
... or, to appease the jackbooted grammar thugs, you only get that for which you pay.
Universities are in the business of selling degrees. They do whatever they can to make the value of a degree in general and their degree in particular seem as high as possible.
One of the greatest benefits of a university degree is the network of contacts one can develop. Graduate students especially have an expectation of a relationship with one or more professors, but also with other graduate students. Those relationships tend to last past graduation.
If you are going for an online graduate degree, make sure you get one that allows close contact with the others in the program.
Raise your children as if you were teaching them to raise your grandchildren, because you are.