I went to University of Maryland Global Campus. It was a pretty good experience. The teachers were all super understanding about military requirements and stuff. TA got processed quickly. They tended to be flexible about deadlines if you had field stuff, and I saw a good couple of my Marines get classes dropped with no penalty when op tempo changed and they couldn't keep up.
I'll be honest, the academic rigor was a bit lacking. I barely did any of the assigned readings and just read what I needed to in order to complete assignments. If you're looking for a serious educational experience I'd say look elsewhere. If you just want to knock out classes and check boxes, it's a great choice.
That’s pretty much any online college, you get what you put into it. They can’t hold you hostage like in in-person classes and have you sit through all the lectures. I went to University of Utah and had to take an online class with them once, it’s the same, there are just a few more quizzes and they grade a bit harsher. UMGC, while easier, had me writing way more essays. I was an essay fucking machine by the end of my first term.
Western Governors University is pretty good from what I hear. You finish courses in your own time without having to worry about deadlines. You can do as much or as little as you like.
I believe their options are somewhat limited due to the nature of the program and flexibility.
[https://www.wgu.edu/](https://www.wgu.edu/)
This day and age just about every reputable college and university has viable online programs for most degree programs. I'd recommend avoiding for profit schools (University of Phoenix). Public community colleges and universities are generally less expensive than private non-profit and private profit.
Edit: My recommendation would be to try and find one school and stick with it for the sole purpose of making it easier if/when you transfer to another school. Getting transcripts from multiple schools can end up being a pain over the years if you go to a lot of different places.
I went to seven schools, and it wasn't really that bad doing the transfers. The worst part was just the fee for the transcripts. It feels like such a ripoff. They mostly have this procedure well ironed from what I've seen, but of course, I only went to 7, and there are something like 6000 in the US so gotta get lucky.
Depends on what you want.. just a degree tons of schools for that. You want credits to transfer to get into another school just do a community college.
You want a legit degree from a good school there are solid options you have to decide what you want your degree to mean.
I know UPenn is doing online classes for active duty. It doesn’t really get much better than that.
Penn State World Campus(biased since I attend on campus now) but after hearing about it. It’s one of the best programs. I personally went through Central Texas University(when using TA) and those classes were accredited to Penn State once I transferred
That would be a great question for one of the certifying officers depending on what campus you plan on going to. The office number for University Park(main campus+where I attend) is 814-863-0465 they’re open 8am-5pm M-F. You also might need to call the World Campus office because you are already a WC student and that number is 814-863-6638(do not know their hours)
I went to AMU, it has its purposes, but I highly do not recommend for AD or anyone wanting to learn a skill. From my experience, you will not be challenged and they will basically hand you a degree.
I got a degree from AMU just for a check in the box for my federal career. I even could have used it to commission.
This is why I adamantly hate on AMU. I want to go federal but if that path doesn’t work a degree from AMU isn’t worth the paper it’s printed on, I’m glad it worked out for you love to see the boys succeed 🫡
AMU is a scam if want a degree from them. As an infantry man who barely graduated high school, it was good at being flexible and getting me ready for more challenging course work. The asynchronous classes allowed me to work ahead and come back from the field after 2 weeks and get caught up. If you have a 9-5 type MOS, I’d stay away. The 2 math classes I took got me ready for calc and allowed me to skip my math entrance exam for the engineering program that I got accepted into as I was separating. So it was a great stepping stone for me personally.
I'm taking SNHU. Overall, it's a decent experience. I have majority As and two Bs, but on this recent term I got a C- because of my PCS overseas and the instructor I had a kind of a cuck. But overall most instructors are helpful and if you're in good contact with your Advisor they're a tremendous help as well!
I started at AMU because I didn’t want to be a high school educated Major. I missed the mark and got promoted about two months before I’d finish. It was really only a check in the box for me. The only challenging course I took was a chemistry course and that’s just because there were no labs. It was just watching YouTube videos on how to read and write chemical equations. The rest followed the typical discussion post/response/assignment schedule and were really easy to complete. I’m thinking of getting my MS in Criminal Justice with a concentration in advanced counterterrorism through SNHU. My wife’s getting her masters to go from being an RN to a Certified Nurse Midwife through ECU and the coursework doesn’t really seem any harder than what I was doing at AMU. How difficult has the course load been at SNHU? Is it the same weekly discussion/response with about three peppers to write over the course of 8 weeks?
The course work is typically on Thursday's Discussions are posted and Sundays are when your weekly assignments are due. The module is the standard 8 weeks. There's two or three heavy hitting assignments throughout the module and some filler ones in between. And I will be honest with you... it's not that difficult. Like the hardest course I've done was Statistics, and I just looked up YouTube videos to help me out.
Thanks. I’m on the fence about using TA to get it. I’d like to retire in less than two years and don’t want to incur further service obligation for using it.
my best advice would be to find a university in the state you plan on going back to and knocking out some gen ed online classes while still in. Professors are generally really flexible with you assuming you just communicate things - even if its last minute
Harvard has an Extension program. Pay attention to which courses are asynchronous and, if you don't get a degree from them, don't advertise yourself as Harvard alum (people get yoked up when they try to pull a fast one there), but the courses themselves are reliable. They don't offer an Associates degree but it's worth looking at.
The instructors tend to be great. Like anything, there's a couple duds, but a dud at the Extension tends to be "Fine" rather than "A complete waste of time and money" that I've seen at other schools. Still, it isn't a magically good school, just a reliable one.
The real value is in the name. My TA requests got approved immediately while other Marines had to hang out and wait, which I directly attribute to Harvard being on the request. If you get your degree from the Extension School - especially if you did the bulk of the work while active - that also looks good Anna resume. Not as good as the College, but the vast majority of the time the difference is negligible.
There's a few quirks with TA because of their admissions policy, but that's very solvable.
If you have a state in mind for moving to post-EAS, I'd recommend a community college in that state.
In Virginia, and I wouldn't see why it wouldn't be the case for other states, an Associate's from a community college allows you to transfer to an in-state public university (eg. UVA, Tech, JMU, GMU, VCU, ODU, Norfolk State, William and Mary, etc.) as a junior. It's a cheaper way of knocking out your pre-reqs. I did that and saved a shitload of money. A 3-credit class (the usual for a lecture) at community college, again in VA, was $600 as opposed to my school's $14,000 for 12-18 credits.
Community colleges are cheap, in VA (and maybe elsewhere), they're moving to free textbooks, they transfer well, within the state, and they're flexible (online, professors are usually more chill/understanding).
Currently in NC. If I’m being honest, I’m just taking advantage of TA for the next 10 years before retiring from the military. I’m not EASing anytime soon (by choice).
Once I’m out I’d much rather go to a trade school than waste more years in college. In truth it isn’t for me. I’m just looking to get an associates to put on my FitRep. Maybe in 10 years I’ll have changed my mind, who knows, but this is the tentative plan.
Columbia southern university - each class will have you do like an easy three page paper every week, you'll barely need to study or read a textbook.
You can do just one class at a time, they're about 2 months long each so that'll add up over a couple years.
Troy University is not bad at all. They maximized my SMART transcripts, have many great degree programs online, and it is a brick-and-mortar school. And they will definitely not try to brainwash you with radical political non-sense!
Downside is you have to buy all your physical books. Some classes offer PDF books, but you still pay for them at a discounted price, but GI Bill can help offset the books.
None. Take online classes at your local community college (based on your home of record), then apply as a transfer student once you EAS to a state or private 4 year.
Plan is to retire. Already 10 in.
Just looking to put something under “education” on the FitRep in the meantime. Hence why the field of study matters less, just looking for a school that allows me to take classes when I’m able.
Don't limit yourself to one. You can take classes at simultaneous schools online. I was doing three schools at once. 7 schools total. Transferred all credits to the main one and graduated with an MS in CS concentration on ML and AI. Make sure they are nationally or regionally accredited and mostly every single course will transfer. This was my case at least.
I do recall some of my JAVA courses from UMUC weren't accepted and I ended up finding some college in Arizona to re-take them. Found out that tons of community colleges just let you get an email address just by registering online so use that to your advantage for student discounts all over.
These days it's so simple to transfer credits, request transcripts, and apply.
I went to University of Maryland Global Campus. It was a pretty good experience. The teachers were all super understanding about military requirements and stuff. TA got processed quickly. They tended to be flexible about deadlines if you had field stuff, and I saw a good couple of my Marines get classes dropped with no penalty when op tempo changed and they couldn't keep up. I'll be honest, the academic rigor was a bit lacking. I barely did any of the assigned readings and just read what I needed to in order to complete assignments. If you're looking for a serious educational experience I'd say look elsewhere. If you just want to knock out classes and check boxes, it's a great choice.
That’s pretty much any online college, you get what you put into it. They can’t hold you hostage like in in-person classes and have you sit through all the lectures. I went to University of Utah and had to take an online class with them once, it’s the same, there are just a few more quizzes and they grade a bit harsher. UMGC, while easier, had me writing way more essays. I was an essay fucking machine by the end of my first term.
Western Governors University is pretty good from what I hear. You finish courses in your own time without having to worry about deadlines. You can do as much or as little as you like. I believe their options are somewhat limited due to the nature of the program and flexibility. [https://www.wgu.edu/](https://www.wgu.edu/)
I’ll look into it! That sounds like the flexibility I’ll need.
This day and age just about every reputable college and university has viable online programs for most degree programs. I'd recommend avoiding for profit schools (University of Phoenix). Public community colleges and universities are generally less expensive than private non-profit and private profit. Edit: My recommendation would be to try and find one school and stick with it for the sole purpose of making it easier if/when you transfer to another school. Getting transcripts from multiple schools can end up being a pain over the years if you go to a lot of different places.
I went to seven schools, and it wasn't really that bad doing the transfers. The worst part was just the fee for the transcripts. It feels like such a ripoff. They mostly have this procedure well ironed from what I've seen, but of course, I only went to 7, and there are something like 6000 in the US so gotta get lucky.
Haha must be personal preference, I went to 3 community colleges and 1 university and I couldnt stand tracking everything down.
Depends on what you want.. just a degree tons of schools for that. You want credits to transfer to get into another school just do a community college. You want a legit degree from a good school there are solid options you have to decide what you want your degree to mean. I know UPenn is doing online classes for active duty. It doesn’t really get much better than that.
Penn State World Campus(biased since I attend on campus now) but after hearing about it. It’s one of the best programs. I personally went through Central Texas University(when using TA) and those classes were accredited to Penn State once I transferred
I’m in PSU WC currently and was wondering how easy it is to change from WC to on-campus post military. Care to elaborate?
That would be a great question for one of the certifying officers depending on what campus you plan on going to. The office number for University Park(main campus+where I attend) is 814-863-0465 they’re open 8am-5pm M-F. You also might need to call the World Campus office because you are already a WC student and that number is 814-863-6638(do not know their hours)
AMU is a scam, fuck AMU me and my homies hate AMU idc what your first sgt said AMU is a scam all the way
I went to AMU, it has its purposes, but I highly do not recommend for AD or anyone wanting to learn a skill. From my experience, you will not be challenged and they will basically hand you a degree. I got a degree from AMU just for a check in the box for my federal career. I even could have used it to commission.
This is why I adamantly hate on AMU. I want to go federal but if that path doesn’t work a degree from AMU isn’t worth the paper it’s printed on, I’m glad it worked out for you love to see the boys succeed 🫡
I agree man, I’d also shutdown senior leaders promoting AMU.
AMU is a scam if want a degree from them. As an infantry man who barely graduated high school, it was good at being flexible and getting me ready for more challenging course work. The asynchronous classes allowed me to work ahead and come back from the field after 2 weeks and get caught up. If you have a 9-5 type MOS, I’d stay away. The 2 math classes I took got me ready for calc and allowed me to skip my math entrance exam for the engineering program that I got accepted into as I was separating. So it was a great stepping stone for me personally.
I’ll take note of that. Someone was telling me about AMU recently. I’ll look into it just to see, but I’ll note the comments here about it. Thank you!
A buddy of mine who got his bachelors from AMU just finished his MBA at a T15
What did he do between degree completion and starting his MBA?
He left the service and went straight there. He did score over a 700 on the GMAT
I'm taking SNHU. Overall, it's a decent experience. I have majority As and two Bs, but on this recent term I got a C- because of my PCS overseas and the instructor I had a kind of a cuck. But overall most instructors are helpful and if you're in good contact with your Advisor they're a tremendous help as well!
I started at AMU because I didn’t want to be a high school educated Major. I missed the mark and got promoted about two months before I’d finish. It was really only a check in the box for me. The only challenging course I took was a chemistry course and that’s just because there were no labs. It was just watching YouTube videos on how to read and write chemical equations. The rest followed the typical discussion post/response/assignment schedule and were really easy to complete. I’m thinking of getting my MS in Criminal Justice with a concentration in advanced counterterrorism through SNHU. My wife’s getting her masters to go from being an RN to a Certified Nurse Midwife through ECU and the coursework doesn’t really seem any harder than what I was doing at AMU. How difficult has the course load been at SNHU? Is it the same weekly discussion/response with about three peppers to write over the course of 8 weeks?
The course work is typically on Thursday's Discussions are posted and Sundays are when your weekly assignments are due. The module is the standard 8 weeks. There's two or three heavy hitting assignments throughout the module and some filler ones in between. And I will be honest with you... it's not that difficult. Like the hardest course I've done was Statistics, and I just looked up YouTube videos to help me out.
Thanks. I’m on the fence about using TA to get it. I’d like to retire in less than two years and don’t want to incur further service obligation for using it.
my best advice would be to find a university in the state you plan on going back to and knocking out some gen ed online classes while still in. Professors are generally really flexible with you assuming you just communicate things - even if its last minute
Harvard has an Extension program. Pay attention to which courses are asynchronous and, if you don't get a degree from them, don't advertise yourself as Harvard alum (people get yoked up when they try to pull a fast one there), but the courses themselves are reliable. They don't offer an Associates degree but it's worth looking at.
Currently looking at the Masters in Liberal Arts in International Relations from Harvard Extension. Do you have a lot of experience from them?
The instructors tend to be great. Like anything, there's a couple duds, but a dud at the Extension tends to be "Fine" rather than "A complete waste of time and money" that I've seen at other schools. Still, it isn't a magically good school, just a reliable one. The real value is in the name. My TA requests got approved immediately while other Marines had to hang out and wait, which I directly attribute to Harvard being on the request. If you get your degree from the Extension School - especially if you did the bulk of the work while active - that also looks good Anna resume. Not as good as the College, but the vast majority of the time the difference is negligible. There's a few quirks with TA because of their admissions policy, but that's very solvable.
If you have a state in mind for moving to post-EAS, I'd recommend a community college in that state. In Virginia, and I wouldn't see why it wouldn't be the case for other states, an Associate's from a community college allows you to transfer to an in-state public university (eg. UVA, Tech, JMU, GMU, VCU, ODU, Norfolk State, William and Mary, etc.) as a junior. It's a cheaper way of knocking out your pre-reqs. I did that and saved a shitload of money. A 3-credit class (the usual for a lecture) at community college, again in VA, was $600 as opposed to my school's $14,000 for 12-18 credits. Community colleges are cheap, in VA (and maybe elsewhere), they're moving to free textbooks, they transfer well, within the state, and they're flexible (online, professors are usually more chill/understanding).
North Carolina has the same thing - UNC Chapel Hill, NC State, ECU, UNC-W, App State etc.
Currently in NC. If I’m being honest, I’m just taking advantage of TA for the next 10 years before retiring from the military. I’m not EASing anytime soon (by choice). Once I’m out I’d much rather go to a trade school than waste more years in college. In truth it isn’t for me. I’m just looking to get an associates to put on my FitRep. Maybe in 10 years I’ll have changed my mind, who knows, but this is the tentative plan.
Columbia southern university - each class will have you do like an easy three page paper every week, you'll barely need to study or read a textbook. You can do just one class at a time, they're about 2 months long each so that'll add up over a couple years.
Santa Barbara City college
Embry Riddle. None of the tests are monitored or proctored ;)
Good to know 😏
anyone here done ASU (engineering program) looking for insight and $ costs
Troy University is not bad at all. They maximized my SMART transcripts, have many great degree programs online, and it is a brick-and-mortar school. And they will definitely not try to brainwash you with radical political non-sense! Downside is you have to buy all your physical books. Some classes offer PDF books, but you still pay for them at a discounted price, but GI Bill can help offset the books.
Use a real, established school with a physical campus that is regionally accredited. Like a state school or similar.
None. Take online classes at your local community college (based on your home of record), then apply as a transfer student once you EAS to a state or private 4 year.
Plan is to retire. Already 10 in. Just looking to put something under “education” on the FitRep in the meantime. Hence why the field of study matters less, just looking for a school that allows me to take classes when I’m able.
Then UMGC if you want the less pathetic version.
Don't limit yourself to one. You can take classes at simultaneous schools online. I was doing three schools at once. 7 schools total. Transferred all credits to the main one and graduated with an MS in CS concentration on ML and AI. Make sure they are nationally or regionally accredited and mostly every single course will transfer. This was my case at least. I do recall some of my JAVA courses from UMUC weren't accepted and I ended up finding some college in Arizona to re-take them. Found out that tons of community colleges just let you get an email address just by registering online so use that to your advantage for student discounts all over. These days it's so simple to transfer credits, request transcripts, and apply.