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Go"Work hard and you'll do fine"
I've been attending UoP since July 2009. A little over a year later, I am halfway through my program in information systems security. I have to say right upfront that some of the complaints in the other posts are valid, although I agree with the people who say that you get back as much as you put in. My experience at the school has fortunately been overwhelmingly positive. I've had few issues with my learning teams and most of my instructors have been both knowledgeable and engaged with their students. I also managed to keep the same academic and financial advisors for at least a year (both of them were great).
As far as some of the complaints that I agree with, I think my biggest criticism of the school has to do with their recruiting/referral methods. When I first started at the school, I got flooded with calls and/or emails asking me to refer at least 3 other people to the university. Eventually, the requests for referrals died down, and now I only receive occasional emails asking for them. Other criticisms I have involve the lack of involvement on some instructors' parts (where their only role or purpose in class seems to be to post assignments and grades) as well as certain features of the OLS, which causes students to sign in and out excessively when accessing different areas of the student Web site (i.e. email, library, classroom).
Besides these few complaints, I have to say that my overall experience at UoP so far has been quite good. I'm getting A's in my courses (despite having no IT background) although it hasn't been easy. I agree with the person who posted in their review that the student experience at this school is better if you already have experience in whatever degree you're getting (especially IT). I think my own experience would be a lot more enriching had I come from an IT background, but I'm doing the best I can to gain some of that experience at this school.
The last thing I want to mention in my review is that in order to be successful here (and at any school), you need to work hard and be persistent. I think some people who posted negative comments may have underestimated the difficulty involved with doing online courses, or the inherent disadvantages that come with it (namely that you miss out on a traditional college experience). Online courses are by no means a cakewalk, but as I like to say, nothing worth earning is easy. If you're up for a challenge or want to have a unique college experience, I recommend this school.
