<p>what's your take on a degree from 'school of continuing studies/education' at top universities like harvard, columbia, and northwestern? do people, particularly those graduate from their regular programs look down upon?</p>
<p>It is what it is. High school seniors don’t realize this, but most adults fully understand that not everyone had the opp to go to college as a young adult, and these programs fill a different need for a different group of people.</p>
<p>Graduates of the “regular” programs who take the time and energy to “look down” on people who get continuing studies degrees are in serious need of a life. As long as they are being honest as to where it comes from, what’s the big deal?</p>
<p>Here’s some info. on one graduate of the Harvard Extension program. Didn’t seem to hurt his career!</p>
<p>[Harvard</a> Extension School: Press Releases](<a href=“http://dcearc.harvard.edu/extension/1999-00/press/2000032001.html]Harvard”>http://dcearc.harvard.edu/extension/1999-00/press/2000032001.html)
[35</a> Who Made a Difference: Mark Plotkin | Science & Nature | Smithsonian Magazine](<a href=“http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/plotkin.html]35”>http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/plotkin.html)</p>
<p>The problem can be in the content of these programs. It’s not that they are necessarily bad but they are usually different. In the CS area, evening programs are usually targeted towards current skills in demand whereas day programs are usually focused more on theory. That’s not always the case but if you think about it, adult learners are more interested in nearterm bang for the buck and current skills do a better job of finding you work in the near term.</p>
<p>MS in Medical Informatics - Northwestern School of Continuing Studies vs Milwaukee School of Engineering
MS in in Bioethics- Columbia School of Continuing Education vs Medical College Of Wisconsin</p>
<p>same degree programs, one offered by a school of continuing education at a top 10 university, another by a regular school at a 3rd tier university. which would you choose?</p>
<p>It depends on what I already have and what I want and who is paying.</p>
<p>The people who are deciding to go for these types of programs already have constraints on them that typical college students don’t have. They may be older, have full or part time jobs, have family commitments, etc. In cases like that, the logistics (cost, scheduling of classes, etc.) may well outweigh any “prestige” factors. </p>
<p>When I was in business school (Kellogg) and was working full-time and my employer was paying for B-school, there were plenty of young adults who were just as smart and could have gone to Kellogg, but decided to go to the DePaul or the Lake Forest MBA programs because they were already trying to balance work / family commitments and based on where they lived, it was easier for them to do so at DePaul or LF. So be it. Sometimes those other things come into play, too.</p>
<p>My S took a bunch of HES classes while in high school. I believe the profs were either the same as at the College or taught at nearby universities (one was from Tufts). I could not compare the classes to daytime-classes, though two were scheduled in such a way that both College and HES students could take them for credit.
The issue S had was not the quality of the courses but the lack of range in his particular field. Past introductory courses, there was a real dearth of courses he could take. This is not the case in every field that is taught at HES. But not every Harvard prof is willing to teach the same course in both the College and HES.
Some time ago, S was sent an email asking how HES could better address the needs of highschoolers. This was seen as a growing market. So HES seems to be catering to both adults who want very specific skills by taking courses sometimes paid by their companies or by high schoolers who have exhausted the offerings of their high school. I don’t know how well the needs of college-age students are being addressed.</p>
<p>from my understanding, master programs at school of continuing studies are professional oriented. would getting a degree from this type of school be a waste of time should i plan to pursue a phd in the field. i’m not talking about master of liberal studies programs but an actual master of science/ master of arts ones. i’m working in the public sector and interested in pursuing a phd in the field. currently looking at these following programs;</p>
<ul>
<li>northwestern’s master of arts in public policy and administration</li>
<li>columbia’s master of science in fundraising management</li>
<li>johns hopkins’ master of arts in government</li>
<li>uchicago’s master of science in threat and response management</li>
</ul>
<p>^if you really care and are excited enough by a field to be thinking about doing a Ph.D., why not just head straight for Ph.D. programs? The funding is generally better at the Ph.D. than at the M.A. level.</p>
<p>i don’t plan to take 5 years off going to school full-time. i’m hoping to get a master from a part-time program and apply to a phd where i can complete within two years. is this even possible? i know top phd programs generally limit number of transferable credits from other institutions.</p>
<p>I don’t know of any Ph.D. program, in any field, that you can complete in two years. If you are motivated and have done a lot of research pinning down a topic, you can finish in four years. Most Ph.D. programs will grant you a master’s en route.</p>
<p>i fully realized a phd cannot be completed in 2 years, that’s why i am taking graduate courses that will be transferable toward a phd. </p>
<p>my primary councern is the admission into top phd programs in public policy. would a master of arts in public policy from northwestern school of continuing studies be more preferable to the one from the school of public policy at a second tier school like rutgers?</p>
<p>Even going in with a masters degree you’re still going to be required to complete at least one year of course work, possibly more, at the PhD level before beginning your original research leading to the dissertation. I know plenty of people who entered PhD programs with a masters and the length of time required to complete the doctorate is still four years (as opposed to five without the masters).<br>
A masters degree program in public policy/administration is going to be more geared towards practitioners, the PhD is geared more towards individuals interested in research/academia. As a previous poster mentioned, a lot of PhD programs will grant you a MA/MS en route to the terminal PhD degree.
In regards to HES, Harvard points out that students in the extension school’s ALM programs have been admitted to PhD programs at every ivy league school as well as other graduate programs at Harvard (including HBS, Harvard Law, etc.). I believe a degree from HES is viewed as a legitimate degree that requires a great deal of work by most in the academic community and can lead to admission into highly selective doctoral programs (assuming you perform well) versus a perception by the general public of HES being “Harvard Lite” or “Harvard Community College” (both of these were terms used to describe HES by a close friend that attended Cornell, but I have heard similar statements from a number of people outside of academia).</p>
<p>comparing ce programs at top schools, what are some main differences in master of liberal studies type degrees and more traditional master of arts/master of science degrees?</p>
<p>^CE programs are designed for working professionals, there won’t be the cohesiveness or strong relationship building that traditional programs offer. I think that is the biggest difference.<br>
Also, for better or worse, the CE degree will probably not be regarded as highly by the general population (including employers) as a traditional masters degree.</p>
<p>I know the focus of this thread has been primarily concerned with the Graduate coursework, but I was wondering if anyone could shed light on the Undergraduate degrees offered by the Harvard Extension School. Are they viewed as “legitimate” by graduate/PhD/law/med schools, or are they viewed more as degrees for people who might not typically have attended college or who work full time and want to go back and get a degree just for the desire to learn that are not on par with a degree from a traditional 4 year university? Obviously a degree from the HES will not be viewed with the same level as a degree from Harvard College, but would it be viewed on par with an undergraduate degree from, say, a four year public university? </p>
<p>I am a student in my mid 20s who started out doing the traditional university route but left after realizing I hated my chosen major at the time and then came back after some time in the working world to community college and am now looking into transferring to complete my undergraduate education. The Extension School looks very enticing as the cost per class is lower now than my traditional in-state public university was 7 years ago, 70% or so of the classes are taught by Harvard faculty(or so the website says), and hell, its harvard. Any thoughts would be appreciated.</p>
<p>Extension Student Forum and Harvard Extended blog has a lot of info.
[Extension</a> Student - All Discussions](<a href=“http://extensionstudent.com/]Extension”>http://extensionstudent.com/)
[Harvard</a> Extended](<a href=“http://harvardextended.blogspot.com/]Harvard”>http://harvardextended.blogspot.com/)
They are real degrees.</p>
<p>Is this the program where you don’t get an undergrad Harvard B.A. degree but somehow you can get one from BU? That doesn’t make any sense but someone said that to me.</p>
<p>You get a BLA (Bachelors in Liberal Arts) as opposed to a BA, at the Harvard extension school. Just go to their site and you will see how it works. Many professors love teaching at the extension and are very enthusiastic about their non-traditional students.</p>