NO CLASS   written by Donna May Breedlove, Michael Breen and Juli Handel photo illustration by Kat Wade Today there are more forms of nontraditional education available to students -- ranging from distance learning through home study or exam and cyberspace classes over the internet. But in the search for fast and easy degrees, some students can fall prey to scam schools called diploma mills. Joseph A. Joyal works as a mechanical engineer in Georgia and has a bachelor's and an master's from Columbia State University. He mailed $2,400 to the school to pay for both degrees and now he is trying to get his money back. Columbia State University, he discovered, is not the correspondence school he thought it was. "I guess it (the school) is what you'd call a degree mill," says Joyal. Columbia State University is a school with no campus, curriculum or faculty. It offers bachelor's, master's and doctorate degrees in only 27 days, through the mail, for what it calls a student's life experience. According to the school's application, students can claim college credit for such things as laying brick, pressing flowers and keeping tropical fish. Sound easy? It is. The only problem is, Columbia State University is a nonexistent school and it does not offer genuine, accredited degrees. What R. Anderson, a 47-year-old certified nursing assistant from Wisconsin, wanted to do was finish the class hours and dissertation she needed to complete the doctorate degree in psychology she started years before. She applied to Columbia State University, because it looks like a mail correspondence school. "Well, all I can say is, I already feel like an idiot," says Anderson, whose son and a friend also sent money to the school. "Now what? I have been out of academia for 20 years, so I have no idea what's available. I saw the ad, so I called the number. They sounded professional enough." The advertisements, brochure and other literature for Columbia State University promise that the school offers legal, accredited degrees. One of the reasons customers believe the school is a real institution is because of its impressive-sounding name. It also runs advertisements alongside ads for genuine, prestigious schools like Harvard and Yale in legitimate publications such as The Economist magazine. Joyal is astonished at how easily he was cheated by the school. "I had thought that because it had state in the name, it was a state school. What a fool," says Joyal. The school's catalog includes an official-looking certificate of accreditation from the American Council on Post-Secondary Accreditation. But the school's claim of accreditation is refuted by officials with the Western Association of Schools and Colleges and the American Council on Education. David Merkowitz, director of public affairs with the American Council on Education, says, "Columbia State University is without a doubt a scam. It is not an accredited school and even though it has an official-looking name, it is not affiliated with Columbia, or licensed with any state-college system." An official with the Western Association of Schools and Colleges confirms Columbia State University is not a legitimately accredited institution. Dr. John Bear, an authority on the subject of nontraditional education, and a one-time expert informant to the FBI investigating diploma mills, has written a guide called The Bears' Guide. It thoroughly looks at schools operating in the United States under the term of nontraditional post-secondary education, while showing and explaining the steps to take in discerning the difference between a legitimate and illegitimate school. "Accreditation is the only widespread system of school evaluation that we have. A school's accreditation status can be helpful to the potential student in this way: while many good schools are not accredited, it is very unlikely that any very bad or illegal school is authentically accredited," according to Bear. In the pre-Reagan era, the U.S. Department of Education had an eligibility and agency evaluation staff, which was required by law to publish a list of nationwide recognized accrediting agencies. This was the foundation on which the responsibility of recognizing and accrediting schools laid. As the U.S. Department of Education took less interest in accrediting schools, a nonprofit nationwide corporation was formed in 1975 -- The Council on Post-Secondary Accreditation -- to evaluate accrediting associations and award recognition to those found worthy. In 1992, COPA voted to disband and formed the Council of Higher Education Accreditation in 1996. And in 1992, Congress tried to remedy the situation of not having a central accrediting agency by passing the Revision of Higher Education Act, which required each state to form a state post-secondary review entity. In 1996, Congress did away with SPRE and now inconsistencies in regulations exist from state to state. Today there are six recognized accrediting associations in the United States, each in charge of accrediting schools in different regions. Along with these six there are more than 80 accrediting agencies for various professional and labor schools around the country. These six accrediting agencies are recognized by the Council on Higher Education Accreditation, the U.S. Department of Education's Division of Eligibility and Agency Evaluation, Bureau of Post-Secondary Education, and the Commission on Recognition of Post-Secondary Accreditation. What this means is confusion about who is accrediting what institutions, because so many exist. "In the U.S., accreditation is an entirely voluntary process, done by private, nongovernmental agencies. As a result of this lack of central control authority, there have evolved good accrediting agencies and bad ones, recognized ones and unrecognized ones, legitimate ones and phony ones," according to Bears' guide. Many diploma mills have taken advantage of the public's confusion by accrediting themselves through creation of a false accrediting agency. Often, someone who knows little about the accrediting agencies will see the word accredited and think of it is a genuine school, not knowing this word in itself means nothing. In other countries, such as England, schools are accredited by a government agency. In the United States it is a voluntary process. This makes choosing accredited institutions more confusing because there is not one national agency in charge of accrediting schools. To confuse things further, some legitimate schools are not accredited for various reasons and some scam schools are accredited by false agencies. There are many legitimate schools that are unaccredited do to factors like waiting for accreditation, or simply choosing not to apply for accreditation since it is a voluntary process. Despite immense skepticism from many instructors and students, online classrooms are continuing to impact the direction education is moving. Not all alternative routes to education are scams. As digital communication becomes more advanced, continuing education becomes unequivocally essential. Schools such as the University of Phoenix have been established to accommodate people already in the professional world who need to continue their education. Chris Garett, an anesthesiologist from South Lake Tahoe, decided to go back to school for his master's in business administration last year. Online schools were something that interested him because he lives two hours from any school and has a hectic schedule at the hospital. "The internet has a lot of useful information, but you have to sort through the junk as well. It's easy for people to establish themselves as so-called experts. The key is being able to tell the difference," Garett explains. Both online degrees and night classes are available at the University of Phoenix. A master's degree in business administration is offered purely online. This allows working people to take the classes on airplanes or from their hotel rooms during business trips. Garret feels strongly that learning is an experiential thing and you can't just sit in front of a screen passively. He decided against taking the University of Phoenix course because it doesn't involve any human interaction. He has been in the master's program at UCLA for the past year. "I realize from my experience in medical school how important it is to develop relationships. I have 70 people as resources at UCLA. You can't develop that kind of relationship through e-mail," he states. Only working professionals who have been in their fields for at least 10 years are eligible for the master's weekend program at UCLA. Everyone enrolled must own a laptop computer and attend class on specific weekends. During lectures, the instructor will have the class use its computers to do exercises like spreadsheets or accessing information using the internet. Although all lecture material is provided on a server, they still get books and handouts. "Not only is digital communication changing the logistics of teaching, but the content has changed as well. We would never be able to cover as much information without the computers," Chris explains. Unlike Columbia State, which claims it can legally accredit itself, the University of Phoenix is accredited by the Commission on Institutions of Higher Education of the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools, and is recognized by the United States Department of Education. The University of Phoenix is an example of a growing type of education that caters to working professionals who want to continue their education. Online degrees are one of the options the University of Phoenix offers. Cristi Martin, a registered nurse in Sacramento, is attending night classes at the university for her bachelor's in nursing. Classes are expensive at the University of Phoenix at $365 per undergraduate credit and $460 for a graduate credit. As a registered nurse, earning her degree will not give Cristi a raise at work, but she says she's doing it for the education and possible opportunities in management for the future. Many people in Cristi's classes work for companies that pay for them to go to the University of Phoenix to continue their education. The university is one of the few for-profit schools designed specifically for people already into their careers. Cristi says, "The University of Phoenix fits the needs of most working people. It's not much different from other schools I've attended." The computer age has clearly provided new methods of learning, but making sure a school is properly accredited is the key to having a positive experience. Diploma mills can be big money-making operations. One such diploma mill named La Salle University had $10 million in cash and $36.5 million in gross receipts when it was shut down by a joint Federal task force of the FBI, the IRS, and the Postal Service last year. La Salle's founder and president, Thomas Kirk, was forced to relinquish his $1.5 million estate and was sent to federal prison after he plead guilty to charges of tax fraud, wire fraud, and credit-card fraud. "Thomas Kirk was careless, and that's how he got caught," says Bear, who has been following the activities of Columbia State University for years. "The owner of Columbia State University is a lot harder to track down and is much more careful at hiding his assets than was Thomas Kirk," Bear says. The application for admission to Columbia State University sets the tuition for a bachelor's degree at $1,995; a master's at $2,495; and a doctorate. at $2,795. A combination package for all three goes for $4,295. "Diploma mills like Columbia State University are big money-making operations," says Bear. The school promises a full money-back guarantee if applicants do not receive their diplomas in 27 days, but it is unlikely that any applicant will fail to get a diploma after paying for it -- and the school does not check its applicants. In a an expos on Columbia State University aired last year by an ABC news affiliate: KGTV in San Diego, investigating reporter Marti Emerald was able to purchase a doctorate in aviation for a pet parrot for the bargain price of $3,695. They found the actual owner of Columbia State University is a man by the name of Ronald Pellar, who also goes by the alias Doctor Dante. He is a man with a colorful, if not sordid, past. Pellar was once a minor celebrity in the 1950s and is one of the former husbands of movie-siren Lana Turner. He had a career as a stage hypnotist and went to federal prison after he tried to hire an undercover cop posing as a hit man to kill a rival hypnotist. Pellar has run other correspondence schools and is currently facing a lawsuit in Central District Federal Court of Los Angeles for charges relating to a correspondence school of cosmetology. Pellar has thus far been able to evade prosecution for his involvement in Columbia State University. "The trouble with diploma mills is that they are often able to evade law enforcement agencies by setting up a mailing address in one state and advertising in another," says Merkowitz. "The law enforcement agencies for each state say that the institution falls under the jurisdiction of the other." Many government agencies are simply not aware of the activities of diploma mills. Joyal called the Louisiana State Attorney General's Office and the Better Business Bureau before he applied to Columbia State University and neither one could tell him the school was not legitimate. A diploma mill doesn't even need an office to operate. According to Merkowitz, one diploma mill ran its operation from a gas station. In the case of Columbia State University, its mailing address is in Louisiana, but its owner, Pellar, is located in Southern California. KGTV was able to trace the mailing address for Columbia State University to a post office box in a mailbox rental store in a suburb of New Orleans, Louisiana. On the federal tax exemption form for Columbia State University, Ronald Pellar, who is listed as the director for the school, has a home address listed in Huntington Beach, Calif. In the mean time, Dr. Bear is advising the public and advertisers to steer clear of Pellar and Columbia State University, and has posted a web site with his warning about the school at: http://www.degree.net/core.html. |ISSUE #1|FEATURES|A&E|INVESTIGATIVE|GREEN WATCH| |NAKED TRUTH|IN MOTION|HEALTH|LIFESTYLES|FYI|INDEX|