Re: Degree Programs

["Mark A. Smith" <web25@charweb.org>]

Just to toss in my two cents worth...It is certainly nice to be able to 
attend an accredited degree program full-time, if your job permits.  
Unfortunately, one of the great shortcomings of our educational system is 
that there is little or no provision for persons who do not meet the 
traditional profile of a college student (i.e., high school to 
undergraduate to Masters' to PhD, then go out and find a job).  Older 
workers, who either did not take the opportunity to finish this process 
in their early 20s or who (like many of us that call ourselves HPs) came 
into a new field after some years in other areas, have few options.  The 
video tape program through Georgia Tech is probably the most prominent 
example of trying to cope with this situation, but there are other 
nontraditional approaches with value and merit.  Of course, there are 
also a lot of "diploma mills" out there that offer nothing more than a 
piece of paper for your money, but let's not condemn all nontraditional 
learning methods on the basis of several bad examples.

Mark Smith, CHP
(I got my MS from the Univ. of Tennessee through night school)