Look Before You Learn: Evaluating OnLine MBA Programs
Yesterday, the Wall Street Journal published a provocative article on how part-time, executive, and online MBA programs are viewed by corporate recruiters. And the results are interesting, important, and relevant, particularly if you are thinking of entering one of those kinds of programs.
Briefly, recruiters view part-time MBA programs as less effective than full-time programs (30% saw part-time programs as not very effective); executive MBA programs fared about the same. But most interesting, these recruiters were very negative about online MBA programs.
Specifically, 39% of them saw online programs as being not at all effective, 41% viewed them as not very effective, while only 10% perceived t hem as being about the same as full-time programs.
I am sometimes asked by students how companies perceive online MBA programs, so now I have at least some information for them
So, why the negative perceptions of online programs? According to the article, the main problem is that online programs lack “student interaction.” The article quotes one recruiter as saying that it is not just the content of the exchanges, but the non-verbal elements that are important. Very interesting.
The article discusses various responses from schools offering online MBAs, which I will not summarize.
As a professor who teaches online courses, I disagree about not enough student interaction. Online courses can be designed to incorporate a lot of student interaction. It is all in the design of the program.
The article goes on to discuss blended online programs, which incorporate face to face time as well, and concludes with a prediction that in 10 or so years, online programs will be much more accepted.
How big are the traditional-classroom classes? What kind of seating arrangement? What inducements to student participation? What extent of actual participation? What non-verbal elements?
As a graduate of a small liberal arts college, I’m a believer in small classroom, round table (literally) discussion classes (not just lectures), with students knowing that participation is part of their grade and perhaps sometimes being “called on” as in law school if they’re being too quiet.
If all that’s not going on (and I doubt it is at many MBA programs), this recruiter comment about nonverbal interaction is a bunch of hooey. He and the author both probably sat in the back row of big lecture halls and passively took notes much more than they participated in meaningful interaction. I could be wrong.
As someone who would not have been able to finish my (admittedly dinky little 2-year) degree without the availability of online courses, this is also quite…interesting…reading for me.
In my experience as a student who took major coursework both in the classroom and online, I can attest that the online classes (I took about five this way) were tougher than the classes in the classroom. Further, the format fostered independent and “out-of-the-box” thinking.
Which do employers value more — the ability to be creative and independent thinkers or “face time” that may or may not be quality instruction when the class gets bogged down or one student monopolizes things? This does happen even to the best of instructors.