Have you had problems with the class approval, appeal and grievance process at TESU?

[TESUstudent]

Hello,

I intend to submit a report to Thomas Edison's Accrediting Agency due to the following grievances:

- Lack of transparency and impartiality in the appeal process 
- Dishonesty or misleading information given by academic advisors
- Courses turned down for no reason other than to force one to take courses at TESU and not elsewhere

These are serious violations to the ethical statement that TESU must agree to abide by in their accreditation process.

If you think you have experienced any of these or other violations, and if you have correspondence that can prove it, please contact me to have the evidence presented to TESU's accrediting agency. Names of students will be edited out, so there is no need to far repercussions from the University administration.

send your experiences to: shoshanafeu@gmail.com

Thomas Edison Student

[sanantone]

From my experience, their accrediting agency won't do anything. TESU does respond to BBB complaints.

[bjcheung77]

I wonder what went wrong with OP's evaluation or something. More details please on the complaint, all schools including the Big3/WGU have their "pros and cons - you know their ins/outs"...

[TESUstudent]

From my experience, their accrediting agency won't do anything. TESU does respond to BBB complaints.

If you do have experience please share it with me privately, I do believe that the accrediting agency will act if enough people lodge a formal mass complaint with each abuse cited, and I am willing to undertake this.

send to: shoshanafeu@gmail.com

[mysonx3]

May I ask what courses they turned down?

[TESUstudent]

a 400-level Biochemistry Course at the University of California San Diego Extension.

The details are not important, what is telling, I think, is the process, which was fraught with dishonesty, and I believe that I am not alone in this experience.

The accrediting agency has a list of their standards that all institutions accredited by them must adhere to here: https://www.msche.org/standards/

Under Standard II, Ethics and Integrity, it says:

"3. a grievance policy that is documented and disseminated to address complaints or grievances raised by students, faculty, or staff. The institution’s policies and procedures are fair and impartial, and assure that grievances are addressed promptly, appropriately, and equitably;"

In my case, I can demonstrate that:
- an appeal that returns for a final decision to the first office that issued a denial is not a fair appeal, it is a sham appeal. Appeals must be handled by a separate authority that reviews the first decision, not throws it back to the same person/office to decide.
- academic advisors who, when asked about an appeal process, state that decisions are final and there is no chance for appeal are dishonest
- decisions made are arbitrary and reflect more the desire to create income for TESU than serve the student's interests


I think we can collectively force the issue to be addressed.

[allvia]

I know I went through an appeal; and although I did not get the credit applied (evaluated) the way I had hoped, I can say it definitely was handed off and escalated to the proper school administrator(s) within the university.   It was for a course I had earned credit for at a B&M prior to applying to TESU; not something I took at another school as an enrolled TESU student and planned in advance (with advising) as a set transfer equivalency to fit my TESU degree program and then have it applied as something totally different.

The TESU's appeal process is clearly stated on their site, I assume you took the escalation steps outlined: https://www.tesu.edu/academics/catalog/p...guidelines

[jsd]

Thankfully the only transfer credit appeals I needed took a single email to resolve within a couple of business days.

Sorry you had trouble with them.

[Merlin]

a 400-level Biochemistry Course at the University of California San Diego Extension.

The details are not important, what is telling, I think, is the process, which was fraught with dishonesty, and I believe that I am not alone in this experience.
[...]
I think we can collectively force the issue to be addressed.

There are usually ways to remedy these kinds of situations in a way that is much more likely to gain results. There is an escalation process. If your advisor doesn't approve your request, and you have grounds for appeal, you can appeal through the evaluations team (which is where it sounds like you ended up). If that doesn't work out, you can escalate to the dean of the college within TESU that your degree applies to. If that doesn't work or you don't feel it is impartial, you can appeal from there up to TESU's president. If that doesn't work then I suspect you may be out of luck. Appealing to the accrediting board will not do anything. From there you may be better off just changing schools.

Not to mention, even if you have a legit grievance, TESU is known for being one of the most flexible institutions when it comes to accepting credits. As long as the school is RA and the course doesn't duplicate something else on your transcript, you should get credit. It may not always apply the way you think it should (i.e., it isn't guaranteed to meet a degree requirement for a specific course), but you will get credit for it.

How a transfer course is evaluated is usually dependent on a comparison of learning outcomes/syllabus of the external course vs a TESU course to determine where to slot it at TESU. If TESU doesn't offer a comparable course, it may get slotted as an X99 course.

I don't know on what basis you're making your impartiality claim, but you must also keep in mind that the advisory team's job to help you select courses within TESU, they are not well informed about transfer credits or even how that process works in many cases.

As for the dishonesty/misleading stuff. I don't believe the advisors intend to be dishonest but they are known for being wrong... a lot. I think it is generally a lack of communication within the TESU advisory organization. When the advisors don't know the answer to a question (which happens a lot with transfer credit), or don't know for sure, it often seems like they will just make an educated guess or assumption rather than running down the answer and confirming it internally. But in many cases those guesses are wrong.

So yeah, they definitely need to fix the communications problems and improve their customer service and response speeds, but those are outside the realm of the accreditation body's purview. My guess is the team is probably short-handed due to tight budgets and are putting in minimal effort to try to get as many things done as possible.

In any case, I think you should try to get the dean of your school (and/or the president of the university) on the phone first to air your issues. That is the most likely way to get a result. Trying to get them in trouble with their accreditation board is unlikely to provide the results you're looking for. Particularly given that schools aren't required to accept transfer credits at all.

[sanantone]

UC San Diego Extension is complicated because it's hard to tell which courses are worth college credit. Many of their courses are for professional development.

When I had a grievance, I couldn't get a response when I needed to escalate it. It wasn't until I went through external channels that TESU did anything. Mine involved their change in residency requirements and how they decided to move my credits after they were pre-approved. I was allowed to graduate after I complained to BBB.